Skip to main content

Moral Story about Indigo Jackal

 



Once, on a dark, cold winter's night, a jackal wandered into a village looking for food. The jackal was very hungry. The winter had been long and hard, and there was no food left in the forest. 'Perhaps', said the jackal to himself, 'I will find something to eat in the village.' The jackal soon started walking towards the village.  He began to howling and some dogs heard him.    

In nature dogs did not like jackals. They began barking and growling, and attacked the jackals from all sides. They scratched and bit the jackal with their sharp claws and big teeth. Terrified, the poor jackal ran from the dogs as fast as he could, through the dark deserted streets of the village. But the dogs did not give up - they ran after him, growling and snarling and barking even more loudly.

The jackal did not know what to do. He did not dare to stop, and he knew he could not run for much longer. Suddenly he saw the wall of a courtyard before him. Without waiting to think he jumped over the wall, and straight into a large pot of indigo dye! The dye had been left there by a dyer, all ready to be used in the morning. The jackal was now dyed a rich indigo color!

Meanwhile the dogs had stopped barking. They couldn't see or smell the jackal any more. They decided to wait near the courtyard wall, just in case he appeared again. But instead of the jackal, a strange blue creature came creeping out of the dyer's house! The dogs were terrified - they had never seen such an animal before. Much to the jackal's surprise, instead of attacking him, the dogs ran way yelping in fright.

A bit puzzled, but also very pleased with the dogs' fright, the jackal returned to the forest. Every forest creature that saw him also ran away, squealing in terror. The jackal soon realised it was his strange new colour that was scaring all the animals away. They did not recognise him as a jackal any more.

The cunning jackal now hatched a plan. He called all the animals to him. When they had gathered, trembling, before him, he said, 'Dear animals do not be afraid. I will not harm you. I have been sent by the gods themselves to look after you, to make sure you come to no harm. In return, you will have to make me your king, and do as I say. Otherwise the gods will be angry with you.'

The frightened animals agreed. They made him the king of the forest, and did all that he asked. The jackal now had plenty to eat. He was never cold or hungry any more. Many months passed this way. One day, a pack of jackals came to live in the forest. Whenever the indigo jackal would see them, he would feel a strange desire to be with them, to be a jackal once again. One night, when the moon was full, the entire jackal pack lifted up their heads and howled. The indigo jackal could not stop himself. Forgetting his lies, he too lifted up his head and howled with the other jackals.

When the animals saw this, they realized they had been tricked. Their king was nothing but a common jackal! They were angry with themselves for having been fooled, and furious with the jackal. When the jackal saw that the animals knew the truth, he tried to run away. But the furious animals chased him and caught and tore him to bits.

In the end, it wasn't a very good idea of the jackal to pretend to be someone he was not, was it?
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

McDow Hole – Anatomy Of A Texas Ghost Story

  Spooky Texas legend of the McDow Hole, where ghost sightings of pioneer woman Jenny Papworth and her baby have long been reported.  Written by Bob Hopkins . I first heard the legendary tale of the Ghost of the McDow Hole in the fifteenth year of my youth. It was near Halloween in October 1975 when a friend related the tale of the ghost that haunts a creek bed in rural Erath County and naturally I believed every word of it in the twilight of an evening spent with friends telling ghost stories. I would again hear the tale over the years while living in North Central Texas. It wasn’t until my chance encounter of meeting an author of the legend in 2002 that my curiosity began to peak and like any good investigator I felt it my duty to dig deeper into the hundred year old tale of pioneer folklore to see how much of the story was true and how much was fabricated. I would discover many similarities in fact and fiction that I believed would leave any reader with the same curiosity t...
Post a Comment
Read more

Tsali: North Carolina Cherokee Ghost Story

  The year was 1838. As the first rays of early morning light crept through the dark and misty mountain valley, Tsali gazed out of his tiny cave with a heavy heart. As a young boy, he spent days running though the thick woods and scampering up the steep, rocky hillsides that surrounded his Cherokee village in western North Carolina. The mountains were his place of escape — a place where he could dream, and be alone with his thoughts. But now, as an ailing, 60-year-old man, Tsali was hiding in these hills for a very different reason. The white man had taken away the land that his ancestors had lived on for centuries. And they would not stop until even these majestic, sacred hills were theirs. Tsali looked out and saw his fellow villagers, who were also hiding in the tiny crevices that dotted the wooded hillside. Many were shivering in the early morning chill. In their haste to leave, they had had no time to pack their belongings. Some managed to smile back at Tsali, their teeth chat...
Post a Comment
Read more

Lorenzo Dow’s Georgia Curse

  There comes a time in life when we all need a little guidance – a little helpful push to remind us what’s right and wrong. And for some folks, that guidance comes from some good old fashioned, fire and brimstone preaching. Now these days, you can’t turn on the TV without seeing one religious channel after another. But back in the old days when there wasn’t any TV – or cars for that matter – the traveling preacher was the only man of God some country folk got to see. Lorenzo Dow was one of the best-known traveling preachers back in the 1800s. He was a funny looking man from Connecticut – tall and skinny with wild eyes, long stringy hair, a thick beard, and a slight hunchback. But he also had a booming voice that made sinners across the country shake in their boots. “Repent now, my brothers and sisters! Repent!” he would scream in every town he visited, and many people did just that. Lorenzo loved the outdoors, and would rather sleep on cold, hard ground in the woods than the most ...
Post a Comment
Read more