Fables of La Fontaine — Fables LXIX and LXX
THE FLY AND THE ANT.
The Fly and Ant once quarrelled seriously: "O Jupiter!"
the first exclaimed, "how vanity Blinds the weak mind!
This mean and crawling thing Actually ventures to compare With me, the daughter of the air.
The palace I frequent, and on the board I taste the ox before our sovereign lord;
While this poor paltry creature lives for days On the small straw she drags through devious ways.
Come, Mignon, tell me plainly now, Do you camp ever on a monarch's brow, Or on a beauty's cheek?
Well, I do so,-- And on her bosom, too, I'd have you know.
I sport among her curls; I place Myself upon her blooming face.
The ladies bound for conquest go To us for patches; their necks' snow With spots of blackness well contrast, Of all her toilette cares the last.
Come, now, good fellow, rack your brain, And let us hear of sense some grain."
"Well, have you done?"
replied the Ant.
"You haunt king's palaces, I grant;
But then, by every one you're cursed.
It's very likely you taste first The gods' own special sacred feast: Nor is it better, sir, for that.
The fane you enter, with the train-- So do the godless and profane.
On heads of kings or dogs, 'tis plain, You settle freely when not wanted, And you are punished often--granted.
You talk of patches on a belle, I, too, should patch them just as well.
The name your vanity delights, Frenchmen bestow on parasites;
Cease, then, to be so grossly vain, Your aspirations, Miss, restrain;
Your namesakes are exiled or hung, And you with famine will be clung.
With cold and freezing misery, Will come your time of penury, When our King Phœbus goes to cheer And rule the other hemisphere: But I shall live upon my store, My labours for the summer o'er, Nor over mountains and seas go, Through storm and rain, and drifting snow;
No sorrow near me will alloy The fulness of the present joy;
Past trouble bars out future care, True not false glory is our share;
And this I wish to show to you-- Time flies, and I must work.
Adieu!
This idle chattering will not fill My little granary and till."
[Illustration] [Illustration] FABLE LXX.
THE GARDENER AND HIS MASTER.
An amateur of flowers--bourgeois and yet clown-- Had made a garden far from any town;
Neat, trim, and snug, it was the village pride;
Green quickset hedges girt its every side;
There the rank sorrel and the lettuce grew, And Spanish jasmine for his Margot, too, Jonquils for holidays, and crisp dry thyme;
But all this happiness, one fatal time, Was marred by a hare; his grief and woe Compel the peasant to his lord to go.
"This cursed animal," he says, "by night And day comes almost hourly for his bite;
He spurns my cunning, and defies my snares, For stones and sticks he just as little cares;
He is a wizard, that is very sure, And for a wizard is there, sir, a cure?"
"Wizard, be hanged!"
the lord said; "you shall see, His tricks and his wiles will not avail with me;
I'll scare the rascal, on my faith, good man."
"And when?"
"To-morrow; I have got a plan."
The thing agreed, he comes with all his troop.
"Good!
let us lunch--fowls tender in the coop?
That girl your daughter?
come to me, my dear!
When you betroth her, there's a brave lad here.
I know, good man, the matrimonial curse Digs plaguey deep into a father's purse."
The lord, so saying, nearer draws his chair, Plays with the clusters of the daughter's hair, Touches her hand, her arm, with gay respect, Follies that make a father half suspect Her coyness is assumed; meantime they dine, Squander the meat, play havoc with the wine.
"I like these hams, their flavour and their look."
"Sir, they are yours."
"Thanks: take them to my cook."
He dined, and amply; his retainers, too;
Dogs, horses, valets, all well toothed, nor few;
My lord commands, such liberties he takes, And fond professions to the daughter makes.
The dinner over, and the wine passed round, The hunters rise, and horns and bugles sound;
They rouse the game with such a wild halloo, The good man is astonished at the crew;
The worst was that, amid this noise and clack, The little kitchen garden went to wrack.
Adieu the beds!
adieu the borders neat!
Peas, chicory, all trodden under feet.
Adieu the future soup!
The frightened hare Beneath a monster cabbage made his lair.
They seek him--find him; "After him, my boys!"
He seeks the well-known hole with little noise;
Yet not a hole, rather a wound they made In the poor hedge with hoof and hunting-blade.
"By the lord's orders it would never do To leave the garden but on horseback, no." The good man says; "Royal your sports may be, Call them whate'er you like, but pity me;
Those dogs and people did more harm to-day Than all the hares for fifty years, I say."
FABLE LXXI.
THE WOODMAN AND MERCURY.
