The Talking Mule
A South Carolina Tall Tale
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
A farmer owned a mule which he used for work all week. But being a Church-going man, he let the mule rest on Sunday.
One Sunday, the farmer had to go to a funeral. So he sent his son to saddle the mule.
"Since when do I have to work on Sunday?" asked the mule.
The boy dropped the saddle and ran to the house.
"Paw, the mule talked!" he shouted.
"Can't you even saddle the mule?" asked the farmer.
"But Paw, the mule don't want to work on Sunday," the boy protested.
The farmer sent the boy to his room for talking crazy and went out to saddle the mule.
"Move over," he said to the mule.
"Where's my supper?" asked the mule.
The farmer dropped the saddle in the same spot as his boy and ran out of the barn, followed by the dog.
"I ain't never heard a mule talk before," he gasped.
"Me neither," said the dog.
The man bolted for the house and slammed the door.
"The mule talked!" he told his wife.
"What!" said his wife.
"And when I exclaimed: 'I ain't never heard a mule talk before', the dog said: 'Me neither'."
"That's crazy," said his wife.
"What's so crazy about that?" asked the cat. "Haven't you ever heard of a talking mule?"
You can read more South Carolina folktales in Spooky South by S.E. Schlosser
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Comments
nice story
Posted by: abi | September 12, 2010 07:18 PM
rotflmfao this is funny
Posted by: domoniji | September 23, 2010 10:42 AM
Haha lol
Posted by: Anonymous | September 28, 2010 12:10 AM
hahaaaa thts cute lol
Posted by: Anonymous | November 10, 2010 10:40 AM
Weird, they never heard of a talking Mule (I think its a horse)but thier cat and dog talks. Nice story though.
Posted by: Courtney | December 21, 2010 06:03 PM
Haha, that's the only story from my state! and its funny!
Posted by: Bigfoot | January 13, 2011 05:22 PM
cool story
Posted by: ryan harley | January 26, 2011 09:03 AM
that's real funny huh!!!LOL
Posted by: Bullet | January 31, 2011 09:57 AM
very good i just love it whoever wrote it is a genius
Posted by: Anonymous | March 2, 2011 09:48 PM
I love this story!
(I do think the African version is better though
Posted by: Anonymous | March 5, 2011 07:22 PM
it is FUNNY
Posted by: Anonymous | May 25, 2011 10:38 AM