A man lived with his wives in the bush far away from the town. His wives were very lazy and he wondered how he could provide food for his large family.
One day, he had a bright idea. He collected a lot of palm nuts. He went first to the leopard and offered him a bunch of nuts. The leopard was very pleased and told him to keep up the supply of nuts only to him. In return, he would give the man the animals he hunted.
Then the man went to a crocodile on the banks of a river and gave him some of the nuts too. The crocodile said he would give him fish every day if the man gave nuts only to him.
The man now had a plentiful supply of food for his wives and his family. The leopard and the crocodile did not know each other, so he carried on getting food from both.
However, it so happened that both the leopard and the crocodile had heard that dogs were very tasty. So, they both wished to eat a dog. And every day each of them asked the man to fetch him a dog to eat.
The man was in a fix. He did not want to give them his dogs as he loved them. Then he hit upon a plan. ‘This will work,’ he thought, ‘because neither of them has ever seen a dog!’
So, he asked the leopard to come to a place on the bank of the river. “You’ll see a dog there,” he said, “You can eat him with your heart’s content.”
He then told the crocodile too to come to the same place at the same time for the dog. Then he hid behind a bush and waited for results.
The leopard came and saw the crocodile lying in the sun on the banks. ‘This is rather a large animal for a dog!’ he thought. By then, the crocodile opened his eyes and, seeing the leopard, thought, ‘So this is what a dog looks like! It’s bigger than I imagined he would be.’
The two attacked each other and there was a really fierce fight in which they killed each other. The man watched them and then ran to call all his friends and relatives. That night, there was a great feast in the house of the man and they all sang and danced till morning!
