An old woman is preparing to starch her clothes when her neighbor’s pet sparrow eats the starch. In a rage, the old woman yells at the sparrow and cuts out its tongue before letting it go. The neighbor, also an old woman, hears what happened, and, deeply upset, and sets out with her husband to find where it had gone. Eventually the couple finds the sparrow’s house. (Inexplicably, the sparrow from this point forward has a human body, when before it was a regular bird). Thrilled to see her, the sparrow hosts the couple at its house and its family serves them fish and sake. The sparrow performs “the sparrow’s dance” for the couple, and they spend the day together. At the end of the day as the couple is preparing to leave, the sparrow brings them two wicker baskets, and asks whether they would take the heavy basket or the light basket. The couple chooses the light basket due to their old age. Back home, the couple opens the basket, revealing fine goods, like gold and silk. The more they take out, the more ‘treasure’ appears in the basket. Looking through the window in the illustration, the mean old woman becomes jealous and asks to know where the sparrow lives and how to get there. Making her way to the house, the sparrow asks her the same question as it asked the old couple, but, thinking that the weight would be proportional to the ‘treasure,’ the mean old woman chooses the heavy basket. The sparrows laugh at her as she leaves, struggling to carry the heavy basket. Once the woman returns home and opens the basket, a hoard of monsters (“devils”) leap out from the box and tear the woman to pieces.

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