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A Blood Feud
A snake crawled up to a countryman's child and killed it. Provoked by this outrage, the father took an axe and waited at the snake's hole, ready to strike it as soon as it came out. When it put its head out he brought down the axe, but missed it and chipped the rock instead. After that he was on his guard against reprisals, and asked his enemy to be reconciled with him. But the snake refused. "No," it said, "I cannot be on good terms with you when I see that cut in the rock, nor you with me when you look at your son's grave."
A serious quarrel cannot be lightly made up.
Dedicated to Jessica Swan
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Evil for Good
One winter's day a farm-hand found a snake frozen stiff with the cold, and moved by compassiion he picked it up and put it in his bosom. But with the warmth its natural instinct returned, and it gave its benefactor a fatal bite. As he died he said: "I have got what I deserve for taking pity on an evil creature."
This story shows that even the greatest kindness cannot change a bad nature.
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Fireside Sketch
A man bought a parrot, to which he gave the run of the house. It was quite tame, and jumping one day onto the hearth it perched there and kept up a pleasant chatter. The house cat eyed it, and asked who it was and where it came from. It said that the master had just bought it. "Then most audacious of creatures," said the cat, "fancy a newcomer like you making such a nouse, when I, who was born in the house, am not allowed to miaow! If ever I do, they are cross and chivy my away." "O mistress of the house," answered the parrot, "my advice to yo is to take along walk. You see, there's a difference. The family does not dislike my voice as it does yours."
This fable stirizes ill-natured critics who are always trying to find fault with outhers (Jessica).
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Tit for Tat
Do not do an ill turn to anyone. But if someone injures you, he deserves, according to the fable which I am going to relate, to be paid back in his own coin.
The story is that a strok which had arrived from foreign parts recieved an invitation to dinner from a fox, who served her with clear soup on a smooth slab of marble, so that the hungry bird could not taste a drop of it. Returing the invitation, the stork produced a flagon filled with pap, into which she stuck her bill and had a good meal, while her guest was tormented with hunger. "You set the example," she said, "and you must not complain at my following it."
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More fables:
Aesop's Fables
Aesop's Fables
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