Fables of La Fontaine Part 14

So Renard clamber'd out, And, leaving there the goat, Discharged his obligations By preaching thus on patience:-- 'Had Heaven put sense thy head within, To match the beard upon thy chin, Thou wouldst have thought a bit, Before descending such a pit.

I'm out of it; good bye: With prudent effort try Yourself to extricate.

For me, affairs of state Permit me not to wait.'

Whatever way you wend, Consider well the end.

[11] Aesop; also in Phaedrus, IV. 9.

VI.--THE EAGLE, THE WILD SOW, AND THE CAT.[12]

A certain hollow tree Was tenanted by three.

An eagle held a lofty bough, The hollow root a wild wood sow, A female cat between the two.

All busy with maternal labours, They lived awhile obliging neighbours.

At last the cat's deceitful tongue Broke up the peace of old and young.

Up climbing to the eagle's nest, She said, with whisker'd lips compress'd, 'Our death, or, what as much we mothers fear, That of our helpless offspring dear, Is surely drawing near.

Beneath our feet, see you not how Destruction's plotted by the sow?

Her constant digging, soon or late, Our proud old castle will uproot.

And then--O, sad and shocking fate!-- She'll eat our young ones, as the fruit!

Were there but hope of saving one, 'Twould soothe somewhat my bitter moan.'

Thus leaving apprehensions hideous, Down went the puss perfidious To where the sow, no longer digging, Was in the very act of pigging.

'Good friend and neighbour,' whisper'd she, 'I warn you on your guard to be.

Your pigs should you but leave a minute, This eagle here will seize them in it.

Speak not of this, I beg, at all, Lest on my head her wrath should fall.'

Another breast with fear inspired, With fiendish joy the cat retired.

The eagle ventured no egress To feed her young, the sow still less.

Fools they, to think that any curse Than ghastly famine could be worse!

Both staid at home, resolved and obstinate, To save their young ones from impending fate,-- The royal bird for fear of mine, For fear of royal claws the swine.

All died, at length, with hunger, The older and the younger; There staid, of eagle race or boar, Not one this side of death's dread door;-- A sad misfortune, which The wicked cats made rich.

O, what is there of h.e.l.lish plot The treacherous tongue dares not!

Of all the ills Pandora's box[13] outpour'd, Deceit, I think, is most to be abhorr'd.

[12] Phaedrus, II. 4.

[13] _Pandora's box._--Pandora, the Eve of the Grecian mythology, was sent to earth with all the human ills and Hope in a box, whence all but Hope escaped.--_Vide_ Elton's Hesiod, _Works and Days_, I. 114, Bohn's edition, &c.

VII.--THE DRUNKARD AND HIS WIFE.[14]

Each has his fault, to which he clings In spite of shame or fear.

This apophthegm a story brings, To make its truth more clear.

A sot had lost health, mind, and purse; And, truly, for that matter, Sots mostly lose the latter Ere running half their course.

When wine, one day, of wit had fill'd the room, His wife inclosed him in a s.p.a.cious tomb.

There did the fumes evaporate At leisure from his drowsy pate.

When he awoke, he found His body wrapp'd around With grave-clothes, chill and damp, Beneath a dim sepulchral lamp.

'How's this? My wife a widow sad?'

He cried, 'and I a ghost? Dead? dead?'

Thereat his spouse, with snaky hair, And robes like those the Furies wear, With voice to fit the realms below, Brought boiling caudle to his bier-- For Lucifer the proper cheer; By which her husband came to know-- For he had heard of those three ladies-- Himself a citizen of Hades.

'What may your office be?'

The phantom question'd he.

'I'm server up of Pluto's meat, And bring his guests the same to eat.'

'Well,' says the sot, not taking time to think, 'And don't you bring us anything to drink?'

[14] Aesop.

VIII.--THE GOUT AND THE SPIDER.[15]

When Nature angrily turn'd out Those plagues, the spider and the gout,-- 'See you,' said she, 'those huts so meanly built, These palaces so grand and richly gilt?

By mutual agreement fix Your choice of dwellings; or if not, To end th' affair by lot, Draw out these little sticks.'

'The huts are not for me,' the spider cried; 'And not for me the palace,' cried the gout; For there a sort of men she spied Call'd doctors, going in and out, From whom, she could not hope for ease.

So hied her to the huts the fell disease, And, fastening on a poor man's toe, Hoped there to fatten on his woe, And torture him, fit after fit, Without a summons e'er to quit, From old Hippocrates.

The spider, on the lofty ceiling, As if she had a life-lease feeling.

Wove wide her cunning toils, Soon rich with insect spoils.

A maid destroy'd them as she swept the room: Repair'd, again they felt the fatal broom.

The wretched creature, every day, From house and home must pack away.

At last, her courage giving out, She went to seek her sister gout, And in the field descried her, Quite starved: more evils did betide her Than e'er befel the poorest spider-- Her toiling host enslaved her so, And made her chop, and dig, and hoe!

(Says one, "Kept brisk and busy, The gout is made half easy.") 'O, when,' exclaim'd the sad disease, 'Will this my misery stop?

O, sister spider, if you please, Our places let us swop.'

The spider gladly heard, And took her at her word,-- And flourish'd in the cabin-lodge, Not forced the tidy broom to dodge The gout, selecting her abode With an ecclesiastic judge, Turn'd judge herself, and, by her code, He from his couch no more could budge.

The salves and cataplasms Heaven knows, That mock'd the misery of his toes; While aye, without a blush, the curse, Kept driving onward worse and worse.

Needless to say, the sisterhood Thought their exchange both wise and good.

[15] The story of this fable is told in Petrarch, (Epistles, III. 13) and by others.

IX.--THE WOLF AND THE STORK.[16]

The wolves are p.r.o.ne to play the glutton.

One, at a certain feast, 'tis said, So stuff'd himself with lamb and mutton, He seem'd but little short of dead.

Deep in his throat a bone stuck fast.

Well for this wolf, who could not speak, That soon a stork quite near him pa.s.s'd.

By signs invited, with her beak The bone she drew With slight ado, And for this skilful surgery Demanded, modestly, her fee.

'Your fee!' replied the wolf, In accents rather gruff; 'And is it not enough Your neck is safe from such a gulf?

Go, for a wretch ingrate, Nor tempt again your fate!'

[16] Phaedrus, I. 8; and Aesop.

X.--THE LION BEATEN BY THE MAN.[17]