Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 27, 1916.djvu/165

Rh When the children heard the axe strike the tree they sang:

He could not find them, so he went home. Next day he went again to the tree. A brother of the three children saw him going and followed him. He saw him chop the tree and heard the children singing:

The man could not find the hollow. The brother came up and said, "What are you doing?" He said, "Only getting bark." The brother said, "What are the voices in the tree?" He said, "Nothing." So the brother went and brought all his brothers, a great crowd; they cut the tree and found the hollow and took the children out. But they killed Mlambe.

There was a Man and he was very powerful; no one could fight him. A Chief sent out a whole army against him; the Man armed himself with a Cow's tail which he kept in a box; he waved it when the army came and they fell dead. He sang this song:

Each time he waved the Cow's tail and said "Nawanje" ten men fell dead.

The Chief and his wise men counselled together and one said, "Tell the Mole that burrows underground to make a tunnel into the Man's house and to steal the tail." So the Mole tunnelled under the house and came up through the floor into the box in which the Cow's tail