Once upon a time there was an old couple in a countryside small village. One end of a year, when the New Year was just around the corner, they were to prepare some osechi dishes for the coming New Year Days. But they couldn't afford any rice cake because they were too poor to keep even a piece of rice in their rice chest.

They talked each other and decided to make some straw hats to sell in a town. They worked on them for several days.
One day the old man said to his wife,
"Now, I will go to the town to sell these hats today."
"All right, but it will be heavy snow today. Please watch your steps."
Said she seeing her husband off at the door.

It was already New Year's Eve. It started to snow before long. He came as far as the edge of the town where he found 6 stone statues of Jizo standing in snow. They looked almost frozen with cold being covered with snow.
"I feel sorry for you standing in such snow."
He said himself and put a straw hat on each Jizo's head one by one. But he had only 5 hats. He didn't have enough hats for the last Jizo. So he put his ragged towel he was wearing to the last Jizo and went back home with nothing in his hands.
"Hello, I'm back." he said.
"Why did you come back without any rice cake?" she asked.
He talked his wife about Jizos and what he did for them.
"You did good for them!" she wasn't angry, but pleased with his kindness. They didn't have any food so they took only some pickles and hot water for their dinner and had gone to bed early.

The New Year had come. A big noise woke them up. Being surprised they opened the sliding door, there were a lot of rice, fish, clothes, and more. They looked at each other wondering it might be a dream. They turned their eyes up, shining there was the first sunrise of the New Year in the east. And they found 6 Jizos in the straw hats going back far beyond. The last Jizo was wearing the ragged towel he had given.

They joined their hands in prayer toward the Jizos for a long time.
　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　 The end.