How It Is That Men Have Stories

Mouse used to go everywhere.  Rich or poor, no house was safe from mouse.  She would watch and look with her eyes, seeing everything that was hidden, even in the most secure treasure chambers.

In the old times long ago, she wove a story child of everything she saw, and to each of her story children she gave a cloak - one white, one red, one blue, and one black.  The stories lived in the house and served her, and she treated them as her own children.

Now, as it so happened, a sheep and leopard lived in a village, and the two of them bore children.  Sheep had a daughter and Leopard had a son.  There was a famine in the land, and Leopard went to Sheep and said, "The only way for us to survive is to kill our children and eat them."  Sheep thought to herself, "If I do not agree, she will kill my child anyway," so she answered, "Good."

But Sheep did a deceitful thing and hid her child, took everything she owned, sold it for dried meat, cooked the meat, and brought it before Leopard.  Both of them ate together, and Leopard killed her own child and ate that also.

A year passed, and Sheep and Leopard both became pregnant again.  The people of the village were hungry, and Leopard once more told Sheep, "Let us kill our children and eat them."  Sheep agreed, but, like last time, she hid her child safely away, bought some dried meat, cooked it, and set it before Leopard.

Many years later, Leopard came to Sheep and said, "Come.  Let us feast."

Sheep saw a table prepared with a great feast - greater than she had ever imagined.  Beside the food were three spoons.  Sheep asked Leoaprd, "Why are there three spoons, when there are only two of us?"

Leopard laughed and opened the door to her home.  "Come, daughter, and let us eat together."  Her daughter came out, and the three of them ate supper.  The Leopard explained, "Because I was hungry, I killed my first child and ate him.  Then I learned how you had saved your first child, and I thought, 'I, too, will play this trick on Sheep.'  So I kept my daughter alive."

Sheep went home and took care of her two children.  Over time, her daughters grew, and so did Leopard's daughter.  Leopard put her child into the fatting house, and she went to Sheep and said, "Please, give me one of your daughters so that our children may be in the fatting house together."

Now, as it was, Sheep and her daughters were both black, but they had servant Goats who were white.  So Sheep took one of the goats and dyed its wool black.  She covered her own daughter with white chalk, and sent them to the fatting house together.  When they arrived, Leopard thought that the goat was Sheep's daughter, and during the night she entered the room, took the Goat, and killed it. 

The next day, Leopard went to Sheep and said, "Please give me your other daughter, that the three of them may be friends in the fatting house together."

Sheep agreed, but she told her daughter to play a trick.  When the second sheep reached the fatting house, she took a bottle of rum and gave it to Leopard's daughter, who drank it and fell asleep.  When she was asleep, the two sheep took Leopard's daughter and put her in in one of their own beds.  At night, when it was very dark, Leopard came in and took her own daughter and ate it, thinking it was one of Sheep's daughters.  The next morning, Leopard went out very early to get palm wine.

The two sheep left the house after her.  One of them went home, but the other followed Leopard.  When Leopard was in the palm tree, the sheep shouted, "You tried to kill me, but you killed your daughter instead!"  Leopard jumped from the tree and chased after the sheep, but she got away.

As she ran, the sheep came across an old woman with a Juju tied around her waist.  The woman was tired, and Sheep offered to carry her Juju.    When they arrived at the woman's house, the woman was tired and her head hurt.  Sheep said, "Let me get you some water."

The woman was thankful.  When the young sheep had done as she promised, she went into another part of the house.  There she saw the woman's medicine, which she rubbed over her wool.  The next morning, the woman asked Sheep for the medicine.  Sheep answered, "Last night, I used that medicine!" 

The old woman sprang up and chased after the sheep.  In her hurry, the Sheep ran into the door of Mouse's house, which broke.  All of Mouse's stories ran out, and Mouse could not get them to come home.  Now, all of the stories of earth roam up and down the land and all over.

-From the Ekoi people of Africa

The most interesting part of this story is the belief that all men, all cultures, share a common source for their primal stories.  What I think is also interesting is the fact that the overall story makes no sense.  The bit with Leopard and Sheep really play very little part in the bit with the Sheep and the Old Woman with the Juju.  It's almost as if the belief in a common origin for stories (a pre-Tower of Babel world, perhaps?) remained, but the means of dispersion for them was lost to this culture.  So, somewhere along the way, they made up an entirely different story.  I can't prove this, of course, but it's just an observation.