Congo Folklore Tales: Stories I–VI

IV. Why the Fowls never shut their Doors

There lived once a chief who owned a large number of Fowls. On arising
early one morning he found that the door of their house had been left
open all night. He thereupon woke up the Head Cock and asked why he had
not shut the door.

The Cock replied: “We did not go to sleep very early last night, as we
quarrelled over who should shut the door. I told one to do it, and he
told another, and at last we became so angry with each other that no one
would shut the door, so we went to sleep leaving it open.”

The owner snapped his fingers in speechless surprise at the Fowl’s
excuse, and walked away.

Another day the chief went to see his wives’ farms and found them all
clean and well weeded, but the road leading to the farms, which was
nobody’s work, was choked with tall grass and weeds. That evening the
chief called out loudly so that all the town could hear: “You women, I
went to your farms to-day, and found the road covered with tall grass
and weeds. Truly you are near relatives of the fowls, who sleep with
open door because each tells the other to shut it. To-morrow all of you
go and clear the road.”

When the Fowls heard these remarks they were very vexed, and the Cock
said: “You have heard what our owner has shouted out to the whole town.
He has held us up as a bad example to all in the place, yet when I went
to a neighbouring town the day before yesterday I saw a buffalo rotting
by the roadside.”

“Why was it rotting there?” asked the Black Hen of her husband.

The Cock replied: "When I reached the town the other day I heard that
Don’t-care, who is the son of Peter Pay-if-you-like, went outside his
house and saw a buffalo; he aroused his companions and told them to go
and shoot it; but they said: ‘Go and shoot it yourself.’ ‘What! am I to
see the buffalo and shoot it also?’ he asked. Thereupon Wise-man fired
at the buffalo, and told another to go and see if it were killed. He
came back and said it was wounded; so another went and killed it; but he
would not cut it up; and another went and cut it into pieces. Then each
thought that the other should carry the flesh into the town;
consequently it was left in the bush, and that was why the buffalo meat
rotted at the roadside."

The Black Hen said: “Indeed, is that so?” But the Speckled Hen observed:
“That it would be better for human beings if they looked better after
their own business, instead of poking their noses into affairs belonging
to Fowls, and holding them up as a bad example to their women.”

The Head Cock said: “That from that day neither he, nor his children,
nor his grandchildren should ever shut the doors of their houses, no
matter how cold it might be, or what risks they might run of being eaten
by wild animals.” Thus it is that Fowls never shut their doors at night.
They are angry that human beings, who conduct their own affairs so
badly, should find fault with the way in which Fowls look after theirs.