Page:An argosy of fables.djvu/242

 188 "Yes, but cats like meat, and there are young birds in this tree."

"Sir," said the Cat, "I have overcome my wicked desire for meat, and have learned the Golden Rule, that our first duty is to refrain from harming any living thing."

Thus the Cat won the old Vulture's confidence, entered the hollow tree, and lived there. And day after day he climbed the tree to steal some of the little birds, and brought them down into the hollow for his dinner. Meanwhile, the parent birds, whose little ones were being eaten, went searching for them in all quarters. Long-Ear becoming aware of this, and fearing detection, quietly slipped out of the hollow and made his escape. Afterwards, when the birds began to search nearer home, they found the bones of the young ones in the hollow of the tree, where the blind Gray-Pate lived. The birds at once decided that their nestlings had been killed and eaten by the old Vulture, and accordingly they executed him.

(Hitopadeça. Book I. Fable 3. Adapted from translation by Sir Edwin Arnold.)

GOLDEN-SKIN, THE MOUSE

N the town of Champaka there once lived a beggar Priest, named Chudakarna, whose habit was to place his begging-dish upon a certain shelf, with such food in it as he had not eaten, and go to sleep beside it. As soon as he slept, a certain Mouse named Golden-Skin, came out of its hole, jumped up on the shelf and devoured whatever food was left in the begging-dish. One day another beggar Priest, a close friend, named Vinakarna, came to pay a visit; and he noticed that all the while they were conversing, Chudakarna kept striking the ground with a split bamboo cane, to frighten the Mouse away.