African American Folktales

by Roger Abrahams

  I killed ten thousand Lions yesterday,

  Lions yesterday, Lions yesterday.

  I killed ten thousand Lions yesterday,

  What do you think about ten today?

  Buh Lion said, “Buh Nansi, I’m so angry with my children, I’m going to have to send my wife to see about them, because they must be playing some kind of game or going a different way than they are supposed to. She should know where they are.” Buh Nansi said, “Well yes, I understand, Buh Lion.” Lion told his wife, “Go and find those children and flog them for me, and tell them to make haste home. Make haste to come back, you hear?”

  His wife set out. He said, “Buh Nansi, I don’t feel good about all this. Let me tell my wife once more.” Buh Nansi said, “All right.” “Oh, wife,” Lion said, calling her. “Wait there for me.” When he caught up with her, he said, “When you go, don’t any of you come back.”

  He went back, and Buh Nansi was still playing the fiddle and singing and dancing:

  I killed ten thousand Lions yesterday,

  Lions yesterday, Lions yesterday.

  I killed ten thousand Lions yesterday,

  What do you think about ten today?

  He played on and on. Finally, Lion decided that he was going himself. He said, “Buh Nansi, this is just taking too much time. I have to go and see where my wife and those children are, you hear? You wait here and I’ll come right back.” Lion lit out, never to come back. He had to leave the house and give it to Buh Nansi because of that song.

  So Lion always has to live in the bush, while Buh Nansi lives in the house.

  —Tobago

  18

  TESTING THE GOOD LORD

  One day Brer Lizard and Deacon Frog were trying to get through a crack in a split-rail fence. Now, in those days, Brer Lizard sat up straight like Deacon Frog does today. Old Deacon Frog said: “I’ll get through this crack here if the Good Lord spares me.” He tried it and, bye and bye, he squeezed through just fine. Brer Lizard was more uppity. He said, “I’ll get through this crack here whether the Lord spares me or not.” He tried it, but, kerflip, down came a log and smashed him flat.

  That’s why the lizard is flat today and crawls in the dust on his belly, while the frog sits straight and hops around.

  —Mississippi

  19

  MR. POSSUM LOVES PEACE

  One night, Brer Possum called by for Brer Coon, according to a previous arrangement. After gobbling up a dish of fried greens and smoking a cigar, they rambled forth to see how things were getting along. Brer Coon was one of these natural pacers, and he raced along like a pony. Brer Possum, he went in a hand-gallop; and they could cover a heap of ground, man. Brer Possum, he got his belly full of persimmons, and Brer Coon, he scooped up a good many frogs and tadpoles along the way. They ambled along just as sociable as a basket of kittens until, bye and bye, they heard Mr. Dog talking to himself way off in the woods.

  “Supposing he runs up on us, Brer Possum. What are you going to do?” asked Brer Coon. Brer Possum sort of laughed around the corners of his mouth. “Oh, if he comes, Brer Coon, I’m going to stand by you,” said Brer Possum. “What are you going to do?” “Who, me?” asked Brer Coon. “If he ran up to me, I’d give him one big scratch!”

  Mr. Dog, he came, and he came a-zooming. He didn’t wait to say “Howdy” either. He just sailed into the two of them. The very first pass he made, Brer Possum put on a grin from ear to ear, and keeled over like he was dead. Then Mr. Dog, he sailed into Brer Coon, and right there is where he really found himself in trouble because Brer Coon was cut out for that kind of business and he fairly wiped up the face of the earth with him. You better believe that when Mr. Dog got a chance to make himself scarce, he took it—at least what there was left of him. He went yelping through the woods like he was shot out of a musket. And Brer Coon, he sort of put his clothes back into shape and dusted himself off. Brer Possum, he still lay there like he was dead, until finally he raised himself up carefully, and when he found the coast was clear, he scrambled up and scampered off like something was after him.

  Next time Brer Possum met Brer Coon, Brer Coon refused to respond to his greeting and this made Brer Possum feel bad as they used to make so many excursions together. “What makes you hold your head so high, Brer Coon?” asked Brer Possum. “I’m not running around with cowards these days,” said Brer Coon. Then Brer Possum got pretty mad. “Who’s a coward?” he asked. “You are,” said Brer Coon, “that’s who. I’m not associating with anyone who lies down on the ground and plays dead when there’s a fight going on,” he said.

  Then Brer Possum grinned and laughed fit to kill himself. “Lord, Brer Coon, you don’t expect that I did that because I was afraid, do you?” he said. “Why I wasn’t any more afraid than you are this minute. What was there to be scared about? I knew you’d fool Mr. Dog if I didn’t, and just lay there watching you shake him up, waiting to get in the fight when the right time came,” he said.

  Brer Coon turned up his nose. “That’s a likely tale,” he said, “when Mr. Dog didn’t even touch you and you keeled right over and lay there as still as a board.” “That’s just what I was going to tell you about,” said Brer Possum. “I wasn’t any more scared than you are right now, and I was fixing to give Mr. Dog a sample of my teeth in his neck, but I’m the most ticklish fool that you ever laid eyes on, and no sooner did Mr. Dog put his nose down along my ribs than I got laughing, and I laughed until I lost the use of my limbs, and it’s a mercy unto Mr. Dog, because a little more and I’d eat him,” he said. “I don’t mind fighting, Brer Coon, any more than you do, but I just can’t stand tickling. Get me in a fight where there isn’t any tickling allowed and I’m your man,” he said.

