THE DRUM AS TOLD BY CHINUA ACHEBE

"Long, long ago, when the world was young, all the animals lived together in one country. In those days there were not as many tortoises as there are today but only one tortoise, Mbe, the ancestor of all tortoises..."

In this idyllic world, a time of famine comes. Tortoise, in desperation, journeys out in search of food. At last he comes upon a palm tree with "thrice four hundred" ripe palm fruits. Atop this palm tree, one of the fruits slips from Tortoise's hand. Unwilling to give up even one of these succulent fruits, Tortoise descends. But the fruit has fallen into a hole, and Tortoise follows.

Tortoise has found his way into the Spirit World, where a spirit child has just eaten his fruit. Tortoise demands recompense and in payment, and the spirits give Tortoise a drum. Upon returning home, Tortoise finds that the drum can provide an endless supply of food.

After a week of feasting, at last certain that the food will not run out, Tortoise decides to share his riches under the condition that the animals make him king. So starved are the animals that they agree. Tortoise, who has decided that beating a drum is beneath a king's dignity, assigns elephant to beat the drum at his coronation ceremony. But the elephant beats the drum too hard.

The drum is broken. And with no drum, no king. "'What's the good of a king without a food drum?'"

So Tortoise returns to the Spirit World. He tricks the same spirit child into eating another of his palm fruits, and then parlays that insult into another drum. But this time, the spirits allow him to choose his drum from many. Tortoise chooses the largest drum, of course

Upon his ascent, Tortoise tests the drum, and "masked spirits with bundles of whips appeared from nowhere and began rushing and jumping around and hitting at everything in their way." They are followed by wasps and bees. Tortoise is badly beaten and stung; it takes days to recover.

When Tortoise regains consciousness, he chooses to share his new "gift" as he did his old. He makes a big show out of holding back the drum until the time is right, but his "subjects" chant, "We! Want! It! Now!! The! King! Of! Drums!!" Tortoise, after locking himself safely in his hut, complies. "As for the animals, what they saw that evening has never been fully told. Suffice it to say that they dragged themselves out of Tortoise's compound howling and bleeding."