7. The Boy Hunting Locusts
A BOY was hunting for locusts.
He had caught a goodly number, when he saw a Scorpion, and mistaking him for a locust, reached out his hand to take him.
The Scorpion, showing his sting, said:
If you had but touched me, my friend, you would have lost me, and all your locusts too!"
8. The Cock and the Jewel
A COCK, scratching for food for himself and his hens, found a precious stone and exclaimed: "If your owner had found thee, and not I, he would have taken thee up, and have set thee in thy first estate; but I have found thee for no purpose.
I would rather have one barleycorn than all the jewels in the world."
9. The Kingdom of the Lion
THE BEASTS of the field and forest had a Lion as their king.
He was neither wrathful, cruel, nor tyrannical, but just and gentle as a king could be.
During his reign he made a royal proclamation for a general assembly of all the birds and beasts, and drew up conditions for a universal league, in which the Wolf and the Lamb, the Panther and the Kid, the Tiger and the Stag, the Dog and the Hare, should live together in perfect peace and amity.
The Hare said, "Oh, how I have longed to see this day, in which the weak shall take their place with impunity by the side of the strong."
And after the Hare said this, he ran for his life. |
