combat. When they stopped suddenly to catch their breath for a
fiercer renewal of the fight, they saw some Vultures waiting in
the distance to feast on the one that should fall first. They at
once made up their quarrel, saying, "It is better for us to make
friends, than to become the food of Crows or Vultures."


The One-Eyed Doe

A DOE blind in one eye was accustomed to graze as near to the
edge of the cliff as she possibly could, in the hope of securing
her greater safety. She turned her sound eye towards the land
that she might get the earliest tidings of the approach of hunter
or hound, and her injured eye towards the sea, from whence she
entertained no anticipation of danger. Some boatmen sailing by
saw her, and taking a successful aim, mortally wounded her.
Yielding up her last breath, she gasped forth this lament: "O
wretched creature that I am! to take such precaution against the
land, and after all to find this seashore, to which I had come
for safety, so much more perilous."


The Shepherd and the Sea

A SHEPHERD, keeping watch over his sheep near the shore, saw the
Sea very calm and smooth, and longed to make a voyage with a view
to commerce. He sold all his flock, invested it in a cargo of
dates, and set sail. But a very great tempest came on, and the
ship being in danger of sinking, he threw all his merchandise
overboard, and barely escaped with his life in the empty ship.