  And down to this day, Brer Possum’s bound to surrender when you touch him in the short ribs, and he’ll laugh if he knows he’s going to be smashed for it.

  —Georgia

  20

  GET BACK, GET BACK

  God did not make folks all at once but sort of in his spare time. One day, for instance, he had a little time on his hands, so he got some clay, seasoned it the way he liked it, then he put it aside and went on to doing something more important. Another day, he had some spare moments, so he rolled the clay all out, and cut out the human shapes, and stood them all up against his long gold fence to dry while he did some important creating. The human shapes all got dry, and when he found time, he blew the breath of life into them. After that, from time to time, he would call everybody he had made back up to him and he would give them new-made spare parts. For instance, one day he called everybody and gave out feet and eyes. Another time, he gave out toenails that Old Maker figured they could use. So then, one day he said, “Tomorrow morning, at seven o’clock sharp, I’m going to give out different colors. Everybody be there on time. I’ve got a lot of creating to do tomorrow, and I want to give out colors and get the whole thing over with. So everybody has to come round the throne at seven o’clock tomorrow morning!”

  So next morning, at seven o’clock, God was sitting on his throne with his big crown on his head and seven suns circling around it. Great multitudes was standing around the throne waiting to get their color. God sat up there and looked east, and he looked west, and he looked north, and he looked south toward Australia. So he looked over to his left and moved his hands over a crowd and said, “You’ll all be yellow people!” They all bowed low and said, “Thank you, God,” and they went on off. He looked at another crowd, moved his hands over them, and said, “You’re red folks!” They made their manners and said,“ Thank you, Old Maker,” and they went on off. He looked toward the center and moved his hand over another crowd and said, “You’re white folks!” They bowed low and said, “Much obliged, Jesus,” and they went on off.

  Then God looked way over to the right and said, “Look here, Gabriel, I miss a lot of multitudes from around the throne this morning.” Gabriel looked too, and said, “Yes, sir, there’s a lot missing.” So God sat there an hour and a
half and waited. Then he called the angel again and said, “Look here, Gabriel, I’m sick and tired of this waiting. I have too much creating to do this morning. You go find them folks and tell them they better hurry on up here if they expect to get any color. If they fool with me, I won’t give out any more.”

  So Gabriel ran on off and started hunting around. After a long while, he found the missing multitudes lying around on the grass by the Sea of Life, fast asleep. So Gabriel woke them up and told them, “You better get up from there and come on up to the throne and get your color. Old Maker is getting mighty worn out from waiting. If you fool with him, he won’t give out any more color.”

  Soon the multitudes heard that, they all jumped up and went running toward the throne, hollering, “Give us our color! We want our color! We got just as much right to color as anybody else.” So when the first ones got to the throne, they tried to stop and be polite. But the ones coming on behind got to pushing and shoving so, till the first ones were thrown against the throne so hard that the throne was careening all over to one side. So God said, “Here! Here! Get back! Get back!” But they were keeping up such a racket that they misunderstood him, and thought he said, “Get black,” and that’s been their color ever since.

  —Florida

  21

  NO JUSTICE ON EARTH

  Well, the Devil was talking with someone, complaining that no matter how much he might try to do good that he would never get a good name for his deeds. There just wasn’t any justice on this earth. When the other person said he didn’t know whether that was really so, the Devil said, “All right, I’ll show you what I mean.”

  So the Devil went to God and asked him if he would be so good as to put out a big stone in the path, so that he could put out a bag of money on it. God put out the stone and the Devil set the money on it. And along came someone walking down the path without looking where he was going, and he stumbled on the rock. “What the Devil,” he said, “I stubbed my toe on this stone.” Then someone else came along and he saw the money. He grabbed hold of the bag and looking upward, he said, “Praise God; I say to you many thanks for sending this money my way!”

  Then the Devil said to the man, “You see what I mean. Didn’t I tell you there is no justice on earth?”

  —Surinam

  INTRODUCTION

  One of the storytellers’ favorite ways to get the action going is to have a character stir things up by bringing news to the neighborhood and thus piquing the interest of other characters, sometimes making one of them angry. The collision of interests or wills then ignites the rest of the plot. The first story in this section, “Meeting the King of the World,” is one of the many Afro-American tales about how problems first came to beset humans.

  The consequences of the coming of trouble are compounded because some people get full of themselves and feel the need to challenge everyone around with regard to their successs and their importance. Thus, in both “Mr. Bamancoo Gets Dropped” and “Tiger Becomes a Riding Horse,” boasting turns into a competition between two old friends about who is going to have the most girl friends, the objective being not only to be the most successful in courtship but also to embarrass and even kill off rival males.

  We can naturally expect the trickster to put his nose into such situations, and included in this section are a number of stories, such as “Making the Stone Smoke,” in which Trickster comes from outside the community, competes with all the most powerful “insiders” for the hand of the king’s beautiful daughter, and manages not only to boast effectively but to pull off a trick that makes good on his boast.

