--- title: Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Spider and the Grassho… — Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria · full text with trees · page 2 description: Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Spider and the Grasshopper., «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell: the whole chapter, every sentence with its dependency tree and pragmatics. It begins: Long ago the spider and the grasshopper were good friends. --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/6/page/2/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/) / Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Sp… # Vii.--how Two Friends Fell Out: the Spider and the Grasshopper. · page 2 [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/6/) **2** The people then carried the meat back to the town and placed the horns in front of their ju-ju.[62](../../62/ "tree and pragmatics") Half the meat was given to the grasshopper, and the remainder divided amongst the people, the spider getting nothing.[63](../../63/ "tree and pragmatics") When the spider saw this he was vexed, and told the grasshopper that he did not want him for his friend again.[64](../../64/ "tree and pragmatics") He then set himself to make a net of web in order to revenge himself on the grasshopper, and has ever since lived on insects.[65](../../65/ "tree and pragmatics") N.B.--This story was given to me at Akparabong by a native, but there would appear to be some doubt as to whether it is a local story or not.[66](../../66/ "tree and pragmatics") A native from Cavally on the Kroo Coast affirms that he first told this story which was afterwards related to me, and this boy certainly gave me afterwards the main features of the story, but with a different local colouring.[67](../../67/ "tree and pragmatics") VIII.--HOW EWA ABAGI, AN INKUM WOMAN, WAS DROWNED IN THE CROSS RIVER, AND HOW SHE WAS RESCUED BY THE YOUNG MEN OF INSOFAN.[68](../../68/ "tree and pragmatics") In the olden days, Ewa Abagi lived at Inkum.[69](../../69/ "tree and pragmatics") She was very rich and was considered to be a most beautiful woman.[70](../../70/ "tree and pragmatics") She made most of her money by trading in palm kernels and camwood, but, as she was so popular wherever she went with the young men of the country, she also made a lot of money out of them, as, if they did not pay her well in advance, she would have nothing to do with them.[71](../../71/ "tree and pragmatics") She received many offers of marriage, but refused them all, until one day a chief of Insofan named Awor sent a message to her that he wished to make her his wife, as he had heard what a fine woman she was.[72](../../72/ "tree and pragmatics") Ewa Abagi then sent word back to the chief that she could not marry him just then as she was expecting to bear a son, but that, some time after the child was born, she would go up the river to Insofan and marry him as she had heard that he was rich and was a good man.[73](../../73/ "tree and pragmatics") The child turned out to be a girl, and shortly after her birth, Ewa Abagi bought a young slave woman called Mossim to look after her baby, while she herself went to the different markets trading.[74](../../74/ "tree and pragmatics") When the girl baby had become six years old, Ewa Abagi dressed herself and her daughter up in their best clothes, and crossed over the river to Okuni with the slave woman Mossim carrying her load.[75](../../75/ "tree and pragmatics") They then proceeded to walk overland to Insofan.[76](../../76/ "tree and pragmatics") On reaching the Abum River which is quite close to Insofan, Ewa Abagi went to bathe, and took her little daughter with her, putting down her cloth and beads on the ground.[77](../../77/ "tree and pragmatics") As the river was very shallow, it being the dry season, they walked and waded down to the Cross River.[78](../../78/ "tree and pragmatics") When she got there, she washed her daughter and then called upon Mossim to scrub her back.[79](../../79/ "tree and pragmatics") The slave woman then came up behind her mistress, and pushed her into the Cross River, where she at once disappeared.[80](../../80/ "tree and pragmatics") When the little girl, whose name was Essere, saw that her mother had gone, she began to cry, but Mossim said, “Do not cry.[81](../../81/ "tree and pragmatics") You must call me your mother, and I will treat you well.[82](../../82/ "tree and pragmatics") When we get to the town, you must not tell anyone that I am not your mother, or I will punish you severely.”[83](../../83/ "tree and pragmatics") She then dressed the child and put on the cloth and beads of Ewa Abagi herself, having just tied up her own clothes into a bundle with some stones and thrown them into the Cross River.[84](../../84/ "tree and pragmatics") Mossim and the child then walked on to Insofan, and, when they got there, the slave woman went to Chief Awor’s house and said, “I am Ewa Abagi whom you wanted to marry, and this (turning to the little girl) is my daughter Essere.”[85](../../85/ "tree and pragmatics") The chief welcomed her, but was not very pleased, as he had expected to see a much finer woman from all the reports he had heard of her beauty.[86](../../86/ "tree and pragmatics") When the people of Insofan heard that the chief’s new wife had arrived, many of them went to see her, as she was so well known by name.[87](../../87/ "tree and pragmatics") When they saw Mossim, they were not greatly impressed by her looks, and said so quite freely in very plain terms.[88](../../88/ "tree and pragmatics") Now, one of the young men of the town, who had been down the river trading, knew Ewa Abagi very well indeed, and, when he saw the slave woman, he recognized her as the servant, so he told Chief Awor.[89](../../89/ "tree and pragmatics") The chief said, “Very well, I hear what you say, and will not marry the woman at present.[90](../../90/ "tree and pragmatics") We will wait for a time, and I will make enquiries.”