Note: This story (usually considered as a novel, although it is, technically, a novella) was first published in March 1927 in the general-interest magazine 改造, Kaizō, "Reconstruction" or "Restructuring". The original Japanese title of this story, 河童, is transcribed as Kappa in the Revised Hepburn notation, a place-name the kanji of which appear to mean "water demon", "good swimmer".

Synopsis: A psychiatric patient has lost his way and arrives at the country of Kappa. He is treated as a special guest and talks with Kappas about many topics. Geeru, a radical capitalist, states that unemployed labourers are killed by gas and their flesh is provided for food. The patient is astonished, but Geeru argues that because the poorest women survive by prostitution, the patient's opposition is sentimental. Kappa's national characteristics are materialism and nihilistic realism. The babies of Kappa control their destiny. While in the womb, the fetus can refuse life as a Kappa and be aborted. The Maggu, a philosopher, writes aphorism, "The words of the fool", one of which says that "a fool always considers others fools". The Tokku, the sceptical poet of Kappa, has committed suicide and appears as a ghost by necromancy through the person of Madan Hobbu. Tokku is concerned about his fame after his death, although he admires the writers and philosophers who died by suicide, such as Heinrich von Kleist and Otto Weininger; he also esteems Michel de Montaigne who justified voluntary death, but dislikes Arthur Schopenhauer, a pessimist who had not committed suicide. As the patient returns to the real world, he muses that Kappa was clean and superior to human society and becomes a misanthrope [adapted from Wikipedia].