Yuki-onna
by Lafcadio Hearn (Koizumi Yakumo)
from Kwaidan (1904)

In a village of Musashi Province, there lived two woodcutters: Mosaku and Minokichi. At the time of which I am speaking, Mosaku was an old man; and Minokichi, his apprentice, was a lad of eighteen years. Every day they went together to a forest situated about five miles from their village. On the way to that forest there is a wide river to cross; and there is a ferryboat. Several times a bridge was built where the ferry is; but the bridge was each time carried away by a flood. No common bridge can resist the current there when the river rises.
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  thanks to consumptive.org

I was first introduced to the wonderful Japanese stories translated by Lafcadio Hearn when I lived in Japan in the late 50s. The miracle of the web makes them available to all.

Lafcadio Hearn
[1850-1904]

"Lafcadio Hearn is almost as Japanese as haiku. Both are an art form, an institution in Japan. Haiku is indigenous to the nation; Hearn became a Japanese citizen and married a Japanese, taking the name Yakumo Koizumi. His flight from Western materialism brought him to Japan in 1890. His search for beauty and tranquility, for pleasing customs and lasting values, kept him there the rest of his life, a confirmed Japanophile. He became the great interpreter of things Japanese to the West. His keen intellect, poetic imagination and wonderful clear style permitted him to penetrate to the very essence of things Japanese."

from Tuttle's "publisher's foreword" to Hearn editions
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Lafcadio Hearn Books Online

K. Inadomi's Private Library

Kwaidan - Criterion Collection