opened. And he went in and stole Dodo's riches, but when he was ready to go away again he forgot the words, he could then remember only Zirka Gumgum, and immediately he had said this the door jambed more tightly than ever into the wall. Then he tried and tried to get out, but he could not do so.
"Now the Women from where they were standing began singing, 'O Mad Robber, we gave you the chance to steal, but we did not give you forgetfulness,' and they went off home. So Dodo when he returned caught the Robber in his house, and he killed him, and stuck his body on a spit. Soon the flesh was cooked, and then Dodo ate it."[1]
Since the Hausa are Mahometans, likewise great travellers and traders, this tale may well have been learned more or less directly from Arabic sources. The following variant from the Cape Verde Islands is probably more indirect.
Picking Teeth; The Password; In the Ashes.
There was a wolf with Tubinh.[2] One day they separated, Lob going to Ferrero and Tubinh to Sparadinha to meet again at Figondago. When they meet Lob asks Tubinh, "Xubinh, how is it you are so fat and I am so thin? Where is it you eat?" "I've been going about getting rats and lizards under the stones, Ti' [uncle] Lob. That's what makes me fat." "This is the seventh day I've been eating lizards," Lob says. "I've a little tail in my teeth. Come take it out." Tubinh took a needle to get it out. "No, Xubinh," objects Lob, "don't you remember it was a needle which sewed for the mortelha [mourning] of
- ↑ Tremearne, A. J. N., Hausa Superstitions and Customs, pp. 211-12, London, 1913. In a variant a woman succeeds in stealing food from Dodo's house, but when her husband goes to the house he is caught.
- ↑ Dialectical for subrinho, nephew. Lob and Tubinh figure in a cycle of tales in the Cape Verde Islands as Boukee and Rabbit figure in a Bahama cycle.
