The Coldest Season

CIX. The Coldest Season. One winter day a bear and a tiger began to dispute as to which is the coldest season of the year; the bear said July and August, which…

CIX. The Coldest Season.

One winter day a bear and a tiger began to dispute as to which is the coldest season of the year; the bear said July and August, which is the rainy season, and the tiger said December and January, which is the winter season. They argued and argued but could not convince each other; for the bear with his long coat did not feel the cold of winter but when he got soaked through in the rain he felt chilly.

At last they saw a man coming that way and called on him to decide--"but have a care"--said the tiger--"if you give an opinion favourable to the bear, I will eat you;" and the bear said "If you side with the tiger, _I_ will eat you." At this the man was terror stricken but an idea struck him and he made the tiger and the bear promise not to eat him if he gave a fair decision and then he said "It is not the winter which is the coldest, nor the rainy season which is the coldest, but windy weather; if there is no wind no one feels the cold much either in the winter or in the rainy season." And the tiger and the bear said "You are right, we never thought of that" and they let him go.

CHAPTER II

Part II.

To a people living in the jungles the wild animals are much more than animals are to us. To the man who makes a clearing in the forest, life is largely a struggle against the beasts of prey and the animals who graze down the crops. It is but natural that he should credit them with feelings and intelligence similar to those of human beings, and that they should seem to him suitable characters around which to weave stories.

These stories are likely to be particularly current among a people occupying a forest country, and for this reason are less likely to appear in collections made among the inhabitants of towns. It is a strange coincidence and presumably only a coincidence that Story 118, 'The Hyena outwitted' is known in a precisely similar form among the Kaffirs of South Africa.