Popular Tales from the Norse Part 69

Now, when Ananzi got into the wood he set his sacks down, and took one fish out and began to eat; then a fly came, and Ananzi said, 'I cannot eat any more, for there is some one near'; so he tied the sack up, and went on further into the mountains, where he set his sacks down, and took out two fish, which he ate; and no fly came, he said, 'There's no one near'; so he took out more fish. But when he had eaten about half-a-dozen, the Lion came up, and said:

'Well, brother Ananzi, a pretty tale you have told me.'

'Oh! brother Lion, I am so glad you have come; never mind what tale I have told you, but come and sit down--it was only my fun.'

So Lion sat down and began to eat; but before Ananzi had eaten two fish, Lion had emptied one of the sacks. Then said Ananzi to himself:

'Greedy fellow, eating up all my fish.'

'What do you say, sir?'

'I only said you do not eat half fast enough', for he was afraid the Lion would eat him up.

Then they went on eating, but Ananzi wanted to revenge himself, and he said to the Lion, 'Which of us do you think is the strongest?'

The Lion said, 'Why, I am, of course.'

Then Ananzi said, 'We will tie one another to the tree and we shall see which is the stronger.'

Now they agreed that the Lion should tie Ananzi first, and he tied him with some very fine string, and did not tie him tight. Ananzi twisted himself about two or three times, and the string broke.

Then it was Ananzi's turn to tie the Lion, and he took some very strong cord. The Lion said, 'You must not tie me tight, for I did not tie you tight.' And Ananzi said, 'Oh! no, to be sure I will not.' But he tied him as tight as ever he could, and then told him to try and get loose.

The Lion tried and tried in vain--he could not get loose. Then Ananzi thought, now is my chance; so he got a big stick and beat him, and then went away and left him, for he was afraid to loose him lest he should kill him.

Now there was a woman called Miss Nancy, who was going out one morning to get some 'callalou' (spinach) in the wood, and as she was going, she heard some one say, 'Good morning, Miss Nancy!' She could not tell who spoke to her, but she looked where the voice came from, and saw the Lion tied to the tree.

'Good morning, Mr Lion, what are you doing there?'

He said, 'It is all that fellow Ananzi who has tied me to the tree, but will you loose me?'

But she said, 'No, for I am afraid, if I do, you will kill me.' But he gave, her his word he would not; still she could not trust him; but he begged her again and again, and said:

'Well, if I do try to eat you, I hope all the trees will cry out shame upon me.'

So at last she consented; but she had no sooner loosed him, than he came up to her to eat her, for he had been so many days without food that he was quite ravenous, but the trees immediately cried out 'shame', and so he could not eat her. Then she went away as fast as she could, and the Lion found his way home.

When Lion got home he told his wife and children all that happened to him, and how Miss Nancy had saved his life, so they said they would have a great dinner, and ask Miss Nancy. Now when Ananzi heard of it, he wanted to go to the dinner, so he went to Miss Nancy, and said she must take him with her as her child, but she said 'No'. Then he said, I can turn myself into quite a little child, and then you can take me, and at last she said 'Yes'; and he told her, when she was asked what pap her baby ate, she must be sure to tell them it did not eat pap, but the same food as every one else; and so they went, and had a very good dinner, and set off home again--but somehow one of the lion's sons fancied that all was not right, and he told his father he was sure it was Ananzi, and the Lion set out after him.

Now as they were going along, before the Lion got up to them, Ananzi begged Miss Nancy to put him down, that he might run, which she did, and he got away and ran along the wood, and the Lion ran after him.

When he found the Lion was overtaking him, he turned himself into an old man with a bundle of wood on his head--and when the Lion got up to him, he said, 'Good-morning, Mr Lion', and the Lion said 'Good- morning, old gentleman.'

Then the old man said, 'What are you after now? 'and the Lion asked if he had seen Ananzi pa.s.s that way, but the old man said 'No, that fellow Ananzi is always meddling with some one; what mischief has he been up to now?'

Then the Lion told him, but the old man said it was no use to follow him any more, for he would never catch him, and so the Lion wished him good day, and turned and went home again.