  In some of the stories included in this section, a small animal manages to become involved in, and control, the behavior of seemingly more powerful creatures by acting as an intermediary and provoking fights, as in “The Signifying Monkey” and “The Tug-of-War between Elephant and Whale.” The desire to assert masculine power animates most of these stories, usually to the detriment of those who choose to carry out a project in a boastful manner. Indeed, two basic strategies of male attempts at dominance are confronted in most of these tales: operating by brute strength and using one’s wits. For the most part, neither approach produces winners; we might even say that these are parables of how to be a vigorous loser.

  One rendering of this pattern has a smaller animal, usually a trickster type, figure out a way of pitting the larger animals against each other, to hilarious results. In some cases, such as “The Tug-of-War between Elephant and Whale,” we can laugh along with Rabbit at how these big guys can be manipulated. But in “The Signifying Monkey” we are amused not only by the details of the fight between Lion and Elephant but also by the antics of Monkey, who is caught at his nonsensical game.

  This last story is given in toast form—that is, in rhyme. This story, which is told widely in the United States, has been collected in a number of Afro-American communities and has been a part of several phonograph recordings of folktales.

  In other stories in this section, the confrontation is brought about by a father who pits his children against each other to see which one loves him better—the King Lear story in a very different setting! In “The Singing Bones” and “Making the Stone Smoke,” both the father and his contest are regarded as foolish by the audience; in other tales, more serious issues regarding the rituals of death arise. The arranged contest between children is, of course, an elaboration of the conflict between parents and children, especially fathers and sons. This theme will emerge in a number of other sections in an even more basic fashion, in stories in which the king attempts to have all his male rivals killed, including his sons (as in “The Old Bull and the Young One”). This display of masculine insecurity usually emerges in comic form, however, even when the comedy leads (as it does) to acts of mayhem and death. Indeed, the reader may be struck by the emphasis on death that pervades these amusements; the subject becomes a little more understandable when we recall that most of these tales are often told at wakes.

  22

  MEETING THE KING OF THE WORLD

  Oh, this was way before your time. I don’t remember just when myself, but the old folks told me about it.

  John was riding along one day, with his long legs thrown around his horse, when the grizzly bear came running out in the middle of the road and hollered: “Hold on a minute! They tell me that you are going around telling everybody that you are the King of the World.”

  John stopped his horse and said, “Whoa! Yeah, I’m King of the World, don’t you believe it?” “No, you aren’t King of anything. Not until you whip me. Get down here and fight it out with me.”

  John hit the ground and then the fight started. First, John grabbed a rough-dried brick and started to rub the fat off of the bear’s head. The bear just fumbled around until he got a good hold on John’s middle, then he began to squeeze and squeeze. John knew he couldn’t stand that much longer. He’d be just one more man whose breath had given out. So he reached into his pocket and got out his razor and slipped it between the bear’s ribs. The bear turned him loose, keeled over, and just lay there in the bushes. He had enough of that fight. John got back on his horse and rode off.

  The lion smelled the bear’s blood and came running to the grizzly and started to lap up his blood. Now the bear was really scared that the lion was going to eat him while he was lying there all cut up and bleeding nearly to death. So he hollered and said, “Please don’t touch me, Brer Lion. I have met the King of the World, and he cut me all up.”

  Now that really got the lion’s bristles all up. “Don’t you just lay down there and tell me that you met the King of the World if you’re not talking about me! I’ll tear you to pieces!” “Oh, don’t touch me, Brer Lion! Please let me alone so I can get well.” “Well, don’t you call anybody else King of the World, then!”

  “Well, Brer Lion, you just sit behind these bushes and see what is coming by here before long.”

  Lion squatted down by the bear and waited. The first person he saw going up
the road was an old man. Lion jumped up and asked Bear, “Is that him?”

  Bear said, “No, that’s Uncle Yistiddy, he’s used-to-be!”

  After a while a little boy passed down the road. The lion saw him and jumped up again. “Is that him? he asked the bear. Bear told him, “No, that’s little tomorrow, he’s going-to-be. You just stay quiet, and I’ll let you know when he gets here.”

  Sure enough, after a while John came down the road on his horse. But now he had his gun with him. He wasn’t taking any more chances. The lion jumped up again and asked, “Is that him?”

  Bear said, “Yes, that’s him! That’s the King of the World.”

  Lion reared up and cracked his tail backward and forward like a bull-whip. He boasted, “You wait till I get through with him and you won’t be calling him King anymore!”

  He jumped out into the middle of the road right in front of John’s horse and laid his ears back. His tail was cracking like torpedoes. “Stop!” Lion hollered at John. “They tell me you call yourself King of the World!”

  John looked him dead in his eye and told him, “Yeah, I’m King. If you don’t like it, you don’t have to take it from me.”

  Lion and John stared at one another for a minute or two and then the lion sprung on John. Well, you never saw such fighting and wrestling since beginning, when the morning stars sung together in the celestial choir. Lion clawed and bit John, and John bit him right back.