A prowling wolf, whose shaggy skin(So strict the watch of dogs had been)Hid little but his bones,Once met a mastiff dog astray.A prouder, fatter, sleeker Tray,No human mortal owns.Sir Wolf in famish’d plight,Would fain have made a rationUpon his fat relation;But then he first must fight;And well the dog seem’d ableTo save from wolfish tableHis […]

A man of middle age, whose hairWas bordering on the grey,Began to turn his thoughts and careThe matrimonial way.By virtue of his ready,A store of choices had heOf ladies bent to suit his taste;On which account he made no haste.To court well was no trifling art.Two widows chiefly gain’d his heart;The one yet green, the […]

A poor unfortunate, from day to day,Call’d Death to take him from this world away.‘O Death’ he said, ‘to me how fair thy form!Come quick, and end for me life’s cruel storm.’Death heard, and with a ghastly grin,Knock’d at his door, and enter’d in‘Take out this object from my sight!’The poor man loudly cried.‘Its dreadful […]

Three sorts there are, as Malherbe says,Which one can never overpraise–The gods, the ladies, and the king;And I, for one, endorse the thing.The heart, praise tickles and entices;Of fair one’s smile, it oft the price is.See how the gods sometimes repay it.Simonides–the ancients say it–Once undertook, in poem lyric,To write a wrestler’s panegyric;Which, ere he […]

Were I a pet of fair Calliope,I would devote the gifts conferr’d on meTo dress in verse old Aesop’s lies divine;For verse, and they, and truth, do well combine;But, not a favourite on the Muses’ hill,I dare not arrogate the magic skill,To ornament these charming stories.A bard might brighten up their glories,No doubt. I try,–what […]

A cock scratch’d up, one day,A pearl of purest ray,Which to a jeweller he bore.‘I think it fine,’ he said,‘But yet a crumb of breadTo me were worth a great deal more.’ So did a dunce inheritA manuscript of merit,Which to a publisher he bore.”Tis good,’ said he, ‘I’m told,Yet any coin of goldTo me […]

Wise counsel is not always wise,As this my tale exemplifies.A boy, that frolick’d on the banks of Seine,Fell in, and would have found a watery grave,Had not that hand that planteth ne’er in vainA willow planted there, his life to save.While hanging by its branches as he might,A certain sage preceptor came in sight;To whom […]

To show to all your kindness, it behoves:There’s none so small but you his aid may need.I quote two fables for this weighty creed,Which either of them fully proves.From underneath the swardA rat, quite off his guard,Popp’d out between a lion’s paws.The beast of royal bearingShow’d what a lion wasThe creature’s life by sparing–A kindness […]

A bachelor caress’d his cat,A darling, fair, and delicate;So deep in love, he thought her mewThe sweetest voice he ever knew.By prayers, and tears, and magic art,The man got Fate to take his part;And, lo! one morning at his sideHis cat, transform’d, became his bride.In wedded state our man was seenThe fool in courtship he […]

A bitch, that felt her time approaching,And had no place for parturition,Went to a female friend, and, broachingHer delicate condition,Got leave herself to shutWithin the other’s hut.At proper time the lender cameHer little premises to claim.The bitch crawl’d meekly to the door,And humbly begg’d a fortnight more.Her little pups, she said, could hardly walk.In short, […]

The peacock[A] to the queen of heavenComplain’d in some such words:–‘Great goddess, you have givenTo me, the laughing-stock of birds,A voice which fills, by taste quite just,All nature with disgust;Whereas that little paltry thing,The nightingale, pours from her throatSo sweet and ravishing a note,She bears alone the honours of the spring.’ In anger Juno heard,And […]

Once in his bed deep mused the hare,(What else but muse could he do there?)And soon by gloom was much afflicted;–To gloom the creature’s much addicted.‘Alas! these constitutions nervous,’He cried, ‘how wretchedly they serve us!We timid people, by their action,Can’t eat nor sleep with satisfaction;We can’t enjoy a pleasure single,But with some misery it must […]

To an astrologer who fellPlump to the bottom of a well,‘Poor blockhead!’ cried a passer-by,‘Not see your feet, and read the sky?’ This upshot of a story will sufficeTo give a useful hint to most;For few there are in this our world so wiseAs not to trust in star or ghost,Or cherish secretly the creedThat […]

A certain commonwealth aquatic,Grown tired of order democratic,By clamouring in the ears of Jove, effectedIts being to a monarch’s power subjected.Jove flung it down, at first, a king pacific.Who nathless fell with such a splash terrific,The marshy folks, a foolish race and timid,Made breathless haste to get from him hid.They dived into the mud beneath […]

Perhaps, had I but shown due loyalty,This book would have begun with royalty,Of which, in certain points of view,Boss Belly is the image true,In whose bereavements all the members share:Of whom the latter once so weary were,As all due service to forbear,On what they called his idle plan,Resolved to play the gentleman,And let his lordship […]

If what old story says of Aesop’s true,The oracle of Greece he was,And more than Areopagus [A] he knew,With all its wisdom in the laws.The following tale gives but a sampleOf what has made his fame so ample.Three daughters shared a father’s purse,Of habits totally diverse.The first, bewitched with drinks delicious;The next, coquettish and capricious;The […]

Each has his fault, to which he clingsIn spite of shame or fear.This apophthegm a story brings,To make its truth more clear.A sot had lost health, mind, and purse;And, truly, for that matter,Sots mostly lose the latterEre running half their course.When wine, one day, of wit had fill’d the room,His wife inclosed him in a […]

A certain hollow treeWas tenanted by three.An eagle held a lofty bough,The hollow root a wild wood sow,A female cat between the two.All busy with maternal labours,They lived awhile obliging neighbours.At last the cat’s deceitful tongueBroke up the peace of old and young.Up climbing to the eagle’s nest,She said, with whisker’d lips compress’d,‘Our death, or, […]

The wolves are prone to play the glutton.One, at a certain feast, ’tis said,So stuff’d himself with lamb and mutton,He seem’d but little short of dead.Deep in his throat a bone stuck fast.Well for this wolf, who could not speak,That soon a stork quite near him pass’d.By signs invited, with her beakThe bone she drewWith […]

When Nature angrily turn’d outThose plagues, the spider and the gout,–‘See you,’ said she, ‘those huts so meanly built,These palaces so grand and richly gilt?By mutual agreement fixYour choice of dwellings; or if not,To end th’ affair by lot,Draw out these little sticks.’‘The huts are not for me,’ the spider cried;‘And not for me the […]