A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.

Overview

A widow travelling with her two daughters encounters a huge coiled snake blocking the narrow path beside a stream. Its head is poised to attack. The narrator identifies it as an ogre in disguise; it addresses the mother in a deep voice, asking where she is going. When she flees into thorny bushes it moves faster, wraps her in its folds and eats her.

The daughters run into the bushes and hide beneath a rock. Their loss introduces the story’s protective fairy, who adopts them, changes them into birds and eventually settles them elsewhere as grown women. The snake-ogre is not defeated in that subsequent plot, and the mother is not released from its body. Its represented powers are disguise, speech and overpowering pursuit; the tale supplies no later human form or additional name.

Huge coiled snake formDeep speaking voiceOgre disguiseConstriction and consumption
01

Origins & earliest records

Bourhill and Drake collected and arranged this English narrative for children. The chapter labels it a Zulu tale but does not name an individual contributor.

02

Records & interpretation

Complete XIII. The Reward of Industry, printed pp. 151–159, including the narrated resolution.

Selected bibliography

Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.

  1. 01

    Fairy Tales from South Africa

    Sarah F. Bourhill and Beatrice L. Drake, collectors and arrangers · 1908

    XIII. The Reward of Industry, pp. 151–159; contributor and editorial roles kept separate.

Family & connections

A source-supported family tree or inspiration record has not yet been compiled for this profile. Related reading below indicates a connection in subject matter, not a proven lineage or creative influence.

Located primary passages

Specific passages supporting details in this entry, grouped by their published witness.

Primary source witness

Sarah F. Bourhill (Mrs. E. J. Bourhill) and Beatrice L. Drake (Mrs. J. B. Drake), Fairy Tales from South Africa, London: Macmillan, 1908; selected original title page and complete headed tales in PG75833. Arranged for children; introduction pp.v–xi attributes principally Swazi, also Zulu and border-region contributions, with Shining Princess attributed to Mapoch. Individual narrators for these selected tales unnamed. Historical colonial framing is not current community consensus.

  1. A widowed mother travelling with two daughters meets an immense speaking snake blocking a path. The narration explicitly identifies it as an ogre in disguise. It coils around and consumes the fleeing mother; the girls escape to a rock.

    XIII The Reward of Industry, pp.152–153; disguised attacker

  2. The daughters describe both parents as dead, and a different helper rescues and raises them. No episode releases the swallowed mother, kills the snake or shows its later recovery. The later fairy transformation does not retroactively identify the ogre as a harmless test.

    XIII, pp.154–159; fatal consequence retained

Selected historical arrangement, not unmediated original-language oral testimony. Individual contributor not named; no separate manuscript inspected. Original facsimile not visually inspected in this batch.

References

Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.

  1. Historical collected tale in an English literary arrangementSarah F. Bourhill and Beatrice L. Drake — XIII. The Reward of IndustryResearch access: 2026-10-05

Image credits

A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.

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