The simple-minded and unsuspecting Crow did as he was told, flew up and let the Mussel fall.

Before he could descend to eat it, however, the other bird had pounced upon it and carried it away.

The Ass and His Purchaser

A Man wished to purchase an Ass, and agreed with his owner that he should try him before he bought him.  He took the Ass home, and put him in the straw-yard with his other asses, upon which the beast left all the others and joined himself at once to the most idle and the greatest eater of them all.

The Man put a halter on him, and led him back to his owner:  and when he was asked how, in so short a time, he could have made a trial of him, “I do not need,” he answered, “a trial; I know that he will be just such another as the one whom of all the rest he chose for his companion.”

A Country Fellow and the River

A stupid Boy, who was sent to market by the good old woman, his Mother, to sell butter and cheese, made a stop by the way at a swift river, and laid himself down on the bank there, until it should run out.

About midnight, home he went to his Mother, with all his market trade back again.

“Why, how now, my Son?” said she.  “What ill fortune have you had, that you have sold nothing all day?”

“Why, Mother, yonder is a river that has been running all this day, and I stayed till just now, waiting for it to run out; and there it is, running still.”

“My Son,” said the good woman, “thy head and mine will be laid in the grave many a day before this river has all run by.  You will never sell your butter and cheese if you wait for that.”

The Playful Ass

An Ass climbed up to the roof of a building and, frisking about there, broke in the tiling.  His Master went up after him, and quickly drove him down, beating him severely with a thick wooden cudgel.

The Ass then cried out in astonishment, “Why, I saw the monkey do this very thing yesterday, and you all laughed heartily, as if it afforded you great amusement!”

The Boys and the Frogs

Some idle boys, playing near a pond, saw a number of Frogs in the water, and began to pelt them with stones.  They had killed several of them, when one of the Frogs, lifting his head out of the water, cried out:  “Pray stop, my Boys:  you forget that what is sport to you is death to us!”

The Camel and His Master

One night a Camel looked into the tent where his Master was lying and said:  “Kind Master, will you not let me put my head inside of the door?  The wind blows very cold to-night.”

“Oh, yes,” said the Man.  “There is plenty of room.”

So the Camel moved forward and stretched his head into the tent.  “Ah!” he said, “this is what I call comfort.”