West African Folktales

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The Yale University Library reserves the right to refuse to accept a copying order, if, in its judgement fulfillment of the order would involve violation of copyright law. 137 C.F.R. §201.14 2018 WEST AFRICAN FOLKTALES V AV AV AV AVA V A V AVAV A V A VAV COLLECTED AND TRANSLATED BY JACK BERR Y EDITED AND WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY RICH ARD SPEARS Northwestern University Press A Evanston, Illinois permission. He sat there on the borders hoping a kind snake would come to help him. Day and night he watched and waited, but no snake came. At last, weary and hungry, he lay down and gave himself up to sleep. As his eyes closed, he heard a small familiar voice, "Kwadwo the Hunter. Your wife Kwaso Adwa would cat Cobra's tongue. Black Cobra is coming! Black Cobra's tongue. Black Cobra is coming." He opened his eyes. Only a few yards away from him a big black cobra stood on its tail, swaying to and fro. It shot out its forked tongue and said, "They gave your wife, Kwaso Adwa, food. She wouldn't cat. Kwaso Adwa would cat black cobra's tongue. Black Cobra ce! I've come!" The snake swayed more and more and moved nearer and nearer the hunter. But the hunter stood there. He was too frightened to move. Just as the snake was about to strike, a magic arrow flew from nowhere and struck the snake in the mouth. Its tongue fell out on the rock. Its body fell to the ground. The small familiar voice said, "Take the cobra tongue to your wife. She will live and grow well when she has eaten it. But as soon as she is strong enough, take her back to her father and mother, because it is dangerous for a woman to develop strange appetites." Whom do you think the familiar small voice belonged to? The dirty- looking boy covered with yaws? But who was the dirty-looking boy covered with yaws? If it wasn't Akokoaa Kwasi Gyinamoa, then this my story which I have told you is a lie. ♦A•A•AVA•••••A•AVA•••••AVAVAVAVAV A 34 The Yam Farm and the Problem Tongue There was a certain Mister Spider who lived with his wife, Konole, in a certain town. And in the town in which they were living there was a great famine. One day Spider said he was going to look for sticks with which to weave baskets that he would go and sell. Going on and on, then, looking through the grass, he came upon a place where somebody had planted yams. It was a huge farm. So he took some trouble to find the owner. He shouted, "Mister Farmer, Hello! Hello! Hello!" Then at the third call the 56 A West African Folktales farmer replied, "What?" When the farmer appeared, he was followed by two other medium-sized young men, and they said this was their farm, and that they had planted the yams and were now looking for somebody who would help them to harvest them, and carry them away. If he would help, they would give him some. So Spider came and laid out his carrying cloth, and he helped them haul the yams away the whole day until nightfall, and then it was time to give Spider his share. Now, one of them asked him, "Call us by our names, and we will give you what we arc to give you." He didn't know the name of any one of them. So they took one puny little yam and gave it to Spider and said, "If you had known our names, we would have given you an equal share of the yams, but since you don't know our names this is your yam." When Spider returned home he went and sat down for a long time and thought about this thing. Then he called his wife, and he said, "Konole." She said, "Yes?" And he said, "By luck I have found a farm with many yams growing on it. There are three people working there, and they need some- one to help harvest the yams. I want you to go and help me." She said, "All right." And Spider told his wife, "When we get to the farm I will change myself into a very small boy, a baby, with huge testicles and all my head shaved clean, and you can lay me under the shed. Your task is to help carry the yams, and my task is to find out the names of those people." And so Konole and Spider started out and went to the farm. When they were almost there, Spider changed himself into a very little boy, a baby just about a week old, with huge testicles, and his scalp was shaved very, very clean. Konole took the baby and put him on her back, and she went forward and greeted them and said, "Hello!" And they said, "Yes," and then they came forward, all three of them. She said, "Spider says I should tell you that because of the work he did here for you, he is not feeling at all well today, so I should come and do his work today." They said, "All right! Pick up your basket and go and carry some yams." And so she took Spider off her back and spread out a cloth under the shed and laid Spider on the cloth. Spider lay there for a long time, and then he noticed that one of the three young men was coming to the kitchen under the shed to drink some water. When he reached the shed he came upon Spider lying there, and he hadn't seen this before. There was a very small baby with huge testicles and all his hair shaved very, very clean. The one who came upon this scene shouted, "Ahihi!" Then the other one said, 'What?" And he shouted again, "Ahaha!" and the other one said, West African Folktales A 57 'What?" And he said, "Come and see, come and see!" And then, of those he called, one asked him, "Asogadagrija, what do you want?" And he said, "You come." Spider kept the three names in his head. Then they came and looked at the enormous testicles for a long time and the bald head of the baby, and then they went back. The one who was to drink, drank his water and went. Then after Konolc had carried yams the whole day till night, the three farmers asked her to tell them their names, and when they asked her this question, Spider, that is Konole's baby that was lying on the cloth, sud- denly started shouting, "Ahihi, Ahaha, Asogadagrija!" in the hope that Konole might hear these names so that she might repeat them to the people. Alas! Konole didn't understand, and so when she, too, couldn't give their names, they took a puny little yam and gave it to her and said, "You see, you couldn't tell our names, but if you had found out our names we would have shared these yams with you equally." And so off Konolc went with the strange-looking baby. After they had gone a little way from the farm, behind a bush Spider jumped down from Konole's back and said, "Konolc, aren't you stupid and foolish? All that time I was crying Ahihi, Ahaha, Asogadagrija!' couldn't you hear what I was saying, shouting all those names at you? You didn't listen, and you went on like that till you had done all that work for nothing. Now, tomorrow you can't come with me." That was what he said to Konole. So they went home and slept, and the following morning Spider alone set out and went along little by little until he arrived at the farm. When he got there he greeted the farmers. When he greeted them they replied and said, "Yesterday you sent a woman here, and she said that you weren't feeling well at all." And he said, "Yes, that's true. Yesterday I didn't feel well at all, so I sent my wife on to come and do my work for me." And they said, "Ah, well, there is your basket." Spider went and picked up his basket and started carting yams, and all the time he was carrying the yams away on his head he was repeating the names over to himself silently. He kept on doing this the whole day till quitting time came in the night—the time when farmers stop work. They lined up, all three of them, and said to him, they said, "Spider, you have finished the work. Tell us our names so that we can give you your share of the yams, and then you can go." Spider said, "You, you are called Ahihi." And then the first one fell 58 ♦ West African Folktales down, yes this one whose name he called fell down and died.

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