“My friend,” said the seal, “it is evident that men deceive you by appearances. I know men. I have followed their boats and have listened to the wonderful sounds they make with their voices and with instruments. Do they not draw fish out of the depths by enchantments? Do they not build their habitations with music? Do they not draw the moon out of the sea and set it for a light in their houses? And is it not known that the fairest daughters of the sea have loved men?”
“When I’m awake long o’ moonlit nights I feel like that myself,” said the ass. Then the recollections of these long, frosty nights made him yawn. Then he brayed.
“What it is to live near men,” said the seal in admiration. “What wonderful sounds!”
“I’d cross the water and rub noses with you,” said the ass, “only I’m afraid of crocodiles.”
“Crocodiles?” said the gray-headed crow.
“Yes,” said the ass. “It’s because I’m of a very old family, you know. They were Egyptians. My people never liked to cross water in their own country. There were crocodiles there.”
“I don’t want to waste any more time listening to nonsense,” said the gray-headed crow. She flew to the ass’s back and plucked out some of the felt. “I’ll take this for my own habitation,” she said, and flew back to the cliff.
The ass would have kicked up his heels only two of his legs were fastened with the straw rope. He turned away, and without a word of farewell to the seal went scrambling up the bank of the island.
The seal stayed for a while moving his head about intelligently. Then he slipped into the water and paddled off. “One feels their lives in music,” he said; “great tones vibrate round the island where men live. It is very wonderful.”
“That,” said the King’s Son, “is the first story in ‘The Breastplate of Instruction,’—‘The Ass and the Seal.’ And now you must tell me a story while we are crossing the field of blue flowers.”