1962 (pub): Kappa Bonesetter

        Sometime during the Genroku period of Japan [between 1688-1703], Takatori Unsho-an - a samurai and a doctor that attended the local feudal lord - and his wife - a daughter of Miyake Kakusuke, a masterless samurai of Higo, noted for both her beauty and accomplishments - had a strange visitor to their home.

        The couple lived in Hakata, in the province of Chikuzen. The whole affair started when Unsho-an's wife was out using the toilet one night, and felt someone touch her buttock. Being a samurai's daughter, she wasn't a weak woman: her first reaction was to shout "Rascal!," which sent the lurker running. By the moonlight she could only make out that it seemed to be a shaggy little man running toward the river. Nothing else happened that night; but on the next night, the stout woman was sure to bring her short sword with her! Again, she was in the toilet, and again someone touched her buttock; but this time she cut off that hand with one swipe of her sword. The same shaggy figure ran away again, but this time shrieking in pain. On the following morning, Unsho-an's wife explained this strange adventure to her husband and then showed him the hand she had acquired... it was webbed, and look like a giant snapping turtle's claw. Unsho-an had no doubt that the owner of such a claw had to be a kappa; a kappa that had a crush on his wife! She wasn't thrilled to hear this news, but was still impressed with her odd victory.

        That night, a voice was heard at the head of Unsho-an's bed: "Give me back my hand." Unsho-an's response was to take down his bow - for he was also an archer -0 and to audibly pluck the string by way of a threat. The kappa got the hint, and left. On the next night the kappa made the same request, and was also chased off. But on the third night, Unsho-an's curiosity led him to ask the kappa why he would want a limb that had been cut off days before. The kappa appeared in his doorway, bowed to the samurai, and then explained that, while a human limb cannot be detached that long, for a kappa the hand could still be made usable again. Unsho-an thought about the matter for a moment, then agreed to give the hand back if the kappa would teach him its knowledge of setting broken bones. The kappa agreed, and it demonstrated the techniques to Unsho-an by reattaching it's hand while he watched carefully. Thus Unsho-an learned the kappas' secrets of bonesetting.

        The kappa was so grateful to the couple for forgiving it that the next day the samurai and his wife found two big beautiful fish hanging on the fence of their garden, which they greatly enjoyed for dinner that night. Soon Unsho-an became famous for his bonesetting skills, and his family transmitted this secret knowledge down for generations afterwards.