The point of the story is voiced in Nassau, 15; “If you find a friend, it is not well to tell him all the thoughts of your heart. If you tell him two or three, leave the rest.” In Cronise and Ward, the man reveals all his resources for transformation but the last, which is “dat t’ing wey turn fas’ fas’ pon top de wattah.” In Tremearne, FL 22, he starts to say the word for “ring” (zoba) gets as far as “zop” and is interrupted. In Barker there is a further Delilah turn to the story. He escapes twice by transformation; [[272]]finally the witch gets his god, while he sleeps with his head in her lap, and burns it. Before it is quite consumed, it turns him into a hawk and he flies away.
In Harris, the version follows the story of the witch and the three dogs as in number [82].
85. Man-Snake as Bridegroom. [[Story]]
Besides the last number, three other types of monster marriage stories are common in Jamaica, all of which, though versions overlap or vary, follow a fairly fixed pattern. They may be distinguished as the Snake husband, the Devil husband, and the Bull husband.
The Snake husband story is very common. Besides the half dozen here set down of the many versions offered me, seven Jamaica stories already collected follow the general pattern with more or less exactness. See Lewis, 291–296, Sarah Wintun; Milne Home, 54–55, The Sneake; 46–50, De Sneake an’ de King’s Darter; Bates, JAFL 9:121, The Yalla Snake; Jekyll, 26, The Three Sisters; 102–104, Yellow Snake; 65, Tacoma and the old Witch Girl.
The story has three parts. (1) A difficult young lady refuses all suitors, but falls in love with a Snake dressed as a handsome man. (2) He has borrowed his fine parts and on the journey home drops them one by one, becomes a Snake, and takes her to his home. (3) Her brothers hear her song of distress and rescue her just as the Snake is about to swallow her. These elements are fairly constant in modern Jamaica versions.
(1) “The pick and choose” idea occurs in Bates’s, all Jekyll’s and all my versions, although the idea that fine clothes do not make the man is also emphasized.
For the “pick and choose” motive, compare Zeltner, 85, where the girl refuses to marry anyone but “un homme n’avant aucune ouverture;” Nassau, 68, where she will have no man with “even a little bit of a blotch on his skin;” Tremearne, FL 22:346, where he must have “not one blemish;” and Christensen, 10, where the girl refuses to marry anyone with a scratch on his back. In none of these cases does the husband take the form of a Snake. Compare also Jacottet, 126–159, where are recorded five snake-husband stories, four of which are enchanted beast stories (two of the “Beauty and the Beast” type and two of the “Yonec” type), and the fifth is a good and bad-mannered girl story, none of which use the “pick and choose” motive.
(2) The borrowed clothes appear in both Milne-Home’s versions, in Bates’s, in two of Jekyll’s and in two of mine. In Milne-Home, [[273]]the story ends with the dropping of the clothes; in Jekyll and in two of mine, the monster carries her to his den or “stone-hole.”