Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse | Page 3

a return, but a blessing will surely follow.
FABLE VI.
THE FOX WITHOUT A TAIL.
A FOX being caught in a steel trap by his tail, was glad to compound for his escape with the loss of it; but on coming abroad into the world, began to be so sensible of the disgrace such a defect would bring upon him, that he almost wished he had died rather than left it behind him. However, to make the best of a bad matter, he formed a project in his head to call an assembly of the rest of the Foxes, and propose it for their imitation as a fashion which would be very agreeable and becoming. He did so, and made a long harangue upon the unprofitableness of tails in general, and endeavoured chiefly to show the awkwardness and inconvenience of a Fox's tail in?particular; adding that it would be both more graceful and more expeditious to be altogether without them, and that, for his part, what he had only imagined and conjectured before, he now found by experience; for that he never enjoyed himself so well, nor found himself so easy as he had done since he cut off his tail. He said no more, but looked about with a brisk air to see what proselytes he had gained; when a sly old Fox in the company, who understood trap, answered him, with a leer, "I believe you may have found a?conveniency in parting with your tail; and when we are in the same circumstances, perhaps we may do so too."
[Illustration: THE FOX WITHOUT A TAIL.]
MORAL.
It is common for men to wish others reduced to their own level, and we ought to guard against such advice as may proceed from this principle.
FABLE VII.
THE BUTTERFLY AND THE SNAIL.
As in the sunshine of the morn,?A Butterfly, but newly born,?Sat proudly perking on a rose,?With pert conceit his bosom glows;?His wings, all glorious to behold,?Bedropt with azure, jet and gold,?Wide he displays; the spangled dew?Reflects his eyes, and various hue.
His now forgotten friend, a Snail,?Beneath his house, with slimy trail,?Crawls o'er the grass; whom, when he spies,?In wrath he to the gardener cries:
"What means yon peasant's daily toil,?From choaking weeds to rid the soil??Why wake you to the morning's care??Why with new arts correct the year??Why glows the peach with crimson hue??And why the plum's inviting blue??Were they to feast his taste designed,?That vermin, of voracious kind??Crush, then, the slow, the pilf'ring race;?So purge thy garden from disgrace."
"What arrogance!" the Snail replied;?"How insolent is upstart pride!?Hadst thou not thus, with insult vain,?Provoked my patience to complain,?I had concealed thy meaner birth,?Nor traced thee to the scum of earth:?For, scarce nine suns have wak'd the hours,?To swell the fruit, and paint the flowers,?Since I thy humbler life surveyed,?In base, in sordid guise arrayed;?A hideous insect, vile, unclean,?You dragg'd a slow and noisome train;?And from your spider-bowels drew?Foul film, and spun the dirty clue.?I own my humble life, good friend;?Snail was I born, and Snail shall end.?And what's a Butterfly? At best,?He's but a Caterpillar, dress'd;?And all thy race (a numerous seed)?Shall prove of Caterpillar breed."
MORAL.
All upstarts, insolent in place,?Remind us of their vulgar race.
FABLE VIII.
THE WOLF AND THE CRANE.
A WOLF, after too greedily devouring his prey, happened to have a bone stick in his throat, which gave him so much pain that he went howling up and down, and importuning every creature he met to lend him a kind hand in order to his relief; nay, he even promised a reward to anyone who should undertake the operation with success. At last the Crane, tempted with the lucre of the reward, and having first made the Wolf confirm his promise with an oath, undertook the business, and ventured his long neck into the rapacious felon's throat.
In short, he plucked out the bone, and expected the promised gratuity; when the Wolf, turning his eyes disdainfully towards him, said, "I did not think you had been so unreasonable! Have I not suffered you safely to draw your neck out of my jaws? And have you the conscience to demand a further reward?"
MORAL.
When we do good to bad men, we must not expect good from them.
FABLE IX.
THE FROG AND THE RAT.
Once on a time, a foolish Frog,?Vain, proud, and stupid as a log,?Tired with the marsh, her native home,?Imprudently abroad would roam,?And fix her habitation where?She'd breathe at least a purer air.?She was resolved to change, that's poz;?Could she be worse than where she was?
Away the silly creature leaps.?A Rat, who saw her lab'ring steps,?Cried out, "Where in this hurry, pray??You certainly will go astray!"
"Ne'er fear; I quit that filthy bog,?Where I so long have croaked incog:?People of talents, sure, should thrive,?And not be buried thus alive.?But, pray (for I'm extremely dry),?Know you of any water nigh?"
"None," said the Rat,