Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Section nineteen of Aesop's Fables, a new translation written by Azop,
translated by V. S. Vernon Jones. This is a LibriVox recording.
All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. This
(00:22):
section has been read by Rosslyn Carlyle. The Rogue and
the Oracle a rogue laid a wager that he would
provide the oracle at Delphi to be untrustworthy by procuring
from it a false reply to an inquiry by himself.
So he went to the temple on the appointed day
(00:44):
with a small bird in his hand, which he concealed
under the folds of his cloak, and asked whether what
he held in his hand were alive or dead. If
the oracle said dead, he meant to produce the bird alive.
If the reply was alive, he and ten to wring
its neck and show it to be dead. But the
oracle was one too many for him, for the answer
(01:07):
he got was this, stranger, whether the thing that you
hold in your hand be alive or dead is a
matter that depends entirely on your own well. The Horse
and the Ass a horse proud of his fine harness,
(01:29):
met an ass on the high road. As the ass,
with his heavy burden, moved slowly out of the way
to let him pass, the horse cried out impatiently that
he could hardly resist kicking him to make him move faster.
The ass held his peace, but did not forget the
other's insolence. Not long afterwards, the horse became broken winded
(01:54):
and was sold by his owner to a farmer. One day,
is the horse was drawing a dunk cart, he met
the ass again, who in turn derided him and said, ha,
you never thought it would come to this, did you,
you who were so proud? Where are all your gay trappings? Now?
(02:17):
The dog chasing a wolf. A dog was chasing a wolf,
and as he ran he thought what a fine fellow
he was, and what strong legs he had, and how
quickly they covered the ground. Now there's this wolf, He
said to himself, what a poor creature he is. He's
no match for me, and he knows it, so he
(02:39):
runs away. But the wolf looked round just then and said,
don't you imagine I'm running away from you, my friend.
It's your master. I'm afraid of grief. And his Deu.
When Jupiter was assigning the various gods their privileges, it's
(02:59):
so oh happened that Grief was not present with the rest.
But when all of them had received their share, he
too entered and claimed his due. Jupiter was at a
loss to know what to do, for there was nothing
left for him. However, at last he decided that to
him should belong the tears that are shed for the dead.
Thus it is the same with Grief as it is
(03:21):
with the other gods. The more devoutly men rendered him
his due, the more lavish is he of that which
he has to bestow. It is not well, therefore, to
mourn long for the departed. Else, Grief, whose sole pleasure
is in such mourning, will be quick to send fresh
cause for tears. The hawk, the kite, and the pigeons.
(03:47):
The pigeons and a certain dovecot were persecuted by a kite,
who every now and then swooped down and carried off
one of their number. So they invited a hawk into
the dovecote to divene them against their enemy. But they
soon repented of their folly, for the hawk killed more
of them in a day than the kite had done
(04:08):
in a year. The woman and the farmer. A woman
who had lately lost her husband, used to go every
day to his grave and lament her loss. A farmer,
who was engaged in plowing not far from the spot,
set eyes upon the woman and desired to have her
(04:29):
for his wife. So he left his plow and came
and sat by her side, and began to shed tears himself.
She asked him why he wept, and he replied, I
have lately lost my wife, who was very dear to me,
and tears ease my grief. And I said, she have
lost my husband. And so for a while they mourned
(04:53):
in silence. Then he said, since you and I are
in like case, shall we not do well to marry
an lived together. I shall take the place of your
dead husband, and you that of my dead wife. The
woman consented to the plan, which indeed seemed reasonable enough,
and they dried their tears. Meanwhile, a thief had come
(05:16):
and stolen the ox in which the farmer had left
with his plow. On discovering the theft, he beat his
breast and loudly bewailed his loss. When the woman heard
his cries, she came and said why are you weeping still,
to which he replied, yes, and I mean it this time.
(05:44):
Prometheus and the making of Man. At the bidding of Jupiter,
Prometheus set about the creation of man and the other animals. Jupiter,
seeing that mankind, the only rational preachers, were far outnumbered
by the irrational beasts, bade him redress the balance by
turning some of the latter into men. Prometheus did as
(06:05):
he was bidden, and this is the reason why some
people have the forms of men, but the souls of beasts,
the swallow and the crow. A swallow was once boasting
to a crew about her birth. I was once a princess,
said she the daughter of a king of Athens. But
(06:28):
my husband used me cruelly and cut out my tongue
for a slight fault. Then, to protect me from further injury,
I was turned by Juno into a bird. You'd chatter
quite enough, as it is, said the crew. What you
would have been like if you hadn't lost your tongue,
I can't think. The Hunter and the horseman. A hunter
(06:53):
went out after game and succeeded in catching a hare,
which he was carrying home with him when he met
a man on horseback who said to him, you have
had some good sport I see, sir, and offered to
buy it. The hunter readily agreed, but the horseman had
no sooner got the hair into his hands than he
set spurs to his horse and went off at full gallop.
