Page:Three hundred Aesop's fables (Townshend).djvu/112

106 A, having a long spite against a Fox for robbing his poultry yard, caught him at last, and, being determined to take an ample revenge, tied some tow well soaked in oil to his tail, and set it on fire. The Fox by a strange fatality rushed to the fields of the Farmer who had captured him. It was the time of the wheat harvest; but the Farmer reaped nothing that year, and returned home grieving sorely.

A, wearied with a long journey, lay down overcome with fatigue on the very brink of a deep well. Being within an inch of falling into the water, Dame Fortune, it is said, appeared to him, and waking him from his slumber, thus addressed him: "Good Sir, pray wake up; for had you fallen into the well, the blame will be thrown on me, and I shall get an ill name among mortals; for I find that men are sure to impute their calamities to me, however much by their own folly they have really brought them on themselves."

Every one is more or less master of his own fate.

A having bolted down too large a fish, burst its deep gullet-bag, and lay down on the shore to die. A Kite seeing him, exclaimed: "You richly deserve your fate; for a bird of the air has no business to seek its food from the sea."

Every man should be content to mind his own business.