Oban's Myths & Legends
Rabbit the hunter
A Native American tale retold by Sanjit
One day Rabbit took his bow and arrow and went hunting. He left the house where he lived with his grandmother and hopped through the forest, happy to be out and about. Suddenly he saw huge footprints in the track.
"Wow! Check out the size of this!" Rabbit said, twitching his nose. He hopped into the middle of the left footprint, then took six long hops to reach the right one.
"This dude is some giant" he said out loud, talking to himself because no one else was there. The forest was silent. He couldn't even hear a wing flap, or a bear breathing.
"I bet that giant's hunted everything!" said Rabbit angrily. And sure enough, when he checked, there wasn't anything left to hunt.
Rabbit went home to his grandmother and told her he hadn't hunted anything for dinner because the giant had been to the forest first. She patted him on the head. "Don't worry dear. I've picked some berries. We can have them for dinner."
"I don't want stupid berries. I want to eat something I've hunted!" Rabbit grumbled to himself. He didn't say it out loud because he didn't want to hurt his grandmother's feelings.
The next day Rabbit got up earlier, hoping to hunt before the giant came. No luck. Everything had gone already. "It's not fair!" cried Rabbit, stamping his feet.
Each day Rabbit got up earlier and earlier, and each day the same thing happened. The giant got there first.
Rabbit became angrier and angrier. "I will set a trap for the giant. And when I catch him, I'll shoot him with my bow and arrow." He strung a net across the track to catch anyone who walked down it. Then he went home to his grandmother, thinking "this will be the last night I have to eat berries for dinner. Tomorrow I'll be able to go hunting." Continue