(07:16):
The hunter ran after him for some little distance, but
it soon dawned upon him that he had been trecked,
and he gave up trying to overtake the horseman, and
to save face, called after him as loud as he could.
All right, sir, all right, take your hair. It was
meant all along as a present. The goatherd and the
(07:40):
wild goats. A goatherd was tending his goats out at
pasture when he saw a number of wild goats approach
and mingle with his flock. At the end of the day,
he drove them home and put them all into the
pen together. Next day, the weather was so bad that
he could not take them out as usual, so he
(08:01):
kept them at home in the pen and fed them there.
He only gave his own goats enough food to keep
them from starving, but he gave the wild goats as
much as they could eat, and more, for he was
very anxious for them. To stay, and he thought that
if he fed them well, they wouldn't want to leave him.
When the weather improved, he took them all out pasture again.
(08:22):
But no sooner had they got near the hills than
the wild goats broke away from the flock and scampered off.
The goatherd was very much disgusted at this, and roundly
abused them for their ingratitude rascals. He cried, run away
like that, after the way I've treated you. Hearing this,
(08:43):
one of them turned round and said, oh, yes, you
treated us all right too well. In fact, it was
just that that put us on our guard. If you
treat newcomers like ourselves so much better than your own flock,
it's more more than likely that if another lot of
strange goats joined yours, we should then be neglected in
(09:07):
favor of the late comers. The Nightingale and the swallow.
A swallow conversing with a nightingale, advised her to quit
the leafy coverts where she made her home and to
come and live with men like herself and nest under
the shelter of their roofs. But the nightingale replied, time
(09:31):
was when I too, like yourself lived among men, but
the memory of the cruel wrongs I then suffered makes
them hateful to me, and never again will I approach
their dwellings. The moral of this story is that the
scene of past sufferings revives painful memories. The Traveler and Fortune,
(09:57):
a traveler exhausted with fatigue after a long journey, sank
down at the very brink of a deep well and
presently fell asleep. He was within an inch of falling
in when Dame Fortune appeared to him and touched him
on the shoulder, cautioning him to move further away. Wake up, good, sir,
I pray you, she said, had you fallen into the well,
(10:19):
the blame would have been thrown not on your own folly,
but on me Fortune. End of section nineteen, end of
Asop's Fables. A new translation written by Azop, translated by V. S.
Vernon Jones, and read by Rosslyn Carlyle.
Section nineteen of Aesop's Fables, a new translation written by Azop,
translated by V. S. Vernon Jones. This is a LibriVox recording.
All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. This
(00:22):
section has been read by Rosslyn Carlyle. The Rogue and
the Oracle a rogue laid a wager that he would
provide the oracle at Delphi to be untrustworthy by procuring
from it a false reply to an inquiry by himself.
So he went to the temple on the appointed day
(00:44):
with a small bird in his hand, which he concealed
under the folds of his cloak, and asked whether what
he held in his hand were alive or dead. If
the oracle said dead, he meant to produce the bird alive.
If the reply was alive, he and ten to wring
its neck and show it to be dead. But the
oracle was one too many for him, for the answer
(01:07):
he got was this, stranger, whether the thing that you
hold in your hand be alive or dead is a
matter that depends entirely on your own well. The Horse
and the Ass a horse proud of his fine harness,
(01:29):
met an ass on the high road. As the ass,
with his heavy burden, moved slowly out of the way
to let him pass, the horse cried out impatiently that
he could hardly resist kicking him to make him move faster.
The ass held his peace, but did not forget the
other's insolence. Not long afterwards, the horse became broken winded
(01:54):
and was sold by his owner to a farmer. One day,
is the horse was drawing a dunk cart, he met
the ass again, who in turn derided him and said, ha,
you never thought it would come to this, did you,
you who were so proud? Where are all your gay trappings? Now?
(02:17):
The dog chasing a wolf. A dog was chasing a wolf,
and as he ran he thought what a fine fellow
he was, and what strong legs he had, and how
quickly they covered the ground. Now there's this wolf, He
said to himself, what a poor creature he is. He's
no match for me, and he knows it, so he
(02:39):
runs away. But the wolf looked round just then and said,
don't you imagine I'm running away from you, my friend.
It's your master. I'm afraid of grief. And his Deu.
When Jupiter was assigning the various gods their privileges, it's
(02:59):
so oh happened that Grief was not present with the rest.
But when all of them had received their share, he
too entered and claimed his due. Jupiter was at a
loss to know what to do, for there was nothing
left for him. However, at last he decided that to
him should belong the tears that are shed for the dead.
Thus it is the same with Grief as it is
(03:21):
with the other gods. The more devoutly men rendered him
his due, the more lavish is he of that which
he has to bestow. It is not well, therefore, to
mourn long for the departed. Else, Grief, whose sole pleasure
is in such mourning, will be quick to send fresh
cause for tears. The hawk, the kite, and the pigeons.
