Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 48.djvu/109

Rh cows swallowed them up. Then they cut meat from the insides of the cows, but the cows did not die.

Next morning the king came to his cows to get meat, and the cows voided meat for the king, but this time the meat was not fresh as it always used to be, because Spider and Kwaku Tse had cut it and left it inside all night. The king said, "I wonder why the meat is not fresh as it always is?" and he sent for a medicine man to see if he could cure the cows, for he thought that they were sick. When the medicine man came, he said that the cows had eaten a bad leaf, and he poured medicine down their throats. Then the medicine purged them and they voided more meat, but it was all stinking.

When the king and the medicine man had gone away, and there was nobody left with the cows, Kwaku Tse came out and went into the cow in which was Spider, and when he came there he found that Spider had done the same as he, Kwaku Tse, had done in the other cow. He said to Spider: "I do not know why we can not make these two cows die. We have cut all the meat inside. I am going back to my cow, and after I have gone inside I will cut its belly right through with a knife." Spider answered: "No, do not do that. When thou goest in, thou must cut neither the belly nor the heart." Kwaku Tse asked, "Why not?" and Spider said, "Because if we kill the cows while we are yet inside, we shall not be able to get out again, and what shall we do then?" Kwaku Tse asked, "Why should we not be able to come out?" Then Spider said, "Is not thy mother dead?" and Kwaku Tse answered, "Yes." Spider said again, "And what caused her death?" and Kwaku Tse answered, "She died by poison." Spider said: "When she was dead, did not a medicine man come and try to make her sneeze or open her mouth, and did he not fail to do it? Thus thou must know that if the cows die while we are yet inside them, we can not get out. But we can hide ourselves, and that is what we will do. The king will rip open their bellies to discover the cause of their death, so thou must chop the meat on one side very small, so that they will think that the cows have received a blow, and have died therefrom. When the king rips open the cow thou must hide in the stomach, and if thou seest that they are about to search there, thou must run into the bowels and hide. When thou goest into thy cow now, after thou hast chopped the side as I told thee, thou must search for the heart and cut it down. When thou hast cut the heart down the cow will die, and then thou must be careful where thou hidest, so as to escape the knife with which they will open the belly. But before thou doest this, first run to the man in whose house we lodge and tell him that we are going to the water side to wash." Then Kwaku Tse went to the house-master and told him, and returned into the belly of