Reading Week 7 B: Brer Rabbit continued

 Mr. Fox and the Deceitful Frogs

• this picks up where Mr. Tarrypin left off
• Turtle is bubbling at the bottom of the pond when Bull Frog starts making sounds
• Frog responds "knee-deep" and BullFrog says "dont believe him" Then Turtle makes more gurgles
• Frog says "wade -in" as if he is translating for Turtle. Bull Frog tells Fox "there youll find your brother"
• Fox did see another Fox across the pond and reached across to shake his hand and fell in he didnt die and managed to scurry away but had he stayed any longer and the Mud Turtle wouldve gotten him

Old Mr.Rabbit, He's a Good Fisherman

• Rabbit finally got some peace and Bear Fox, Coon, and Rabbit all were working on a new roasting area by clearing the Briar and Rabbit was tired but feared he would be called lazy so he kept going and then pretended to have a brer stuck in his paw
• He left and found a well that seemed cool and sat in the bucket but began sinking in scared, Fox was following him and was confused and thought Rabbit either had his money there, found a gold mine, or something else that Fox would find out
• Fox crept close but didn't see nor hear anything. Rabbit stayed still so he wouldn't spill into the water saying his prayers over and over then Fox yelled down and asked who Rabbit was visiting.
• Rabbit said he was fishing for suckers. Fox asked how many were there, Rabbit said tons and that he needed help getting them out. 
• He got out of the bucket and held the rope and told Fox to hop in and grab the suckers then he will pull him out. Fox did, lifting Rabbit back up. 
• On the way up Rabbit sang :Good-bye, Brer Fox, take care your clothes;For this is the way the world goes; Some goes up and some goes down, You'll get to the bottom all safe and sound.
• Then he told the owners of the well that Fox was down there muddying up the water, then went back and told fox that a man with a gun was going to pull him up and that when he does he better run
• So half an hour later the two of them make it back to the clearing and work harder than ever, Rabbit occasionally laughing and Fox smiling embarrassed

Mr. Rabbit Meets His Match Again

• Buzzard and Rabbit went together on a crop and it did really well but Rabbit cheated Buzzard out of his share
• The crop was gone and Rabbit pretended to be more sad than Buzzard to throw him off the trail Buzzard knew and planned 
• one day Buzzard told Rabbit he found a gold mine across the river but Rabbit had to find a way to cross the river because whenever he got wet the whole family caught cold
• Buzzard said he would fly him across and he flew him to the tallest pine on an island in the river Rabbit caught on and told Buzzard since he was so nice he would show him his gold mine first and that they should head back
• Buzzard laughed because he didn't believe this Rabbit told him not to laugh because when he shakes it shakes his wings then they both will fall. 
• Buzzard starts going down and Rabbit explains what happened to the crops and agrees to divide it fair and Buzzard takes him home but Rabbit walked weak in the knees for a month

A Story About The Little Rabbits

• The Lil Rabbits were really good kids and if they were to ever misbehave they wouldve been harshly punished
• one day Fox came by and didn't see Rabbit who was out raiding a collard patch, or Miss Rabbit who was doing quilting with someone in town, Just the Lil Rabbits playing Hide n Switch
• The Lil Rabbits (I am calling them Bunnies from now on) were fat and tasty looking but Fox didn't act yet remembering what happened to Wolf
• the Bunnies huddled in the corner with fear while Fox came up with an excuse. He noticed a sugar cane in the corner and asked the Bunnies to break him off a piece but they couldn't no matter how hard they tried.
• A bird told sang a song of advice: 

Take your toothies and gnaw it,

Take your toothies and saw it,

Saw it and yoke it,

And then you can broke it.

• The Bunnies chewed it off just in time to give it to Fox who had to think of another excuse, he saw a sifter and told them to go to the creek and get him some water with it
• The Bunnies were sad because they couldn't get water with a sifter then a bird told them:

Sifter hold water same as a tray,

If you fill it with moss and dob it with clay;

The Fox get madder the longer you stay—

Fill it with moss and dob it with clay.

• They did and brought Fox water, which made him mad, so he told them to put this ginormous stick on the fire
• Bunnies couldn't do it so the bird sang again:

Spit in your hands and tug it and toll it,

And get behind it, and push it, and pole it;

Spit in your hands and rear back and roll it.

• They got the wood on the fire just as their dad came home, the bird flew away and the Fox tried to dash away but Rabbit asked him to stay for a snack as he gets lonely since Wolf no longer stops by to visit. this scared Fox and he went home

Mr. Rabbit and Mr. Bear

• One day Fox said he should plant a Goober patch and he went to work immediately
• Rabbit watched this and sang to his kids:

Ti-yi! Tungalee! I eat 'em pea, I pick 'em pea.

