room:  so he crawled stealthily along until he could reach it, and stuck it in his girdle.  Then, drawing near to Sanza, he bestrode his sleeping body, and, brandishing the sword made a thrust at his throat; but in his excitement his hand shook, so that he missed his aim, and only scratched Sanza, who, waking with a start and trying to jump up, felt himself held down by a man standing over him.  Stretching out his hands, he would have wrestled with his enemy; when Banzayemon, leaping back, kicked over the night-lamp, and throwing open the shutters, dashed into the garden.  Snatching up his sword, Sanza rushed out after him; and his wife, having lit a lantern and armed herself with a halberd,[28] went out, with her son Kosanza, who carried a drawn dirk, to help her husband.  Then Banzayemon, who was hiding in the shadow of a large pine-tree, seeing the lantern and dreading detection, seized a stone and hurled it at the light, and, chancing to strike it, put it out, and then scrambling over the fence unseen, fled into the darkness.  When Sanza had searched all over the garden in vain, he returned to his room and examined his wound, which proving very slight, he began to look about to see whether the thief had carried off anything; but when his eye fell upon the place where the Muramasa sword had lain, he saw that it was gone.  He hunted everywhere, but it was not to be found.  The precious blade with which his Prince had entrusted him had been stolen, and the blame would fall heavily upon him.  Filled with grief and shame at the loss, Sanza and his wife and child remained in great anxiety until the morning broke, when he reported the matter to one of the Prince’s councillors, and waited in seclusion until he should receive his lord’s commands.

[Footnote 28:  The halberd is the special arm of the Japanese woman of gentle blood.  That which was used by Kasa Gozen, one of the ladies of Yoshitsune, the hero of the twelfth century, is still preserved at Asakusa.  In old-fashioned families young ladies are regularly instructed in fencing with the halberds.]

It soon became known that Banzayemon, who had fled the province, was the thief; and the councillors made their report accordingly to the Prince, who, although he expressed his detestation of the mean action of Banzayemon, could not absolve Sanza from blame, in that he had not taken better precautions to insure the safety of the sword that had been committed to his trust.  It was decided, therefore, that Sanza should be dismissed from his service, and that his goods should be confiscated; with the proviso that should he be able to find Banzayemon, and recover the lost Muramasa blade, he should be restored to his former position.  Sanza, who from the first had made up his mind that his punishment would be severe, accepted the decree without a murmur; and, having committed his wife and son to the care of his relations, prepared to leave the country as a Ronin and search for Banzayemon.