ANANZI AND QUANQUA

Quanqua was a very clever fellow, and he had a large house full of all sorts of meat. But you must know he had a way of saying _Quan?

qua?_ (how? what?) when any one asked him anything and so they called him 'Quanqua'. One day when he was out, he met Atoukama, Ananzi's wife, who was going along driving an ox, but the ox would not walk, so Atoukama asked Quanqua to help her; and they got on pretty well, till they came to a river, when the ox would not cross through the water. Then Atoukama called to Quanqua to drive the ox across, but all she could get out of him was, 'QUAN? QUA? _Quan?

qua?_' At last she said, 'Oh! you stupid fellow, you're no good; stop here and mind the ox while I go and get help to drive him across.' So off she went to fetch Ananzi. As soon as Atoukama was gone away, Quanqua killed the ox, and hid it all away, where Ananzi should not see it; but first he cut off the tail, then he dug a hole near the river side and stuck the tail partly in, leaving out the tip. When he saw Ananzi coming, he caught hold of the tail, pretending to tug at it as if he were pulling the ox out of the hole.

Ananzi seeing this, ran up as fast as he could, and tugging at the tail with all his might, fell over into the river, but he still had hold of the tail, and contrived to get across the water, when he called out to Quanqua, 'You idle fellow, you couldn't take care of the ox, so you shan't have a bit of the tail', and then on he went.

When he was gone quite out of sight, Quanqua took the ox home, and made a very good dinner.

Next day he went to Ananzi's house, and said, Ananzi must give him some of the tail, for he had got plenty of yams, but he had no meat.

Then they agreed to cook their pot together. Quanqua was to put in white yams, and Ananzi the tail, and red yams. When they came to put the yams in, Quanqua put in a great many white yams, but Ananzi only put in one little red cush-cush yam. Quanqua asked him if that little yam would be enough, he said, 'Oh! plenty', for I don't eat much.

When the pot boiled, they uncovered it, and sat down to eat their shares, but they couldn't find any white yams at all; the little red one had turned them all red. So Ananzi claimed them all, and Quanqua was glad to take what Ananzi would give him.

Now, when they had done eating, they said they would try which could bear heat best, so they heated two irons, and Ananzi was to try first on Quanqua, but he made so many attempts, that the iron got cold before he got near him; then it was Quanqua's turn, and he pulled the iron out of the fire, and poked it right down Ananzi's throat.

THE EAR OF CORN AND THE TWELVE MEN

[This tale is imperfect at the beginning.]

Ananzi said to the King, that if he would give him an ear of corn, he would bring him twelve strong men. The King gave him the ear of corn, and he went away. At last he got to a house, where he asked for a night's lodging which was given him; the next morning he got up very early, and threw the ear of corn out of the door to the fowls, and went back to bed. When he got up in the morning, he looked for his ear of corn, and could not find it anywhere, so he told them he was sure the fowls had eaten it, and he would not be satisfied unless they gave him the best c.o.c.k they had. So they were obliged to give him the c.o.c.k, and he went away with it, all day, until night, when he came to another house, and asked again for a night's lodging, which he got; but when they wanted to put the c.o.c.k into the fowl-house, he said no, the c.o.c.k must sleep in the pen with the sheep, so they put the c.o.c.k with the sheep. At midnight he got up, killed the c.o.c.k, threw it back into the pen, and went back to bed. Next morning when it was time for him to go away, his c.o.c.k was dead, and he would not take anything for it but one of the best sheep, so they gave it to him, and he went off with it all that day, until night-fall, when he got to a village, where he again asked for a night's lodging, which was given to him, and when they wanted to put his sheep with the other sheep, he said, no, the sheep must sleep with the cattle; so they put the sheep with the cattle. In the middle of the night he got up and killed the sheep, and went back to bed. Next morning he went for his sheep, which was dead, so he told them they must give him the best heifer for his sheep, and if they would not do so, he would go back and tell the King, who would come and make war on them.

So to get rid of him, they were glad to give him the heifer, and let him go; and away he went, and walked nearly all day with the heifer.

