ame moment, and fought
fiercely for its possession. When they had fearfully lacerated each
other, and were faint from the long combat, they lay down exhausted with
fatigue. A Fox who had gone round them at a distance several times, saw
them both stretched on the ground, and the Kid lying untouched in the
middle, ran in between them, and seizing the Kid, scampered off as fast
as he could. The Lion and the Bear saw him, but not being able to get
up, said: "Woe betide us, that we should have fought and belabored
ourselves only to serve the turn of a Fox!"

It sometimes happens that one man has all the toil, and another all the
profit.

The Stag in the Ox-Stall.

[Illustration]

A Stag, hardly pressed by the hounds, and blind through fear to the
danger he was running into, took shelter in a farm-yard, and hid himself
in a shed among the oxen. An Ox gave him this kindly warning: "O unhappy
creature! why should you thus, of your own accord, incur destruction,
and trust yourself in the house of your enemy?" The Stag replied: "Do
you only suffer me, friend, to stay where I am, and I will undertake to
find some favorable opportunity of effecting my escape." At the approach
of the evening the herdsman came to feed his cattle, but did not see the
Stag. The Stag, congratulating himself on his safety, began to express
his sincere thanks to the Oxen who had kindly afforded him help in the
hour of need. One of them again answered him: "We indeed wish you well,
but the danger is not over. There is one other yet to pass through the
shed, who has as it were a hundred eyes, and, until he has come and
gone, your life is still in peril." At that moment the master himself
entered, and having had to complain that his oxen had not been properly
fed, he went up to their racks, and cried out: "Why is there such a
scarcity of fodder? There is not half enough straw for them to lie on.
Those lazy fellows have not even swept the cobwebs away." While he thus
examined everything, he spied the antlers of the Stag peeping out of the
straw. Summoning his laborers, he ordered that the Stag should be
killed.

What is safety for one is not always safety for another.

The Eagle and the Jackdaw.

[Illustration]

An Eagle, flying down from his eyrie on a lofty rock, seized upon a
lamb, and carried him aloft in his talons. A Jackdaw who witnessed the
capture of the lamb, was stirred with envy, and determined to emulate
the strength an