ANANSE AND HIS FISHING FRIENDS

All of them agreed to what the Monkey had suggested and so decided to go into the fishing business without delay. They purchased a canoe and a fishing net and began fishing in a lake near them. They were regularly making some big catch and within a few weeks they had made a lot of money. Most of the fishmongers who resided in the town came to the lake every afternoon to purchase some. One Thursday morning, when the four friends were mending their net, a group of fishmongers approached them and said they were fish sellers in the local market and that they had come to arrange with them to be their sole buyers of every catch of fish that they would bring down.

Monkey, the senior man among the four friends, said they liked that arrangement, so from the following week, the Monkey and his friends began to supply the fishmongers with every catch that they made. One Friday afternoon, after the Monkey, the Rabbit, Ananse and the Grasscutter had returned from fishing, the Monkey selected some five big fish and gave them to Auntie Korko to smoke nicely to be presented to the Deer, the chief. When Auntie Korko brought the smoked fish, all the four friends presented them to the chief. When the chief received the five big fish, he was very grateful to the four friends. He quipped, ‘You see how nice you are together’?

Now with the money that they were making, the Monkey advised them that they should individually try and own some property for themselves. So each of them built a nice house and acquired a land for farming. The lives of the four friends were so