Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 29, 1918.djvu/220

 210 barrels in the house of their uncle. While they were cooking for the captain, the children took the corkscrew to get out the molasses. They bored a hole in the barrel, the man inside the barrel asked, "Is this the time?" The little boy said, "No, wait a while." He told his mother that somebody was inside the barrel. The mother went and bored holes in all the barrels. "Is this the time?" they asked. "Wait a while," said the woman, "Wait a while." The woman took a club, she went behind the captain sitting at table. She gave him a blow on the head, she killed him. The woman put on the fire a big pot of water. She turned up all the barrels, in each she made a big hole. She poured boiling water into the barrels, she killed all the robbers. Then she sent to summon two kinsmen. They dug a big hole in the court, they buried the bodies. The poor brother went back to the rock, he took out the rest of the money, he brought it home, he divided it with the widow. The eldest son of the woman became a doctor, the second son a governor, the youngest a priest. The girl became a schoolmistress. The four children and the widow together built a fine house in their place. The road to their house was paved with gold. When the widow died she left all her wealth to my father. My father was so mean he drank up all the money and left me none.

Between this Cape Verde Islands variant and the following variant from Northern Nigeria occurs a gap which I have no doubt will be filled in when larger collections of African tales are available.

"Dodo [a mythical monster]. The Robber, and the Magic Door.— Soon the Women met a certain Robber who said that he was going to commit a theft in Dodo's house. So they said, 'When you go, say to the door "Zirka bude" [open], and when you have stolen what you want, and have gone out again, say "Zirka Gumgum" [shut].' So he went to Dodo's house and said, 'Zirka bude,' and the door