Coxcombs, an ever-noisy race,
Are trumpets of their own disgrace.'
'Why so severe?' the cub replies;
'Our senate always held me wise.'
'How weak is pride!' returns the sire;
'All fools are vain, when fools admire!
But know what stupid asses prize,
Lions and noble beasts despise.'
* * * * *
FABLE XX.
THE OLD HEN AND THE COCK.
Restrain your child; you'll soon believe
The text which says, we sprung from Eve.
As an old hen led forth her train,
And seemed to peck to shew the grain;
She raked the chaff, she scratched the ground,
And gleaned the spacious yard around.
A giddy chick, to try her wings,
On the well's narrow margin springs,
And prone she drops. The mother's breast
All day with sorrow was possess'd.
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A cock she met; her son she knew;
And in her heart affection grew.
'My son,' says she, 'I grant your years
Have reached beyond a mother's cares;
I see you vig'rous, strong, and bold;
I hear with joy your triumphs told.
Tis not from cocks thy fate I dread;
But let thy ever-wary tread
Avoid yon well; that fatal place
Is sure perdition to our race.
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Print this my counsel on thy breast;
To the just gods I leave the rest.'
He thanked her care; yet day by day
His bosom burned to disobey;
And every time the well he saw,
Scorned in his heart the foolish law:
Near and more near each day he drew,
And longed to try the dangerous view.
'Why was this idle charge?' he cries;
'Let courage female fears despise.
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Or did she doubt my heart was brave,
And therefore this injunction gave?
Or does her harvest store the place,
A treasure for her younger race?
And would she thus my search prevent?
I stand resolved, and dare the event.'
Thus said. He mounts the margin's round,
And pries into the depth profound.
He stretched his neck; and from below
With stretching neck advanced a foe:
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With wrath his ruffled plumes he rears,
The foe with ruffled plumes appears:
Threat answered threat, his fury grew,
Headlong to meet the war he flew,
But when the watery death he found,
He thus lamented as he drowned:
'I ne'er had been in this condition,
But for my mother's prohibition.'
* * * * *
FABLE XXI.
THE RAT-CATCHER AND CATS.
The rats by night such mischief did,
Betty was every morning chid.
They undermined whole sides of bacon,
Her cheese was sapped, her tarts were taken.
Her pasties, fenced with thickest paste,
Were all demolished, and laid waste.
She cursed the cat for want of duty,
Who left her foes a constant booty.
An engineer, of noted skill,
Engaged to stop the growing ill.
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From room to room he now surveys
Their haunts, their works, their secret ways;
Finds where they 'scape an ambuscade,
And whence the nightly sally's made.
An envious cat from place to place,
Unseen, attends his silent pace.
She saw, that if his trade went on,
The purring race must be undone;
So, secretly removes his baits,
And every stratagem defeats.
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Again he sets the poisoned toils,
And puss again the labour foils.
'What foe (to frustrate my designs)
My schemes thus nightly countermines?'
Incensed, he cries: 'this very hour
This wretch shall bleed beneath my power.'
So said. A pond'rous trap he brought,
And in the fact poor puss was caught.
'Smuggler,' says he, 'thou shalt be made
A victim to our loss of trade.'
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The captive cat, with piteous mews,
For pardon, life, and freedom sues:
'A sister of the science spare;
One interest is our common care.'
'What insolence!' the man replied;
'Shall cats with us the game divide?
Were all your interloping band
Extinguished, of expelled the land,
We rat-catchers might raise our fees,
Sole guardians of a nation's cheese!'
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A cat, who saw the lifted knife,
Thus spoke, and saved her sister's life:
'In every age and clime we see,
Two of a trade can ne'er agree.
Each hates his neighbour for encroaching;
Squire stigmatises squire for poaching;
Beauties with beauties are in arms,
And scandal pelts each other's charms;
Kings too their neighbour kings dethrone,
In hope to make the world their own.
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But let us limit our desires;
Nor war like beauties, kings, and squires!
For though we both one prey pursue,
There's game enough for us and you.'
* * * * *