Towards evening he met a funeral, and asked whose it was? one of the men said, it was his sister, so he asked the men if they would let him have her; they said no, but after a while, he begged so hard, saying he would give them the heifer, that they consented, and he took the dead body and walked away, carrying it until it was dark, when he came to a large town, where he went to a house and begged hard for a night's lodging for himself and his sister, who was so tired he was obliged to carry her, and they would be thankful if they would let them rest there that night. So they let them in, and he asked them to let them sit in the dark, as his sister could not bear the light. So they took them into a room, and left them in the dark; and when they were alone, he seated himself on a bench near the table, and put his sister close by his side, with his arm round her to keep her up. Presently they brought them in some supper; one plate he set before his sister, and put her hand in it, and the other plate for himself, but he ate out of both plates. When it was time to go to bed, he asked if they would allow his sister to sleep in a room where there were twelve strong men sleeping, for she had fits, and if she had one in the night, they would be able to hold her, and would not disturb the rest of the house. So they agreed to this, and he carried her in his arms, because, he said she was so tired, she was asleep, and laid her in a bed; he charged the men not to disturb her, and went himself to sleep in the next room. In the middle of the night he heard the men calling out, for they smelt a horrid smell, and tried to wake the woman-first one man gave her a blow, and then another, until all the men had struck her, but Ananzi took no notice of the noise. In the morning when he went in for his sister and found her dead, he declared they had killed her, and that he must have the twelve men; to this the townsmen said no, not supposing that all the men had killed her, but the men confessed that they had each given her a blow-so he would not be satisfied with less than the twelve, and he carried them off to the King, and delivered them up.

THE KING AND THE ANT'S TREE

There was a King who had a very beautiful daughter, and he said, whoever would cut down an Ant's tree, which he had in his kingdom, without brus.h.i.+ng off the ants, should marry his daughter. Now a great many came and tried, but no one could do it, for the ants fell out upon them and stung them, and they were forced to brush them off.

There was always someone watching to see if they brushed the ants off.

Then Ananzi went, and the King's son was set to watch him. When they showed him the tree, he said, 'Why, that's nothing, I know I can do that.' So they gave him the axe, and he began to hew, but each blow he gave the tree, he shook himself and brushed himself, saying all the while, 'Did you see me do that? I suppose you think I'm brus.h.i.+ng myself, but I am not.' And so he went, on until he had cut down the tree. But the boy thought he was only pretending to brush himself all the time, and the King was obliged to give him his daughter.

THE LITTLE CHILD AND THE PUMPKIN TREE

There was once a poor widow who had six children. One day when she was going out to look for something to eat, for she was very poor, she met an old man sitting by the river side. He said to her 'Good morning.'

And she answered, 'Good morning, father.'

He said to her, 'Will you wash my head?'

She said she would, so she washed it, and when she was going away, he gave her a 'stampee'[A small coin], and told her to go a certain distance, and she would see a large tree full of pumpkins; she was then to dig a hole at the root of the tree and bury the money, and when she had done so, she was to call for as many pumpkins as she liked, and she should have them.

So the woman went, and did as she was told, and she called for six pumpkins, one for each child, and six came down, and she carried them home; and now they always had pumpkins enough to eat, for whenever they wanted any, the woman had only to go to the tree and call, and they had as many as they liked. One morning when she got up, she found a little baby before the door, so she took it up and carried it in, and took care of it. Every day she went out, but in the morning she boiled enough pumpkins to serve the children all day. One day when she came back she found the food was all gone, so she scolded her children, and beat them for eating it all up. They told her they had not taken any--that it was the baby--but she would not believe them, and said, 'How could a little baby get up and help itself'; but the children still persisted it was the baby. So one day when she was going out, she put some pumpkin in a calabash, and set a trap over it. When she was gone the baby got up as usual to eat the food, and got its head fastened in the trap, so that it could not get out, and began knocking its head about and crying out, 'Oh! do loose me, for that woman will kill me when she comes back.' When the woman came in, she found the baby fastened in the trap, so she beat it well, and turned it out of doors, and begged her children's pardon for having wronged them.