277. The Crow and the Serpent
A CROW in great want of food saw a Serpent asleep in a sunny nook, and flying down, greedily seized him. The Serpent, turning about, bit the Crow with a
mortal wound. In the agony of death, the bird exclaimed:
"O unhappy me! who have found in that which I deemed a happy windfall the source of my destruction."
278. The Hunter and the Horseman
A CERTAIN HUNTER, having snared a hare, placed it upon his shoulders and set out
homewards.
On his way he met a man on
horseback who begged the hare of him, under the pretense of purchasing it. However, when the Horseman got the hare, he rode off as fast as he could. The Hunter ran after him, as if he was sure of overtaking him, but the Horseman increased more and more the distance between them.
The Hunter,
sorely against his will, called out to him and said, "Get along with you! for I will now make you a present of the hare."
279. The King's Son and the Painted Lion
A KING, whose only son was fond of
martial exercises, had a dream in which he was warned that his son would be killed by a lion.
Afraid the dream should prove true, he built for his son a pleasant palace and adorned its walls for his amusement with all kinds of life-sized animals, among which was the picture of a lion. When the young Prince saw this, his grief at being thus confined burst out afresh, and, standing near the lion, he said:
"O you most detestable of animals! through a lying dream of my father's, which he saw in his sleep, I am shut up on your account in this palace as if I had been a girl: what shall I now do to you?' With these words he stretched out his hands toward a thorn-tree, meaning to cut a stick from its branches so that he might beat the lion. But one of the tree's prickles pierced his finger and caused great pain and inflammation, so that the young Prince fell down in a fainting fit. A violent fever suddenly set in, from which he died not many days later.
We had better bear our troubles
bravely than try to escape them.
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