BOTH) THE SPIRITS OF THE BUSH 215 



145. The Stoey of Adaba (A) 



There were once three l)r()thers who went out to hunt, takinj;; their slater with them. 

 Far out in the l)usli they Ixiilt a banab, where the sister was left all alone, while they 

 wandered about in search of game. Everv day the three brothers went hunting in 

 all directions, but never l)rought i)ack any meat except a powis. This happened for 

 many days. Now there was an Adaba [tree-trog] living in a hollow tree [Sect. 144] 

 which contained a little water, close to the l)anab, and one afternoon he was singing 

 his song, Wang! Wang! Wayig! when the girl heard him. "WTiat are you holloing 

 for?" she said; "it would be much better if you stopped that noise and brought me 

 some game to eat" [Sect. liO]. So the Adaba stripped holloing, changed himself 

 into a man, went away into the bush.' and returned in about two hours with some 

 meat for her. "Cook this," he told her, "before your brothers come back: as u.sual 

 they will return with nothing." Adaba spoke truly, for soon after the three brothers 

 came back empty-handed. You can imagine their surprise when they saw their 

 sister barbecuing plenty of meat and a strange man lying in one of their hammocks. 

 Yes, he was a strange man indeed: he had stripes all the way down his thin legs, and 

 he wore a lapcloth; otherwise he was quite naked. They spoke to him, and they said, 

 "How day" to one another. After Adaba had asked them whether they had been 

 hunting, and was informed that they had shot nothing, he told them he would like 

 to see the arrows they were using. When they showed liim these, he burst into a 

 hearty laugh, and pointing to the fungus that was growing everywhere on them, said 

 that so long as they did not remove this stuff their arrows would never shoot straight 

 [Sect. 144]- He also cleaned their arrows for them. Adaba tlien told their sister 

 to spin a fishing-line which, when completed, lie tied between two trees. He next 

 told the brothers to take aim at the fishing-line, with the cleaned arrows, and shoot. 

 They did so, and each brother's arrow stuck into the very center of the fisliing line. 

 Adaba also had a curious trick in shooting with his arrow, because instead of taking 

 aim at an animal direct, he would point t)ie arrow up into the sky, so tliat in its descent 

 it would stick into the creature's back. The brothers began to learn this method, 

 and soon became such adepts at it that they never missed anything. Indeed the 

 brothers became so proud of themselves and of Adaba that they took liim homo with 

 them, and made him their brother-in-law. And Adaba lived a long, long time very 

 happily witli their sister. But one day, tlie woman said to him, "Husband, let ut go 

 and have a bath in the pond." They went away together, and when they reached 

 there, tlie wiie got in first and called upon Adaba to come in also. But he said: "No, 

 I never bathe in ])laccs like this, in ponds. My bathing-place is in the water-holes 

 inside the hollow trees." So she dashed some of the water over him, and after doing 

 so three times, slie jumped out of the pond and rushed to seize him, but directly she 

 put her hands on him. he turned himself into a frog again, and hopped away into the 

 hollow tree, where he still is. When the sister came back home again, her brothers 

 asked her where their brother-in-law was and all she would tell them was that he had 

 gone away. But they happened to know how and why he had gone away, and so they 

 beat their sister unmercifully. This, however, did not mend matters, because Adaba 

 never came out of the hollow tree again to bring them luck. The three brothers often 

 went out hunting after that, but they never brought back of an evening anything 

 like the quantity of game that they used to get when Adaba was present. 



146. Why the Indians Killed Black Tiger (W) 



A man went to fish. He went far into the bush to the upper creeks, and while 

 fishing heard a noise like thunder, but did not pay much attention to it. By and 

 by he heard the noise again; this made him exclaim "Well! What can that be?" 

 When he came to think over the matter, he recognized that the sound came, not from 



