A FABLE.

Beside the several pieces of morality to be drawn out of this vision I learned from it, never to repine at my own misfortunes, or to envy the happiness of another; since it is impossible for any man to form a right judgment of his neighbour's sufferings.

ADDISON.

I Do not know whether my readers ever felt a desire of the sort, but I have often thought it must be pleasant to listen in the days of Æsop, when every thrush could offer counsel in a voice as sweet as that with which she bids farewell to the departing sun, and every butterfly could whisper a warning to the frivolous and vain, before the cold wind numbed her golden bosom. However, remotely wandering from the walks of men, however much condemned to solitude and silence, he could hear something that was worth the listening; and worth the telling too, as the world has seemed to think; since, for ages after, it is content to read what the Fabler has ceased to tell, and the birds and the beasts have so unkindly ceased to utter.

Perhaps my readers do not believe that it ever has been so. That is a scepticism very unfavourable to the reception of my story; but if it be so, I can only say, that all I repeat, I did surely hear, and if they listen they may hear it too: and perhaps they will think with me, that since it cannot be the discourse of creatures rational, I do wisely attribute

it to those we term irrational. Perhaps, could these irrationals be heard in their own behalf, they would say our fables do them much injustice. They have shared our miseries, but not our sins. The wolf devours the lamb because he is hungry, and the lamb is the food that nature has appointed him; when he no more is hungry, he will no more slay the lamb. He obeys the hard necessity brought on him by man's delinquency, and thinks and knows no wrong But the jealousy and the pride, and the hard unkindness, and the restless discontent, and aimless mischief, is all reserved for bosoms rational. We have put into the mouths of the viper and the lion, words of wrong that amid all created things, perhaps, were never heard but from our own. However, this may be, I must proceed with my tale; and if my readers, after a careful perusal, should be of opinion that I was deceived, and that the creatures I saw and heard were neither birds nor beasts, I willingly submit to their decision.

One day-if it was not in the days of Æsop, it must have been in some region not very commonly known-I was wandering by myself in the fairest of scenes, on the finest of days, and in the best of humours. How could I be otherwise? It was a day and a scene in which the spirit that delights in nature's charms, feels almost a painful struggle to enlarge its powers that it may enjoy them more. It was not hot, for the fresh breeze blew from the sea, bearing with it the perfume of the moss and herbage over which it passed. It was not cold, for a bright autumn sun wanted yet some hours of setting; and if now and then a silvery fleecy cloud passed over it aş a veil, it was but to change the tints and vary a prospect nothing could improve. Either my mind was that day free from care, or in the overwhelming

sense of gratitude for the bounty that with so much beauty clothes this perishable world, the remembrance of them was for the time absorbed: could I be dissatisfied where all besides was harmony and peace? Everything was beautiful, and everything, as I thought, seemed happy. A crowd of living creatures gave animation to the scene, and each one appeared, in my delighted vision, exactly formed to be what it was, and to do what it was doing; and could any one be other than itself, I thought it must lose something of its fitness and its charms. Yonder cold worm, I said, that crawls in naked ugliness upon the soil, and cannot rise from it, should I take it up and lay it upon that rose, would thank me little for my pains; it would pine on its beauty, and starve upon its perfumes. And what would avail it in its earthly prison, the beetle's golden wing, or the velvet bosom of the fluttering moth? From nature's largest work, to the least insect that frets the leaf, each thing has organs, and feelings, and habits, exactly suited to the place it is to fill: were it other than it is, it could not fill its place; and being what it is, were it removed to any other, it would surely be less happy. The flower of the valley would die upon the mountain's top; and as surely would the hardy mountaineer, now flourishing on Alpine heights, languish and die if transplanted to the valley. The Maker of the world, then, has made no mistakes, has done no injustice. Everything as he has arranged it is what it should be, and is placed where it should be, and none can repine, and none complain.

I thought so, but I was mistaken: things are very different when you come to look into them, from what they appear on superficial observation. Viewed from a distance, the troubled ocean seems an unbro

ken surface; go closer, it becomes a scene of tumult and destruction. And I, alas! was not destined to carry home the delusion I had brought out, or had falsely gathered in the contemplation of nature's works, and the Creator's wisdom and munificence. Instead of all being fitness, beauty, and harmony serene, I had to learn that all was absolutely wrong, and nothing could be altered without being amended.

First, from the tall summit of a rocking fir-tree I heard the solitary raven thus bewail himself: "It is surely hard that I am doomed to dwell forever on the top of this tall tree, battered by every storm that blows, and chilled by every bitter blast. For many an age my ancestors, they say, dwelt here before me; but why must one be born to a destiny not of one's own choosing? Yon tiny linnet's nest, could I get into it, would suit my taste exactly, and I might spend my days in quietness and peace."

"This element," said a trout to his fellow, as they glided down the stream," is neither healthy nor agreeable. The sunbeam plays upon the surface but to mock us, and never comes beneath to warm our blood. There is no reason that ever I have heard, why fishes have not as much right to fly in the air, as either birds or butterflies."- "True," replied his fellow, "and we would try it in despite of fortune, but that our lungs are so badly formed, I am not sure we could breathe when we came there."

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I am a contented creature," croaked out a frog that sat crouching by the streamlet's side-"I like my condition well enough, nor ever wish to live but in this mud: yet I confess I see no reason why that gay pheasant should wear such brilliant feathers, while I have none. The gifts of Providence are very partially distributed, methinks."

A bulky cabbage, (for in those days vegetables

could speak quite as well as animals,) from an unweeded bed, where without much care it had grown full, large, and round, was just then looking through the window of a green-house, and with no small bitterness of tone exclaimed, "How blinded, how misjudging are mankind! While I, a most wholesome and useful vegetable, am left here to grow as I may, through summer heat and winter cold, those tawdry japonicas, fit for nothing but to look at, are to be nursed, and warmed, and watered. It is hard indeed to bear the world's injustice !"—" And I," rejoined an Ox, comfortably grazing on a field, who had, doubtless, overheard the last remark, "had I the management of this world's good, would have a very different arrangement, and if any did not labour, neither should they have food. I, who have toiled all day, am fed on grass, and sent forth to gather it for myself, while yonder idle spaniel is reared on dainties from his master's hand. But ere he be allowed to eat, he ought to be yoked as we are, and sent forth to plough."-"It is true," replied a team Horse, his companion; "I see no reason why we, of animals the largest and the best, should be obliged to do the work for all. Why should not those idle blackbirds come down and prepare the ground for casting in the seed, while we go sit upon the tree and sing, till it suits our appetite to come and pick up what others sow?"

"Alas! alas!" whistled a pretty, painted Goldfinch, with whom berries that day were rather scarce; "to what a hard destiny am I condemned! Were I yon ugly barn-door fowl, I should be fed and sheltered for the sake of my eggs and chickens; but in this sordid, selfish age, beautiful as I am, no one cares for me, because I can give them nothing in return.”

VOL. II.

Y