ONE day a mother Eagle came flying out of her nest to look for food for
her babies. She circled round and round, far up in the air, looking
down upon the earth with her keen eyes.
By and by she saw a little baby Fox, whose mother had left it alone
while, like the Eagle, she went for food.
Down came the bird, whir went her wings, and away she soared again,
with the little Fox clutched fast in her claws.
The poor mother Fox just at that moment came running home to her child,
and saw it being carried away.
“O Eagle!” she cried, “leave me my one little baby. Remember your own
children, and how you would feel if one of them should be taken away.
Oh, bring back my poor cub!”
But the cruel Eagle, thinking that the Fox could never reach her, in
her nest high in the pine tree, flew away with the little Fox, and left
the poor mother to cry.
But the mother Fox did not stop to cry long. She ran to a fire that was
burning in the field, caught up a blazing stick of wood, and ran with
it in her mouth to the pine tree where the Eagle had her nest.
The Eagle saw her coming, and knew that the Fox would soon have the
tree on fire, and that all her young ones would be burned. So, to save
her own brood, she begged the Fox to stop, and brought her back her
little one, safe and sound.