***THE END***
GRANNY OMITSU AND ZUITON, THE RACCOON-DOG
By Tadao Morishita
Once upon a time, in the outskirts of the town of Seki, Japan were two mountains, Mt. Asakura and Mt. Kannon. Between them, ran a single mountain road along the pass. At the entrance to that pass, living alone, was an old woman called Omitsu. Everyone called her Granny Omitsu because she was so old. One night, hearing a loud noise coming from the mountain, she lit her lantern and went out to see what all the noise was about. It was a baby tanuki, or raccoon dog, with big round eyes, caught in a trap that a hunter had set. Without even thinking about it, Granny Omitsu untied the rope holding the trap and set the poor little tanuki free.
"Who would set such a dangerous thing? You look half starved!" the old lady fumed, untying the trap's cord and throwing it away so that it would never happen again. Then, she closed her back door and went to sleep.
The next morning, a group from the village came to Granny Omitsu's house. "There's a tanuki living in this pass that's up to all sorts of mischief," they said. "You know what tanuki are like. Always making trouble and destroying things. We set a trap and caught it, but someone set it free. Do you know anything about it? It=s stealing all our sweet potatoes."
The Love of a Silver Fox: Folk Tales from Seki CIty Page 19
