Now the hare wears a dark fur cap on his head. And before he had a white cap. His father, an old hare, sewed it for the hare. But the hare didn’t have to flaunt it for long. A jackal saw him and took his cap. The hare began to cry and began to ask for his father’s gift to be returned to him. How can you persuade a jackal? So the hare was left without a hat. He harbored a grudge and decided to take revenge on the jackal. Once a hare met a jackal in the forest and said:
- Brother jackal! I know a tree here where bees live. Help me collect honey! I myself am small and cannot jump to the hollow.
The jackal heard about honey and was happy.
- Lead me quickly, show me where that tree with a hollow is somewhere! I'll get to the honey quickly.
The jackal hare led the jackal to a large tree where bees lived in a hollow. He started jumping around the tree and complaining:
“You see, brother jackal, I can’t reach the hollow!” Try it yourself, maybe you'll make it.
The jackal ran up, jumped onto a tree and grabbed the edge of the hollow with its front paws. He stuck one paw into the hollow, picked out a piece of honeycomb and threw it down. The hare immediately picked up the honeycomb and hid behind a tree. He quickly sucked the honey and shouted to the jackal:
- Brother jackal! Scoop it up deeper, otherwise there’s no honey here, just wax!
The jackal got tired of holding on to the edge of the hollow with his paws and decided to climb deeper into it. He pulled himself up, with difficulty stuck his head into the hollow and began to rake out the honeycombs with honey. And then the disturbed bees attacked him. They began to sting the jackal in the paws and face. His whole head was swollen. He wanted to jump to the ground, but his head couldn’t get back through. A jackal is stuck in a bee hole!
And the hare screams in a frightened voice:
- Brother jackal, hunters! Oh-oh-oh, apparently there's a raid! And it looks like they are coming here. Get down quickly!
The jackal tried to pull his head out, but he couldn’t. And the bees sting even more!
- Brother hare! - the jackal wheezed. - I can’t get my head out of the hollow. Run to the python, ask him to help me, otherwise I will die here.
“Okay, brother jackal,” said the hare. “Just get more honey, I’ll take it to the python, otherwise he won’t budge.”
The jackal threw a honeycomb with honey on the ground. The hare picked them up and took them home. He hid the honey at home, took his big drum and ran to the hollow.
He runs, beats the drum and shouts:
- Brother jackal! Python is not at home! The raid is getting closer. We run quickly, hunters surround us. Do you hear the beaters beating their tom-toms? Let's run, otherwise they'll grab you and tear your skin off? Quicker!
And then the hare began to beat the drum with all his might.
The jackal heard the drumming, rushed and pulled his head out of the hollow, stripping off all the fur on his ears. The jackal fell to the ground and, without making out the way, ran away from the place where the drum was thundering.
When he ran away, the hare crawled out of the bushes. He sees: pieces of dark jackal skin hanging on a tree. The hare jumped to them and took them down from the tree. He took these scraps to his father and asked him to sew a hat out of them.
The father sewed a new hat for the hare. He put it on and went to show off through the forest. Unfortunately, he met a jackal. He saw the hare's new hat and asked:
-Where did you get it from? Something about the fur looks familiar—whose is it?
- But these are shreds from your skin, brother jackal!
- Well, give me the hat here, since it’s made from my skin!
- No matter how it is, brother jackal! You took my white hat, but you won’t get this dark one!
Hearing this answer, the jackal became furious. He rushed at the hare, but it jumped to the side and took off running. The jackal is behind him! And since then he has been chasing the hare, trying to take his hat away.
Is it possible for a jackal to catch a hare?
So to this day, hares run around in dark hats.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru