ther has simply secured
thy inheritance to thee: to prevent his slaves from plundering the
estate before thou couldst formally claim it, he left it to one of them,
who, believing himself to be the owner, would take care of the property.
Now, what a slave possesses belongs to his master. Choose, therefore,
the slave for thy portion, and then possess all that was thy father's."
The young man followed his teacher's advice, took possession of the
slave, and thus of his father's wealth, and then gave the slave his
freedom, together with a considerable sum of money.[86]

[86] This story seems to be the original of a French popular
tale, in which a gentleman secures his estate for his
son by a similar device. The gentleman, dying at Paris
while his son was on his travels, bequeathed all his
wealth to a convent, on condition that they should give
his son "whatever they chose." On the son's return he
received from the holy fathers a very trifling portion
of the paternal estate. He complained to his friends of
this injustice, but they all agreed that there was no
help for it, according to the terms of his father's
will. In his distress he laid his case before an eminent
lawyer, who told him that his father had adopted this
plan of leaving his estate in the hands of the churchmen
in order to prevent its misappropriation during his
absence. "For," said the man of law, "your father, by
will, has left you the share of his estate which the
convent should choose (_le partie qui leur plairoit_),
and it is plain that what they chose was that which they
kept for themselves. All you have to do, therefore, is
to enter an action at law against the convent for
recovery of that portion of your father's property which
they have retained, and, take my word for it, you will
be successful." The young man accordingly sued the
churchmen and gained his cause.

* * * * *

And now we proceed to cite one or two of the rabbinical fables, in the
proper signification of the term--namely, moral narratives in which
beasts or birds are the characters. Although it is generally allowed
that Fable was the earliest form adopted for conveying moral truths, yet
it is by no means agreed among the learned in what country of remote
antiquity it orig