Jailer Wu 吳押獄

In Chapter 78 of the Romance, Cao Cao saw the god of the pear tree, a man in black with unbound hair and a sword in hand, strike at him; he woke with a start and was afflicted with an unbearable headache, and when Hua Xin recommended the divine physician Hua Tuo, Cao Cao had him summoned through the night. When Hua Tuo said that the root of the illness could be removed only if, after drinking mafeitang, Cao Cao had his head split open with a sharp axe to take out the wind-phlegm, Cao Cao declared that Hua Tuo, being on close terms with Guan Yu, meant to take revenge, and had him thrown into prison and interrogated under torture. Jia Xu remonstrated that such a physician had few equals in the world, but Cao Cao said he was no different from Ji Ping and had the torture carried through to the end. Romance, Ch. 78 §9–10 · 13–16

While Hua Tuo was in prison, there was a jailer surnamed Wu whom everyone called 'Jailer Wu.' Every day he brought wine and food to serve Hua Tuo. Moved by his kindness, Hua Tuo said that he would soon die and regretted that his Qingnang Book had not been handed down to the world; he would write a letter, and if Jailer Wu sent someone with it to his home to fetch the book, he would give it to him, and he asked him to carry on his medical art. Romance, Ch. 78 §16

Jailer Wu, overjoyed, answered that if he obtained the book he would give up this post, cure the sick of the whole realm and so pass on the master's virtue. Taking the letter Hua Tuo wrote for him, he went straight to Jincheng, got the Qingnang Book from Hua Tuo's wife and brought it back; after Hua Tuo had looked it over in prison and handed it to him, he took the book home and hid it away. Romance, Ch. 78 §17

Ten days later Hua Tuo died in prison after all, and Jailer Wu bought a coffin, saw to the laying-out and burial, gave up his post and went home. When he went to take out the Qingnang Book to study it, he saw his wife burning it and hurriedly snatched it away, but it had already burned up, with only one or two leaves left. When he angrily rebuked her, his wife said that even if he learned to be as marvelously skilled as Hua Tuo, he would only end up dying in prison, so what use was it; and Jailer Wu could do nothing but sigh. Romance, Ch. 78 §18–19

The Romance records that for this reason the Qingnang Book was never handed down to the world, and that all that was passed on were minor methods such as gelding chickens and pigs, contained in the one or two leaves that survived the fire. It then cites a poem by a later writer lamenting that with the man dead the book too was lost, and that later generations would never again see the Qingnang. Jailer Wu's name appears in the Romance only in four passages of this chapter. Romance, Ch. 78 §16–20