[Footnote 18: _Chants et Contes_, p. 135, see also the preceding story, and some remarks on p. 86, footnote 2.]
[Footnote 19: Alcée Fortier, _Louisiana Folklore_, p. 24.]
Besides Annancy himself, and the "Tiger" already mentioned, we have, in these stories, either domestic or quasi-domestic animals: Cow, Hog, Dog, Puss, "Ratta," etc., or creatures indigenous to Jamaica, such as John-Crow, Chicken-Hawk, Sea-Gaulin, Candle-Fly, Crab and Tarpon. Some stories, for which I fail to recall any exact parallel, either in Africa or Europe, may be of purely local origin; this is most likely to be true of those which profess to explain some elementary fact in natural history, such as the inability of two bulls to agree in one pasture ("Timmolimmo"), or the hostility between dogs and cats. Even were this not so, the amount of local colour introduced (as always where tales are transmitted orally) could change them almost beyond recognition. This often has a very quaint effect, as in "Parson Puss and Parson Dog," who are evidently conceived as ministers of some rival Methodist denominations, and in the references to weddings, funerals, and dances possibly ending up with a free fight, as in "Gaulin," "How Monkey manage Annancy," "Doba," etc. Annancy's inviting the animals to his father's funeral and slaughtering them (with the exception of Monkey, who is too clever for him) reminds us of the Temne "Mr. Leopard fools the other animals,"[20] but in this, Leopard himself pretends to die. Cunnie Rabbit's test, "Die pusson nebber blow," is less ingenious than that applied by Brer Rabbit in "Uncle Remus:"[21] "When a man go to see dead folks, dead folks allers raises up der behime leg en hollers _wahoo_!" (In Mr. Owen's version, they "grin and whistle.") In the Sesuto story[22] the Monkey suspects a trick and escapes, when the Hare persuades the Lion to entrap the other animals by shamming death. Perhaps the baptism of the crabs ("Annancy in Crab Country") may be connected with "Mr. Spider initiates the fowls,"[23] where the Temne Spider, assuming for the nonce a quasi-religious character, gathers his victims together to celebrate the Bundo mysteries, and massacres them wholesale.
[Footnote 21: "Mr. Wolf makes a failure."]