THE HEN WITH THE GOLDEN EGGS
LA FONTAINE
How avarice loseth all,
By striving all to gain,
I need no witness call
But him whose thrifty hen,
As by the fable we are told,
Laid every day an egg of gold.
"She hath a treasure in her body,"
Bethinks the avaricious noddy.
He kills and opens—vexed to find
All things like hens of common kind.
Thus spoil'd the source of all his riches,
To misers he a lesson teaches.
In these last changes of the moon,
How often doth one see
Men made as poor as he
By force of getting rich too soon!
[218]
THE WOLF IN SHEEP'S CLOTHING
A Wolf wrapped himself in the skin of a Sheep and by that means got admission into a sheep-fold, where he devoured several of the young Lambs. The Shepherd, however, soon found him out and hung him up to a tree, still in his disguise.
Some other Shepherds, passing that way, thought it was a Sheep hanging, and cried to their friend, "What, brother! is that the way you serve Sheep in this part of the country?"
"No, friends," cried he, turning the hanging body around so that they might see what it was; "but it is the way to serve Wolves, even though they be dressed in Sheep's clothing."
The credit got by a lie lasts only till the truth comes out.