Cobwebs from an Empty Skull. Ambrose Bierce

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СКАЧАТЬ a man was trying with all his might to cross a fence, a bull ran to his assistance, and taking him upon his horns, tossed him over. Seeing the man walking away without making any remark, the bull said:

      "You are quite welcome, I am sure. I did no more than my duty."

      "I take a different view of it, very naturally," replied the man, "and you may keep your polite acknowledgments of my gratitude until you receive it. I did not require your services."

      "You don't mean to say," answered the bull, "that you did not wish to cross that fence!"

      "I mean to say," was the rejoinder, "that I wished to cross it by my method, solely to avoid crossing it by yours."

      Fabula docet that while the end is everything, the means is something.

XVIII.

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      An hippopotamus meeting an open alligator, said to him:

      "My forked friend, you may as well collapse. You are not sufficiently comprehensive to embrace me. I am myself no tyro at smiling, when in the humour."

      "I really had no expectation of taking you in," replied the other. "I have a habit of extending my hospitality impartially to all, and about seven feet wide."

      "You remind me," said the hippopotamus, "of a certain zebra who was not vicious at all; he merely kicked the breath out of everything that passed behind him, but did not induce things to pass behind him."

      "It is quite immaterial what I remind you of," was the reply.

      The lesson conveyed by this fable is a very beautiful one.

XIX.

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      A man was plucking a living goose, when his victim addressed him thus:

      "Suppose you were a goose; do you think you would relish this sort of thing?"

      "Well, suppose I were," answered the man; "do you think you would like to pluck me?"

      "Indeed I would!" was the emphatic, natural, but injudicious reply.

      "Just so," concluded her tormentor; "that's the way I feel about the matter."

XX.

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      A traveller perishing of thirst in a desert, debated with his camel whether they should continue their journey, or turn back to an oasis they had passed some days before. The traveller favoured the latter plan.

      "I am decidedly opposed to any such waste of time," said the animal; "I don't care for oases myself."

      "I should not care for them either," retorted the man, with some temper, "if, like you, I carried a number of assorted water-tanks inside. But as you will not submit to go back, and I shall not consent to go forward, we can only remain where we are."

      "But," objected the camel, "that will be certain death to you!"

      "Not quite," was the quiet answer, "it involves only the loss of my camel."

      So saying, he assassinated the beast, and appropriated his liquid store.

      A compromise is not always a settlement satisfactory to both parties.

XXI.

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      A sheep, making a long journey, found the heat of his fleece very uncomfortable, and seeing a flock of other sheep in a fold, evidently awaiting for some one, leaped over and joined them, in the hope of being shorn. Perceiving the shepherd approaching, and the other sheep huddling into a remote corner of the fold, he shouldered his way forward, and going up to the shepherd, said:

      "Did you ever see such a lot of fools? It's lucky I came along to set them an example of docility. Seeing me operated upon, they 'll be glad to offer themselves."

      "Perhaps so," replied the shepherd, laying hold of the animal's horns; "but I never kill more than one sheep at a time. Mutton won't keep in hot weather."

      The chops tasted excellently well with tomato sauce.

      The moral of this fable isn't what you think it is. It is this: The chops of another man's mutton are always nice eating.

XXII.

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      Two travellers between Teheran and Bagdad met half-way up the vertical face of a rock, on a path only a cubit in width. As both were in a hurry, and etiquette would allow neither to set his foot upon the other even if dignity had permitted prostration, they maintained for some time a stationary condition. After some reflection, each decided to jump round the other; but as etiquette did not warrant conversation with a stranger, neither made known his intention. The consequence was they met, with considerable emphasis, about four feet from the edge of the path, and went through a flight of soaring eagles, a mile out of their way!^[A]

XXIII.

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      A stone which had lain for centuries in a hidden place complained to Allah that remaining so long in one position was productive of cramps.

      "If thou wouldst be pleased," it said, "to let me take a little exercise now and then, my health would be the better for it."

      So it was granted permission to make a short excursion, and at once began rolling out into the open desert. It had not proceeded far before an ostrich, who was pensively eating a keg of nails, left his repast, dashed at the stone, and gobbled it up.

      This narration teaches the folly of contentment: if the ostrich had been content with his nails he would never have eaten the stone.

XXIV.

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      A man carrying a sack of corn up a high ladder propped against a wall, had nearly reached the top, when a powerful hog passing that way leant against the bottom to scratch its hide.

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