“Thank you,” said he, but he was not really grateful at all. He was already planning to play a joke on the Hyena.
“Climb up on the cloud and eat some of the good white fat,” said he. “It is the finest food I have ever eaten in my life.”
The Hyena was glad to hear that the Jackal had left some for her, and she climbed the tree and jumped out upon the cloud and began to eat. She ate and ate, as the Jackal had done, until she was so full that she did not dare to try to climb down the tree.
“I am coming down! Catch me!” she called to the Jackal, and he planted his four feet firmly in the ground and stood under the cloud. But as she jumped he stepped back, and down came the Hyena on her hind legs. So far and so hard did she fall that her hind legs were driven into her body, and have ever since been shorter than her fore legs, as you may see to this day.
But the Jackal’s turn came in time, for no dog is top dog in every fight. This is what happened to him.
One day the sun came down into the forest and sat down on the soft green earth, to rest. The Jackal came by and saw the sun resting there, and his eyes were dazzled so that he thought it was a goat. Now a goat would make him a fine dinner, so he pounced upon it quickly and put it in a sack and threw the sack over his shoulders to carry home.
He had not traveled far when the sun began to burn his shoulders.
“Oh! oh! oh!” cried the Jackal, trying to throw the sun off his shoulders. “Get down! get down!”
But the sun would not get down until he was quite ready, and the Jackal’s back was scorched in a long black stripe which he wears to this day.
When the Hyena saw the long black stripe she howled with delight, and ever since then, when the Hyena and the Jackal meet and the Hyena sees the stripe on the Jackal’s back, the Hyena laughs and the Jackal yelps, just as you hear them doing now [concluded the Alo Man].