Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review Volumes 32 and 33.djvu/579

 Festivals of the Hill Tribes South of Assam. 269

my power, yet I cannot overcome the cloud : give it to him." But the cloud said, " Though I overcome the sun I fly before the wind : give it to him." The wind said, " Though I can drive away the cloud I cannot move the rock : give it to him." But the rock said, " Though I can withstand the wind, yet I am nothing before the bird who covers me with his droppings." So they gave it to the bird as the conqueror of all. That is why the bat has only one foot, as you may see when it hangs asleep from a branch.

Perhaps you may wonder why I have read you this not very interesting tale of the type of the Old Woman driving her Pig to Market. Taken by itself it is hardly worthy of your attention ; but it is only one version of a tale which has been recorded in four other localities. First, it was recorded by that very great man, Lt.- Colonel Lewin, in whose footsteps I was privileged to follow. He took it down about 1865 at Demagri from a Lushai.^ It was recorded for the second time by the late Mr. E. Stack of the Assam Commission some time previous to his death in 1886 from a Mikir named Sardoka. The Mikirs live on both sides of the Brahmaputra east of Tezpur, and are also found on the northern slopes of the Khasia hills, from which area this story came I cannot say.- It was next recorded by Babu Bisharup Singh in 1889 for the Linguistic Survey from an Aimol in Manipur, just south of Ukhrul whence our tale comes. ^ From the area between the Tangkhuls and the Mikirs we get from the Semas a tale which bears a strong family likeness to ours, called the

1 Lushai is classed by Sir G. Grierson in the Central Chin sub-group of the Kuki-Chin group of the Tibeto-Burman Family.

2 The Mikir language is placed by Sir G. Grierson in the Naga-Bodo sub-group of the Naga group, the Tangkhuls being in the Naga-Kuki sub-group of the same group.

3 Aimol is classed by Sir G. Grierson in the Old Kuki sub-group of the Kuki-Chin languages.