Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 22, 1911.djvu/432

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Reviews.

When the bitch entered, a puppy came to meet her, and said, — "While you were away, the leopard came, but could not find us. Then she wanted to drink water, and came to the water pot where you hid us ; but we bit her hand, and she complained how bad you were for having put fishbones round the water pot." The dog mother said,—" Be quiet, you are naughty boys."

Next morning the bitch had to go to the market, and she mused as to where she could find a safe place to hide the puppies. One puppy said, — "Don't trouble. You just give me some string." The mother said, — " What good can it do?" but gave the string all the same. And the puppy put pegs in the middle of the floor, and, binding one end of the string to them, tied the other to the top of the roof. Then he took his six brothers, and put them all on the top of the roof. When they were all there, he said,— " Now, mother, you may go to the market."

Soon the leopard came, and looked for them all round the house, and the pups called down to him to look up to the roof. " How did you climb up there?" the leopard asked. The puppy replied, — " Do you see the string in the middle of the floor? We climbed up on it." So the leopard went to the string, and began climbing up, but, when it was half way, the pup bit the string, and the leopard fell down, knocked his head, and died. The puppy then came down, cut up the leopard, and put him on the fire to cook. When the mother came back from the market, the puppy said, — " Mother, I have killed the leopard." " How did you do it?" she asked. " I made him climb up the string, and then cut it. He fell, and died." The bitch was pleased, and they all ate the leopard, so that nothing was left of him.

The puppy told his mother that he wanted to see the world ; so, taking provisions for the journey, he started. When he came to Ehramosagbodo, he saw Osa, carrying some fowl in a calabash. He greeted him, — " Hail, father. Let me help you." So Osa gave him the load, and the puppy carried it behind him to the farm ; there the fowls were released. They worked together on the farm. One day he asked Osa,— " Are there any wild fowl near the place where we are working?" Osa said that there were. So the puppy proposed to make traps to catch them. He pretended to do so, but in going to the bush he took two of Osa's tame fowls and killed them. These he hid in the bush. When he came back to Osa, he said, — "There are many partridges near this farm. I have made traps to catch some." They worked the whole day, and, when evening came, the puppy said he would go and see his traps ; in the bush he took the two tame fowls he had killed, plucked all their feathers, and took them to Osa, saying that he had caught two partridges. They ate them, and when night came they went to sleep. Thus two by two he killed all of Osa's fowls. In time Osa said that he was going home, and asked the pup to bring his fowls. But the pup said, — "Where are your fowls? Have you not eaten them all, two every day?" Osa took a whip and beat the pup, which was running away. So they came to a place where palm wine was made ; there stood an empty calabash, and the puppy jumped inside. Osa asked the man who was making the palm wine to pour the wine out of the calabash, and to let him have the dregs ; this the man did, and Osa took the