The officials were suspicious of this strange name, but since they had no way to confirm or deny it, they reluctantly paid the reward to the man.
The magistrate was furious and immediately accused the man of committing the capital offence of trying to defraud the government.
When he saw his wife, he said to her, "When our boy grows up, make sure you don't let him call squid 'surume' when it is dried."
This was a contemporary ritual to make a wish come true, in this case to save her husband from his death sentence.
Content in this edit is translated from the existing Japanese Wikipedia article at ja:てれすこ; see its history for attribution.