It grow in the ground, it grow so free;

Ti-yi! Them goober pea.

•  The goobers sprouted up soon enough but every time Fox went to check them, they were all torn up and he suspected Rabbit but Rabbit was so good at covering his tracks, there was no proof.
• one day Fox saw a crack in the fence where the rail had run smooth and set a trap. He bent down a hickory sapling and tied plow line to it and then a slip knot and trigger and attached it to the crack 
• Sure enough the next day Rabbit was stuck in the trap and was afraid he would fall while dangling but also was afraid of what would happen if he didn't get out. he started to think of an excuse for Fox when Bear came by after getting into a bee hive. He greeted Bear
• Bear asks how Rabbit is, Rabbit says he is fine, Bear asks why he is up there. Rabbit tells him he is making a dollar a minute acting as a scarecrow for Fox's goober-patch, and if Bear wanted to take his place since he has all those kids. 
• Bear and Rabbit switch places. Rabbit then runs and tells Fox someone is caught in his trap. Fox sees Bear and before he could explain Fox hits him in the mouth with his walking stick, this goes on anytime Bear opens his mouth
• meanwhile Rabbit runs away and hides from Bear, sure enough Bear runs down the road and asks Frog if he's seen Rabbit, Frog tells him he went that way, as Bear passed Rabbit got out of the mud hole he was hiding in and dries off then goes home like nothing happened.

Mr. Terrapin Shows His Strength

• I am calling Terrapin Turtle
• Miss Meadows and her gals are making Candy one evening and everyone comes and helps out in peace since there is a rule about fighting there
• Bear gets firewood, Fox tends fire, Rabbit greases plates so candy doesn't stick, Wolf keeps the dogs away and Turtle keeps the molasses from boiling over
• Rabbit starts bragging about he is the fastest, Fox he is the most clever, Wolf says he is the most servigorous, and Bear the strongest
• Turtle says they left him out and that he knows he is faster than Rabbit as he beat him before, but he also is stronger than Bear. And everyone doubted him and he said if they have a rope Bear can try to pull him up from the river
• The guys say they don't have rope so Turtle says then he must be stronger than Bear since Bear is chickening out. 
• Miss Meadows offers up her rope and says the guys can go down and settle the bet while the candy cools
• Turtle goes down to the river and tells the guys to bring the rope back to the woods up hill while he gets ready and he will hollar when he is
• Turtle ties the rope to a tree root in the water instead and hollars. Bear pulls on the rope winking at the ladies but the rope doesn't budge
• he tries harder with the rope over his shoulder, same result. Wolf helps, same thing. Turtle asks why they haven't started
• Turtle feels they quit pulling and unties the rope from the root and sits casually and tells Bear that that last pull was pretty strong and a little more and he would have had him , and that he had a bit of advantage on him being in the water
• Bear took well to the sweet talk and suggested they go get their candy and they did

Deluge

• Not really a Brer story but the Uncle Remus version of the great flood with african animals
• Back a long time ago animals used to have the same amount of cognisance as humans and would meet and settle their affairs
• Lion was there as the King, so was Rino, Elephant, even down to the Crawfish and they would argue and yell and sort our their dealings
• Elphant put his foot down while arguing and squished a Crawfish who squished whatever was under him. The Crawfish were mad now and took off with a big speech calling out the Elephant but no one heard except for Mud Turtle and Lizard who had no real say
• Lion and Unicorn were arguing and Elephant stomped again squishing another Crawfish almost getting Mud Turtle too. The Crawfish called Elephant out again but they may as well just been singing 
• No one paid attention to the Crawfish who waited nervously then not wanting to get squished, winked at Lizard and Mud Turtle and began boring holes in the ground
• They kept going until the reached the fountains of the earth and all the water rose out and drowned the other animals all because the bigger animals wouldn't listen

Plantation Proverbs

• I read these but they are all self explanatory so I did not denote them

Joel Chandler Harris, Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings  (1881), Text Source

Brer Bear Caught in Brer Fox's Goober Trap From Mr. Rabbit and Mr. Bear  on the Disney World Ride, Splash Mountain. Source

Note:

I have been to Disney World 3 times and love Splash Mountain but it wasn't until I went when I was 16 that I knew the origins of the ride were not just from Song of the South but rather the Brer Rabbit Stories that the movie was based on. Recently Disney has made the decision due to concerns that the ride was too outdated and racially insensitive. They instead will be changing the ride to be in the theme of 2009 film Princess and the Frog which highlights black culture in early 1920's New Orleans.