XXII. The Affair of the Hippopotamus and of the Tortoise.—A very curious variant of the Whuppitie Stoorie, or Tom-Tit-Tot story, depending on the power conferred by learning the secret name of an opponent. These secret names are conferred at Australian ceremonies. Any amount of the learning about secret names is easily accessible.
XXIII. Why Dead People are Buried.—Here we meet the Creator so common in the religious beliefs of Africans as of most barbarous and savage peoples. "The Creator was a big chief." The Euahlayi Baiame is rendered "Big Man" by Mrs. Langloh Parker (see The Euahlayi Tribe). The myth is one of world-wide diffusion, explaining The Origin of Death, usually by the fable of a message, forgotten and misrendered, from the Creator.
XXIV. The Fat Woman who Melted Away.—The revival of this beautiful creature, from all that was left of her, the toe, is an incident very common in folk-tales, i.e. the Scottish Rashin Coatie. (The word "dowry" is used throughout where "bride-price" would better express the institution. The Homeric ἕνα is meant.)
XXV. The Leopard, the Squirrel, and the Tortoise.—A "Just So Story."
XXVI. Why the Moon Waxes and Wanes.—A lunar myth; not a poetical though a kindly explanation of the habits of the moon.
XXVII. The Story of the Leopard, the Tortoise, and the Bush Rat.—A "Just So Story."
XXVIII. The King and the JuJu Tree.—This is a fine example of Ju Ju beliefs, and of an extraordinary sacrifice to a Ju Ju power located in a tree. Goats, chickens, and white men are common offerings, but "seven baskets of flies" might propitiate Beelzebub. The "spirit-man" who can succeed when sacrifice fails, chooses the king's daughter as his reward, as is usual in Märchen. Compare Melampus and Pero in Greece. The skull in spirit-land here plays a friendly part, in advising the princess, like Proserpine, not to eat among the dead. This caution is found everywhere—in the Greek version of Orpheus and Eurydice, in the Kalewala, and in Scott's "Wandering Willie's Tale," in Redgauntlet. Like Orpheus, the girl is not to look back while leaving spirit-land. Her successful escape, by obeying the injunctions of the skull, is unusual.
XXIX. How the Tortoise overcame the Elephant and the Hippopotamus.—A "Just So Story," with the tortoise as cunning as Brer Rabbit.
XXX. Of the Pretty Girl and the Seven Jealous Women.—Here the good little bird plays the part of the popinjay who "up and spake" with good effect in the first ballads. The useful Ju Ju man divines by casting lots, a common method among the Zulus. The revenge of the pretty girl's father is certainly adequate.
XXXI. How the Cannibals drove the People from Insofan Mountain to the Cross River (Ikom).—This professes to be historical, and concerns human sacrifices, "to cool the new yams," and cannibalism.