[91](../../91/ "tree and pragmatics") In the morning Mossim told the girl to go and get water from the spring, and the little girl went off with the water pot on her head.[92](../../92/ "tree and pragmatics") Essere, however, did not go to the spring as she had been told, but went to the place where she had seen the slave woman push her mother into the water.[93](../../93/ "tree and pragmatics") She then sat down and began to cry for her mother.[94](../../94/ "tree and pragmatics") When Ewa Abagi heard her daughter crying, she came out of the river and talked to her.[95](../../95/ "tree and pragmatics") She then painted her daughter with \_okukum\_,\[1\] and having helped the child with the water pot, she returned to the river, and Essere went home.[96](../../96/ "tree and pragmatics") When she arrived at the house, Mossim asked her who had painted her with okokum and why she had been so long getting the water from the spring.[97](../../97/ "tree and pragmatics") The child did not answer, so the slave woman said to her, “Don’t you be so long another time, or you will get into trouble.”[98](../../98/ "tree and pragmatics") The next day Essere went to get the water at the same place.[99](../../99/ "tree and pragmatics") She called for a long time, but her mother did not come out, as she saw a man making tombo in a tree near at hand.[100](../../100/ "tree and pragmatics") At last, however, as she did not like to hear her little daughter crying, Ewa Abagi came out very quickly, helped Essere with the water pot on to her head, and went back again into the river.[101](../../101/ "tree and pragmatics") The man, who had been watching, saw Ewa Abagi and recognized her.[102](../../102/ "tree and pragmatics") He therefore came down from the tree and went at once to the chief and told him what he had seen.[103](../../103/ "tree and pragmatics") The chief then told all the young men of the town to go early the next morning to the place where Ewa Abagi had been seen and to try and get her out of the river.[104](../../104/ "tree and pragmatics") He promised them that, if they succeeded in bringing the woman to him, he would hold a big play and “dash” them plenty of tombo and food.[105](../../105/ "tree and pragmatics") The chief told Essere that, when she went in the morning to get the water, if she wanted to get her mother back, directly she had got the water out of the river she must take the pot back some little distance into the bush.[106](../../106/ "tree and pragmatics") When the morning came, the little girl went off with her pot, as before, and having filled it with water, carried it back into the bush some little way from the river, and then sat down, and called for her mother to come and help her.[107](../../107/ "tree and pragmatics") The young men, who had gone to the place before it was light, and who had lined both banks of the Abum river, by the chief’s orders, were all hidden out of sight, and, when Ewa Abagi came out of the water, they immediately surrounded her and caught her before she could get back to the river.[108](../../108/ "tree and pragmatics") They then carried her back to the chief.[109](../../109/ "tree and pragmatics") The slave woman was then seized, and tied up to a tree, and, when the morning came, the chief charged her with trying to kill her mistress.[110](../../110/ "tree and pragmatics") She was found guilty, and was ordered to be killed as a sacrifice to the water ju-ju.[111](../../111/ "tree and pragmatics") Mossim was then handed over to the young men who had rescued Ewa Abagi, and they took her to the place where she had pushed her mistress into the river, and, having cut her head off, threw the head and body into the river.[112](../../112/ "tree and pragmatics") This is one of the reasons why slaves are always killed and put into the grave of their master or mistress when they die, as a warning to other slaves not to try to kill their owners.[113](../../113/ "tree and pragmatics") \_Author’s note.[114](../../114/ "tree and pragmatics") There is a firm belief amongst all the natives in the Ikom district that the slaves who are killed and buried with their master will meet him again in the Spirit Land, where the conditions of life will be the same as they were on earth.[115](../../115/ "tree and pragmatics") The master will recognise his slaves and they will work for him.[116](../../116/ "tree and pragmatics") They also believe that, when a chief arrives in the Spirit Land, accompanied by these slaves, carrying the gin cloth, rods, etc., which were placed in the grave, the people of the Spirit Land-will say, “This is a chief coming.[117](../../117/ "tree and pragmatics") Look at his slaves, etc.”[118](../../118/ "tree and pragmatics") Some years ago a road was being made through an old compound which had tumbled down and disappeared, leaving no trace of any human habitation.[119](../../119/ "tree and pragmatics") The road passed through an old grave of a chief who had been buried in the house, and many things, including rods, bottles of gin and plates, had been put in the grave.[120](../../120/ "tree and pragmatics") The natives who were working on the road were afraid to touch anything in the grave, but a native foreman, who came from another country where they held different beliefs, opened a bottle of gin and drank some of it.[121](../../121/ "tree and pragmatics") When the natives saw that nothing happened to him, they all rushed in and there was a regular scramble for everything.[122](../../122/ "tree and pragmatics") Told by Abassi of Inkum.--\[E.D., 1.6.10.\][123](../../123/ "tree and pragmatics") Thomas, District Clerk, Inkom, told me this grave incident, and said it happened in his presence some years ago at Calabar, when he was time-keeper in the P.W.D.[124](../../124/ "tree and pragmatics") [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/6/) **2** - ← previous: [page 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/6/) - next →: [Ix.--the Story of the War Between Inkum and Enfitop.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/7/) - ↑ back to [Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/)