Page:Amazonian Tortoise Myths.djvu/44

 — 36 — latter found himself fast, and in his struggle broke off his tail.

I add also the following story of a conversation between a jabutí and a tapir, which however appears condensed and incomplete.

A jabutí met a tapir in the forest, and asked him where he was going. The jabutí said:—"I am going to marry the daughter of a humming-bird." The tapir laughed, and told him that he had such short legs that he would never reach her house.

The jabutí then asked the tapir where he was going, when the latter replied that he was on his way to ask the daughter of the deer in marriage. The tortoise laughed in turn, and answered:—"Ya! You will never marry the deer's daughter." "Why not?" asked the tapir. "Because she will run away from you," replied the jabutí. "Well," said the tapir "I also can run. I break down the branches before me as I go."

Besides the jabutí stories, there are others found on the Amazonas that seem to me to be solar myths, but the limits of this article will not allow me to do much more than refer to them.

In one of these stories, the kingfisher marries the daughter of the mukúra, and with his wife goes out fishing. The uairirámba or kingfisher, shakes his maraká rattle; a big tukunaré fish comes up, and he pounces upon him, and brings him to land. The mukúra is