Horacio Quiroga

One day the snakes held a great ball. They invited the frogs and the toads, the flamingos, and the alligators and the fish. The fish, as they couldn’t walk, weren’t able to dance; but as the ball was on the riverside, they jumped up onto the sand and clapped along with their tails.

The alligators, to adorn themselves well, had put a necklace of bananas round their necks, and they smoked Paraguayan cigars. The toads had stuck fish scales all over their bodies, and waggled around as if they were swimming. And every time they passed, very serious, along the edge of the river, the fish shouted jibes to make fun of them.

The frogs had perfumed their whole bodies, and walked on two feet. And each one carried a little glow-worm that hung swinging like a little lantern.

But the most beautiful of all were the snakes. All, without exception, were dressed in ballerina dress, each snake according to her colour. The red snakes wore little skirts of grey tulle painted with stripes of brick dust and ash, because that is the colour of vipers.

And the most splendid of all were the snakes dressed in great, long chiffon dresses of red and black, and they danced around like serpentine party streamers. When the snakes danced and spun round on the points of their tails, all the guests applauded like mad.

Only the flamingos, who in those days had white feet, and had then as they do now very thick and twisted noses, only the flamingos were sad, because as they have very little intelligence, they hadn’t known how to dress up. They envied everybody’s finery, and above all that of the coral snakes. Every time that a snake passed by in front of them, flirting and waving her serpentine chiffon, the flamingos died of envy.

Then one flamingo said: “I know what we’re going to do. We’re going to put on black, red and white stockings, and the coral snakes are going to fall in love with us.

And taking off in flight together, they crossed the river and ran into a store in town.

“Knock! Knock!” they rapped with their feet.

“Who is it?” answered the store man.

“We’re the flamingos. Do you have any black, red and white stockings?”

“No, there aren’t any,” answered the store man. “Are you nuts? You won’t find stockings like that anywhere.” So the flamingos went to another store.

“Knock, knock! Have you got any black, red and white stockings?”

“What did you say? Black, red and white? There are no stockings like that anywhere. You’re all crazy. Who are you?”

“We’re the flamingos,” they replied.

“Then clearly you’re crazy flamingos.”

They went to another store.

“Knock, knock! Do you have any black, red and white stockings?”

The store man shouted: “What colour? Black, red and white? Only big-nose birds like you would think of asking for stockings like that. Get out of here at once!”

And the man shooed them away with his broom.

The flamingos went to every store in town, and everywhere they were dismissed as crazy.

Then an armadillo, who had gone for a drink of water by the river, decided to play a trick on the flamingos, and he told them, with a friendly greeting: “Good evening Messrs flamingos! I know what you are looking for. You won’t find stockings like that in any store. Perhaps they have them in Buenos Aires, but you’d have to order them by post. My sister-in-law, the Owl, has stockings like that. Ask her for them, and she will give you the black, red and white stockings you want.

The flamingos thanked him, and went flying off to the Owl’s cave. And they said to her: “Good evening, Owl! We’ve  come to ask you for black, red and white stockings. The snakes are having a great ball, and if we put those stockings on, the coral snakes are going to fall in love with us .

“With pleasure!” replied the owl. “Just wait a moment. I’ll be right back.”

And she flew off, leaving the flamingos alone. A little while later she came back with the stockings. But they weren’t stockings; they were coral snakeskins, gorgeous skins recently stripped off the snakes that the Owl had hunted.

“Here are the stockings,” said the owl. “You’ll have no worries at all, but remember just one thing: dance all night, dance without ever stopping, dance sideways, dance on your heads, any way you want; but don’t stop for a second, because if you do instead of dancing you’ll end up weeping.”

But the flamingos, being so stupid, didn’t understand what the great danger was, and wild with joy they put on the snakeskins like stockings, sticking their legs inside the skins as if they were tubes. And then they flew off happily to the ball.

When they saw the flamingos with their beautiful stockings, all the guests were jealous. The snakes only ever wanted to dance with them, and as the flamingos never stopped moving their legs for a moment, the snakes couldn’t see what their stockings were made of.

But little by little, the snakes began to get suspicious. When the flamingos went dancing past them, they crouched down to the ground to get a good look. The coral snakes were especially concerned. They never took their eyes off the stockings, and they crouched down too, trying to touch the flamingos’ legs with their tongues, because the tongue is to the snake what the hand is to a human being. But the flamingos danced on without stopping, even though they were tired and felt they couldn’t go on.

The coral snakes, who knew this, asked the frogs for their little lanterns, which were glow worms, and they all waited together for the flamingos to collapse from exhaustion. And indeed, a minute later one flamingo who simply couldn’t go on tripped over an alligator’s cigar and staggered and fell on his side. At once the coral snakes ran over with their lanterns and shone them on the flamingo’s legs. And they saw what the stockings were really, and let out a cry that could be heard on the far side of the Paraná river.

“They’re not stockings!” cried the snakes. “We know what they are! They’ve tricked us! The flamingos have killed our sisters and have put their skins on like stockings! The stockings they have are made of coral snakes!”

When they heard this, the flamingos, filled with fear because they’d been discovered, tried to fly away; but they were so tired that none of them could lift a leg. Then the coral snakes leapt at them, and coiling around their legs they tore the stockings to shreds with their teeth. They ripped up the stocking in a fury, and bit the flamingo’s legs too, to kill them. The flamingos, driven wild with pain, leapt from one side to another so that the coral snakes couldn’t coil around their legs. Finally, seeing not a shred of the stockings was left, the snakes let them go, exhausted, straightening out the muslin of their dancing suits. The coral snakes were sure that the flamingos were going to die anyway, because at least half of the snakes that had bit them were poisonous.

But the flamingos did not die. They ran into the water in great pain. They screamed and cried, and their legs, which had been white, had turned red from the snake poison. Days went by, and they continued to feel a burning pain in their legs, which were always the colour of blood because they were poisoned.

This all happened a very long time ago. But still to this day, the flamingos spend almost all day with their red legs stuck in the water, trying to soothe the pain they feel in them. Sometimes they leave the water and take a few steps onto the land to see how they feel. But the pain from the poison comes right back and they run back again into the water. At times the pain they feel is so great that they pull one leg up and hold it that way for hours, because they can’t stretch it out. This is the story of the flamingos, who used to have white legs and now have red ones. All the fish know why, and they make fun of them. But the flamingos, while soothing themselves in the water, never miss a chance to get revenge, and eat any little mocking fish that gets to close.

A follower of the Modernist school founded by Rubén Darío, and greatly influenced by the works of Edgar Allen Poe, Uruguayan writer Horacio Quiroga (1878-1937) was a master of the macabre tale. Even his humorous tales, like the one included here, are tinged with tragic and even horrific elements that reveal the savage and brutal justice of Nature.

Translated by Martin Boyd