The Dog and the Shadow.15 by Townsend
A DOG, crossing a bridge over a stream with a piece of
flesh in his mouth, saw his own shadow in the water and
took it for that of another Dog, with a piece of meat
double his own in size. He immediately let go of his own,
and fiercely attacked the other Dog to get his larger
piece from him. He thus lost both: that which he grasped
at in the water, because it was a shadow; and his own,
because the stream swept it away.
Pe133=Ch185, Ph1.4, Ba79, Cax1.5, Laf6.17, L'Es6, TMI
J1791.4, Type34A
Kalila and Dimna
Pancatantra 4 The Unfaithful Wife.
quotation from "VISNU SARMA The Pancatantra"
translated by Chandra Rajan, Penguin Classics.
---
there came along a vixen carrying a chunk of raw meat. As
she stopped and looked around, the vixen saw a huge fish
leap out of the river and lie stranded on the river bank.
Dropping the chunk of meat the vixen darted towards the
fish. But before she could grab it a kite swooped down
from the sky, seized the gobbet of meat and flew up
again.
The fish too seeing the vixen coming towards it somehow
managed to struggle back into the river.
---omit the rest
The Stag and the Lion (HITOPADESA FABLES
from India)
He who has knowledgehas force. See how a
proud Lion was killed by a Stage. In the mountain
named Mandara dwells a Lion called Darganta, who hunts
the other beasts, and kills great numbers of them for his
food. All the beasts being assembled, he was thus
addressed by them: "Why are so many beasts killed by
thee? We will give you one every day in our turns for
your food: so many ought not to be slain by thee."
"Be it so, " Said the Lion; and all of them,
one by one, for his food daily gave a beast.
On a certain day, when the lot fell upon an old
Stag, he thus thought within himself: "For the sake
of our own souls, and in hope of life, homage is paid:
but if I must meet this fate, what need have I to respect
the Lion?" He moved, therefore, slowly step
by step; and the Lion, tormented by hunger, said to him
angrily:
"Why dost thou come so late?"
"It is not my fault," said he, "for
in the way I was forcibly seized by another Lion, till I
swore to the necessity of my coming to you; and now I
approach thee with supplication." The Lion
having heard this, passionately said: "Where is that
audacious animal?" The Stag led him
near a deep well, and said: "Let my lord
behold." Then the Lion seeing his own image in the
water, proudly roared, and throwing himself down with
rage, perished in the well.
Pancatantra1.8, Hitopadesa2, Kalila and Dimna
Generally the trickster of this fable is not a Stag, but
a Hare.
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