The cock replied, "I know very well that I can get the better of the hare. Now I am going off to see him, and you will all hear the news of what has passed between the hare and me very soon."
So the cock set forth and went to see the hare.
The hare asked him, "How is it that you have never before walked out to our house here? To-day is the first time that I have seen you, oh cock."
The cock answered, "Your words are true. I have never yet walked as far as your house. To-day I have come to ask your friendship, for I have no friend. That is why I want your friendship. We will get on very well together, and now I am going to return home. I will prepare food for you, and to-morrow you must come and see me and we will have a talk."
The hare replied, "It is well. To-morrow, if Allah pleases, I will come to your house."
The cock then returned home and told his wives, "To-morrow my friend the hare is coming, so get food ready for him. When the hare comes I will sit in the courtyard and hide my head under my wing. Serve up food to the hare, and when he asks, 'Where is my friend the cock?' show him his friend and say, 'There is his body lying in the courtyard, but he has sent his head away to have audience of the Sultan, and to speak his cases for him.' Tell the hare like that."
AFRICAN BLACK-BACKED JACKALS
So next day, when the hare came and asked for his friend the cock, the cock's wives took him, and showed him the cock where he was lying with his head under his wing, and they told him, as they had been taught, that his head had gone away to speak his cases for him before the Sultan. Then they took him on to the verandah and bade him sit down and await his friend and eat the food that was ready for him.
That hare was very astonished, and said to himself, "My friend the cock must indeed be strong if he can send his head by itself all the way to the Sultan's, to speak his cases alone without a body."