Sir Isegrim, the Wolf, was grown old. The years that had passed over his head, too, had brought with them changes hardly to be expected in a wolf at any season of life. All his fierceness and ferocity were gone; he was no longer the slayer of sheep and terror of shepherds: no; he had lost his teeth, and was now a philosopher. To superficial observers, perhaps, the alteration in his character might not have been very obvious; but he himself knew that he was no more what he had been--that his lupuline prowess had departed from him. He resolved accordingly on showing mankind what a reformation had overtaken him. “One of my brethren,” said he, “once assumed the garb of a lamb, but he was still a wolf at heart. I reverse the fable; I seem outwardly a wolf, but at heart I am a lamb. Appearances are deceptive; whatever prejudices may be excited against me by my exterior, with which I was born, and for which I am not accountable, I have that within which passeth show. I trust that I feel an exemplary horror for the blood-thirstiness of my juvenile instincts, and the savage revellings of my maturer years. I am determined, therefore, to accommodate my way of life in future to the usages of society--to march with the spirit of the age--to cut no more throats--to become in short quite civilized--and set an example which may have the effect of eventually bringing all the wolves of the forest into the same reputable position as my own.” Full of these thoughts, and possibly some others, which he kept to himself, he set out upon a journey to the hut of the nearest shepherd, which he soon reached. “Shepherd,” said he, “I have come to talk over a little matter with you, personal to myself. You have been long the object of my esteem; I entertain a special regard for you; but you requite my esteem and regard with suspicion and hatred. You think me a lawless and sanguinary robber. My friend, you labour under a deplorable prejudice. What have I done, at least for many years back, worse than others? The head and front of my offending is that I eat sheep. Suppose so: must not every animal eat some other animal? I have the misfortune to be subject, like all quadrupeds (as well as bipeds), to hunger. Only guarantee me from the attacks of hunger; and upon my honour, Shepherd, I will never even dream of pillaging your fold. Give me enough to eat, and you may turn your dogs loose, and sleep in security. Ah! Shepherd, believe me, you do not know what a gentle, meek, sleek-tempered animal I can become when I have got what I think enough.”