‘In the morning she said, “I heard them, my brother.” Then he said to her husband, “Brother-in-law, lend me an adze, I want to make myself a big wooden top” (_chinguli_).[28] When he had finished it, he put it into his sister’s baskets (the luggage she had brought from home), and fastened it firmly, and put his sister into the baskets, and sang: “_Chínguli chánga, nde, nde, nde,_ _Mpérekezéni, nde, nde, nde,_ _Kúli amái, nde, nde, nde,_ _Chínguli chánga, nde, nde, nde._” That is, “My top! take her home to her mother!” ‘It flew up and flew away over the Bush, and the hyenas followed; but he repeated the same song again, and they flew on till they were just above their mother’s village. Then he sang again, _Chínguli chánga_ (and so on, as above), and the people heard it in the air over their heads, and looked up, and saw them; and the _chinguli_ came to a stop, and let them down right on top of the grain-mortar. And then the brother said, “My sister wanted to send me back because I had sore eyes; but they would have eaten her at that village, and I have brought her home.”’ In another version, the mother follows this up with some more good advice, pointing out what she owes to her brother, and warning her ‘never to do it again.’ A favourite Yao story is that of the python (_Sato_) who was befriended by a man when caught in a bush-fire. He appealed first to a passing herd of buck to stop and save him, but they, considering that he had just eaten one of their number, not unnaturally refused. Then a man passed by with a hoe in his hand, and, on being assured that the python would not devour him, hoed up a piece of ground all round him, and thus saved him from the fire. The grateful python told him to come back in four days’ time, which he did, and found that it had changed into a young lad, who took him home, entertained him with plenty of beer, and finally presented him with two pieces (1 piece = 16 yards) of calico and a magic bottle, which was to be opened in presence of his enemies. When the man went home, he found there was war; his family had fled, and the enemy were occupying the village. He opened his bottle, and they were immediately annihilated. He then went to hoe in the gardens, leaving his bottle and other property in his hut. Another detachment of the enemy arrived—they took possession of the village and all that was in it, pursued him to his garden, and took him prisoner. He was tied up, with his neck in a gori-stick, with a view to being killed next day. During the night he felt a rat gnawing his feet, and asked it to go to the chief’s house and bring the bottle. The rat did so, and the man said, ‘I will pay you in the morning.’ When the people were all assembled, and the man was brought out into the _bwalo_ to be killed, he opened his bottle. ‘The people who sat there when he held it up were dead and gone’—there was no one there! So he rewarded the rat with two cows.