“Ah, beloved griffiness, my tail is yours to eternity, but you pinch it a little too hard.”
Scarcely had he said this, when down dropped the basket, but not with the fox in it; he found himself caught by the tail, and dangling half way down the rock, by the help of the very same sort of pulley wherewith he had snared the dog. I leave you to guess his consternation; he yelped out as loud as he could,—for it hurts a fox exceedingly to be hanged by his tail with his head downwards,—when the door of the rock opened, and out stalked the griffin himself, smoking his pipe, with a vast crowd of all the fashionable beasts in the neighbourhood.
“Oho, brother,” said the bear, laughing fit to kill himself; “who ever saw a fox hanged by the tail before?”
“You’ll have need of a physician,” quoth Doctor Ape.
“A pretty match, indeed; a griffiness for such a creature as you!” said the goat, strutting by him.
The fox grinned with pain, and said nothing. But that which hurt him most was the compassion of a dull fool of a donkey, who assured him with great gravity that he saw nothing at all to laugh at in his situation!
“At all events,” said the fox, at last, “cheated, gulled, betrayed as I am, I have played the same trick to the dog. Go and laugh at him, gentlemen; he deserves it as much as I can, I assure you.”
“Pardon me,” said the griffin, taking the pipe out of his mouth; “one never laughs at the honest.”
“And see,” said the bear, “here he is.”
And indeed the dog had, after much effort, gnawed the string in two, and extricated his paw; the scent of the fox had enabled him to track his footsteps, and here he arrived, burning for vengeance and finding himself already avenged.