Long, long ago, a young gentleman went on a journey riding on a horse. Before he had gone very far, a May beetle came flying towards him. ‘Hullo, young gentleman!’ it said. ‘May I come with you?’

‘Certainly,” answered the young man. ‘Do come with me.’

So the May beetle alighted the horse and they both rode on together. Then an egg came rolling along the road towards them, and it too said, ‘Hullo, young gentleman! May I come with you?’

And the man replied, ‘Certainly, do come with me.’ So the egg got on the horse, too.

This happened again with a crab, then came a rice ladle, an awl, a mortar, a straw mat and finally a pack carrier.

So the young gentleman, the May beetle, the egg, the crab, the rice ladle, the awl, the mortar, the straw mat and the pack carrier went on their journey together, all riding on the horse. In the evening they came to a house in the mountains and knocked at the gate. No answer came from the house. So the young man opened the gate himself and went into the house. In a room he found a young girl sobbing bitterly.

‘What is the matter?’ he asked. ‘Why are you sobbing?’

‘There is a tiger in the mountain behind the house,’ she answered. ‘It has come down every night, and already it has eaten my father, my mother, my brother and my sister. It will be my turn tonight. That is why I am crying.’

So he said to soothe her, ‘Do not be alarmed. My friends and I can help you.’

He devised a plan, and sent all of his newfound friends to their posts. The girl then went to her room and lit a candle, while the young man waited in the stable with his horse in the dark. Before long the tiger came down from the mountain and went into the house. It sprang into the girl’s room and tried to seize her.

At that moment, the May beetle, hiding by the candle, blew it out with its wings. So the tiger said, ‘My dear girl, the light has gone out. I can’t see where you are.’

The girl answered, ‘You can’t eat me in the dark. You had better go into the kitchen and blow the fire to get some light.’ So the tiger went to the kitchen and bent down to blow at the embers of the charcoal fire.

The egg, which was hiding in the ashes left from the fire, burst out and blew ashes in the tiger’s eyes. ‘Oh my eyes,’ the tiger screeched in pain, and then rushed to the sink to bathe them in water. But the crab was hiding in the sink and jumped out and gouged out the tiger’s eyes with its claws. Blinded, the tiger rushed from the kitchen in a frenzy. As it passed a kettle, the rice-ladle emerged from behind the kettle and hit the tiger violently in its face. Then the tiger tried to get back to the girl’s room, but when it stepped on a part of the floor, the awl, which had hidden itself under the floorboards, pierced the tiger’s foot. So it leapt out of the house onto the ground, writhing in pain. Then the mortar, which was waiting on the roof, jumped from its perch and crushed the tiger to death. The straw mat and the pack carrier emerged from the storeroom where they had been hiding. The straw mat wrapped up the tiger’s body, and then the pack carrier hauled it off to the river and threw it into the water.