(03:47):
The pigeons and a certain dovecot were persecuted by a kite,
who every now and then swooped down and carried off
one of their number. So they invited a hawk into
the dovecote to divene them against their enemy. But they
soon repented of their folly, for the hawk killed more
of them in a day than the kite had done
(04:08):
in a year. The woman and the farmer. A woman
who had lately lost her husband, used to go every
day to his grave and lament her loss. A farmer,
who was engaged in plowing not far from the spot,
set eyes upon the woman and desired to have her
(04:29):
for his wife. So he left his plow and came
and sat by her side, and began to shed tears himself.
She asked him why he wept, and he replied, I
have lately lost my wife, who was very dear to me,
and tears ease my grief. And I said, she have
lost my husband. And so for a while they mourned
(04:53):
in silence. Then he said, since you and I are
in like case, shall we not do well to marry
an lived together. I shall take the place of your
dead husband, and you that of my dead wife. The
woman consented to the plan, which indeed seemed reasonable enough,
and they dried their tears. Meanwhile, a thief had come
(05:16):
and stolen the ox in which the farmer had left
with his plow. On discovering the theft, he beat his
breast and loudly bewailed his loss. When the woman heard
his cries, she came and said why are you weeping still,
to which he replied, yes, and I mean it this time.
(05:44):
Prometheus and the making of Man. At the bidding of Jupiter,
Prometheus set about the creation of man and the other animals. Jupiter,
seeing that mankind, the only rational preachers, were far outnumbered
by the irrational beasts, bade him redress the balance by
turning some of the latter into men. Prometheus did as
(06:05):
he was bidden, and this is the reason why some
people have the forms of men, but the souls of beasts,
the swallow and the crow. A swallow was once boasting
to a crew about her birth. I was once a princess,
said she the daughter of a king of Athens. But
(06:28):
my husband used me cruelly and cut out my tongue
for a slight fault. Then, to protect me from further injury,
I was turned by Juno into a bird. You'd chatter
quite enough, as it is, said the crew. What you
would have been like if you hadn't lost your tongue,
I can't think. The Hunter and the horseman. A hunter
(06:53):
went out after game and succeeded in catching a hare,
which he was carrying home with him when he met
a man on horseback who said to him, you have
had some good sport I see, sir, and offered to
buy it. The hunter readily agreed, but the horseman had
no sooner got the hair into his hands than he
set spurs to his horse and went off at full gallop.
(07:16):
The hunter ran after him for some little distance, but
it soon dawned upon him that he had been trecked,
and he gave up trying to overtake the horseman, and
to save face, called after him as loud as he could.
All right, sir, all right, take your hair. It was
meant all along as a present. The goatherd and the
(07:40):
wild goats. A goatherd was tending his goats out at
pasture when he saw a number of wild goats approach
and mingle with his flock. At the end of the day,
he drove them home and put them all into the
pen together. Next day, the weather was so bad that
he could not take them out as usual, so he
(08:01):
kept them at home in the pen and fed them there.
He only gave his own goats enough food to keep
them from starving, but he gave the wild goats as
much as they could eat, and more, for he was
very anxious for them. To stay, and he thought that
if he fed them well, they wouldn't want to leave him.
When the weather improved, he took them all out pasture again.
(08:22):
But no sooner had they got near the hills than
the wild goats broke away from the flock and scampered off.
The goatherd was very much disgusted at this, and roundly
abused them for their ingratitude rascals. He cried, run away
like that, after the way I've treated you. Hearing this,
(08:43):
one of them turned round and said, oh, yes, you
treated us all right too well. In fact, it was
just that that put us on our guard. If you
treat newcomers like ourselves so much better than your own flock,
it's more more than likely that if another lot of
strange goats joined yours, we should then be neglected in
(09:07):
favor of the late comers. The Nightingale and the swallow.
A swallow conversing with a nightingale, advised her to quit
the leafy coverts where she made her home and to
come and live with men like herself and nest under
the shelter of their roofs. But the nightingale replied, time
(09:31):
was when I too, like yourself lived among men, but
the memory of the cruel wrongs I then suffered makes
them hateful to me, and never again will I approach
their dwellings. The moral of this story is that the
scene of past sufferings revives painful memories. The Traveler and Fortune,
(09:57):
a traveler exhausted with fatigue after a long journey, sank
down at the very brink of a deep well and
presently fell asleep. He was within an inch of falling
in when Dame Fortune appeared to him and touched him
on the shoulder, cautioning him to move further away. Wake up, good, sir,
I pray you, she said, had you fallen into the well,
(10:19):
the blame would have been thrown not on your own folly,
but on me Fortune. End of section nineteen, end of
Asop's Fables. A new translation written by Azop, translated by V. S.
Vernon Jones, and read by Rosslyn Carlyle.
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