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The
most interesting and satisfactory answers to these questionscan be
found in folklore. A folk tale among the Han people goes asfollows: Once
upon a time, Huangdi（the Yellow Emperor） wantedto choose 12 animals to
guard his palace. The cat entrusted the rat todraw up a list of animals
to compete for the positions. The rat forgotto include the cat, which
thenceforth became the rat' s enemy. Anelephant came to join the
contest, and the rat ran up its trunk andcaused it to stampede. The rat
then jumped onto the back of the oxwhich was the leader of the other
animals, whereupon the pig startedsquealing. So the rat ended up at the
head of the procession ofanimals, and the pig was assigned to the rear.
The tiger and thedragon were not pleased with this, and so were made the
King of theMountains and the King of the Sea, respectively, and placed
behindthe rat and the ox. The rabbit was not satisfied either. He beat
thedragon in a race, and so was placed in front of the latter.
Thisincensed the dog, which bit the rabbit. For this, the dog was
punishedby being placed second from the end. The snake, the horse,
thesheep, the monkey and the cock also competed for positions, andwere
arranged accordingly. And so, the final lineup was: Rat, Ox,Tiger,
Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Sheep, Monkey, Cock, Dogand pig.
