d laugh out of
the other side of your bill. The splendour of your tail is quite
eclipsed."

Thus craftily did he inveigle the vain bird, who finally came and
spread his tail alongside the fracture for comparison. The gorgeous
feathers at once froze fast to the ice, and--in short, that artless
fowl passed a very uncomfortable winter.

C.

A volcano, having discharged a few million tons of stones upon a small
village, asked the mayor if he thought that a tolerably good supply
for building purposes.

"I think," replied that functionary, "if you give us another dash of
granite, and just a pinch of old red sandstone, we could manage with
what you have already done for us. We would, however, be grateful for
the loan of your crater to bake bricks."

"Oh, certainly; parties served at their residences." Then, after the
man had gone, the mountain added, with mingled lava and contempt: "The
most insatiable people I ever contracted to supply. They shall not
have another pebble!"

He banked his fires, and in six weeks was as cold as a neglected
pudding. Then might you have seen the heaving of the surface boulders,
as the people began stirring forty fathoms beneath.

When you have got quite enough of anything, make it manifest by asking
for some more. You won't get it.

CI.

"I entertain for you a sentiment of profound amity," said the tiger to
the leopard. "And why should I not? for are we not members of the same
great feline family?"

"True," replied the leopard, who was engaged in the hopeless endeavour
to change his spots; "since we have mutually plundered one another's
hunting grounds of everything edible, there remains no grievance to
quarrel about. You are a good fellow; let us embrace!"

They did so with the utmost heartiness; which being observed by a
contiguous monkey, that animal got up a tree, where he delivered
himself of the wisdom following:

"There is nothing so touching as these expressions of mutual regard
between animals who are vulgarly believed to hate one another. They
render the brief intervals of peace almost endurable to both parties.
But the difficulty is, there are so many excellent reasons why these
relatives should live in peace, that they won't have time to state
them all before the next fight."

CII.

A woodpecker, who had bored a multitude of holes in the body of a dead
tree, was asked by a robin to explain their purpose.

"As yet, in the infancy of science