“What do you want?” inquired the Tortoise.

“You shall die,” cried the monkeys.  “Tell us what will kill you.  We will chop you to pieces with the axe.”

“Oh, no! that won’t hurt me in the least,” replied the Tortoise.  “You can see the marks on my shell, where my father used to cut my body:  but that didn’t kill me.”

“We will put you in the fire, then, and burn you to death,” chorussed the monkeys.  “Will that do?”

“Fire does not hurt me,” returned the Tortoise.  “Look at my body!  See how brown it is where my father used to stick me into the fire.”

“What, then, is best to kill you?” urged the monkeys.

“The way to kill me,” replied the Tortoise, “is to take the punch used for brass, bulit, [142] and run [143] it into my rectum.  Then throw me into the big pond, and drown me.”

Then the monkeys did as they were told, and threw him into the pond.  But the Tortoise began to swim about in the water.

Exultantly he called to the monkeys, “This is my own home:  you see I don’t drown.”  And the lake was so deep that the monkeys could not get him.

Then the monkeys hurried to and fro, summoning all the animals in the world to drink the water in the lake.  They all came,—­deer, pigs, jungle-fowl, monkeys, and all the rest,—­and began to drink.  They covered their pagindis [144] with leaves, so that the water could not run out of their bodies.  After a time, they had drunk so much that the lake became shallow, and one could see the Tortoise’s back.

But the red-billed bakaka-bird that lived in a tree by the water was watching; and as quick as the back of the Tortoise came into sight, the bird flew down and picked off the leaves from the pagindis of the deer.  Then the water ran out from their bodies until the lake rose again, and covered the Tortoise.  Satisfied, the bird flew back into the tree.  But the deer got fresh leaves to cover their pagindis, and began to drink again.  Then the bird flew to the monkeys, and began to take the leaves from their pagindis; but one monkey saw him doing it, and slapped him.  This made the bird fall down, and then all the monkeys left the Tortoise in the lake, and ran to revenge themselves on the bird.

They snatched him up, pulled out every one of his feathers with their fingers, and laid him naked upon the stump of a tree.  All the animals went home, leaving the bird on the stump.

Two days later, one Monkey came to look at the Bakaka.  Little feathers were beginning to grow out; but the Monkey thought the bird was dead.

“Maggots are breeding in it,” said the Monkey.

Three more days passed, and then the Monkey came again.  The Bakaka’s feathers had grown out long by that time; and the Monkey said, “It was all rotten, and the pigs ate it.”

But the bird had flown away.  He flew to the north until he reached a meadow with a big tual-tree in the middle.  The tree was loaded with ripe fruit. [145] Perched on one of the branches, the bird ate all he wanted, and when done he took six of the fruit of the tual, and made a necklace for himself.  With this hung round his neck, he flew to the house where the old Monkey lived, and sat on the roof.  He dropped one tual through the roof, and it fell down on the floor, where all the little monkey-children ran for it, dancing and screaming.