This fable is addressed to those who treat their friends in a similar manner and imagine that their prosperity is specially and directly due to the munificence of God. An ungrateful man, says the poet, is one who addresses no thanks to Divine Providence for the innumerable gifts showered upon him: he is a blasphemer, as well as an ingrate, who is grateful toward no one excepting the giver of them all. THE HUNTER AND HIS HOUNDS A certain Hunter, who was seized with an ardent desire to make his prey a superb anqua,[1] spent large sums of money in the keeping of Hounds. By accident, one of his bitches bit his son, and the child died of the wound. “Since the Hounds have caused his death,” said the master to the servants, “let us kill them all.” “Alas!” cried one of the poor creatures, “all of us must die for the fault committed by a single one of us!” A single scoundrel is sufficient to bring ruin on a whole ward. THE FOOL WHO SELLS WISDOM A certain Fool kept constantly passing through the streets of a town. “Who will buy Wisdom?” he cried in a loud voice. A passer-by met him on his way, accosted him, and presented him with some small pieces of money. “Sell me a little Wisdom,” he said. “Here it is,” replied the other, cuffing him heartily. Immediately afterward he put into his hands a long thread. “If you wish in future to be wise and prudent,” said the Fool to him, “always keep as far away from fools as the length of this thread.” We should avoid all connection and communication with fools and cranks. THE DICER A Dicer one day lost at play all that he possessed, even to his clothes. Sitting at the door of a wine shop he burst into tears. One of his friends happened to pass, and noticed the state he was in. “Have you anything the matter with you that you are so mournful, my friend?” he inquired. “I have nothing,” replied the other. “Nothing?” went on the other. “Then there is no reason for weeping.” “It is really because I have nothing that I weep,” replied he. Numerous are the applications of this profound fable. THE LAMB AND THE WOLF A tender lamb was in the fold, when suddenly a Wolf entered for the purpose of devouring her. Throwing herself at the feet of the Wolf, she said, weeping: “God has put me in your power; sound therefore your horn in order to grant me one moment’s delight; my desires will then be perfectly satisfied, for my parents have told me that the race of wolves are the best players on the horn.” The Wolf heard this silly proposal, and set himself to cry out with all his might and main; when lo and behold, the dogs were waked up and attacked him. He took to flight, and did not stop until he reached a hill, where he said, lamenting: “I certainly deserve this mishap, for who has made me a musician, when I have never been anything but a butcher?”