Atondido Stories
how well I can dance."
The children opened the box and let the monkey out into the
room. The monkey played on his guitar, "Lee, lee, lee, lee, lee
lay, lee lay, lee ray, lee ray," and he danced about the room. Then
he said, "O, children! O, children! You have nothing at all cook-
ing in that pot over the fire. Let us put something into the pot to
cook."
The children thought that it would not be polite to tell the
monkey what the pot of water was waiting for, so they let the
monkey fill the pot as he liked. He put into it some little dry
sticks and an empty cocoanut shell. Then he said, "O, children,
O, children, I cannot dance any more. It is so hot here in this
room."
The children begged him to dance some more.
"If you will open the door a little bit so that I can have more
air to breathe I'll show you a new dance," said the monkey.
The children opened the door. The monkey danced over to the
door and out of the door away to the tree top. That was the last
they ever saw of him. He moved to another part of the country
after that experience.
When the man came home with fuel for the fire the children
did not dare to tell him that the monkey had escaped. They let
him think that the sticks and the cocoanut shell in the pot was
the monkey. He built a big roaring fire under the pot and soon it
was boiling merrily. After the pot had boiled a while he called
the children to come to supper with him. The children let him
taste first. He fished a hard stick out of the pot and bit into it.
"This is not the monkey's leg. It is just a dry stick," he said, as he
made a wry face. Then he fished the empty cocoanut shell out of
the pot. "That is not the monkey's head," he said as he tasted it,
"That is just an empty cocoanut shell." He couldn't find a single
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