[Illustration: THE EAGLE AND THE FOX.]
An Eagle that had young ones, looking out for something to feed them
with, happened to spy a Fox's cub, that lay basking itself abroad in the
sun. She made a stoop, and trussed it immediately; but before she had
carried it quite off, the old Fox coming home, implored her, with tears
in her eyes, to spare her cub, and pity the distress of a poor fond
mother, who should think no affliction so great as that of losing her
child. The Eagle, whose nest was up in a very high tree, thought herself
secure enough from all projects of revenge, and so bore away the cub to
her young ones, without showing any regard to the supplications of the
Fox. But that subtle creature, highly incensed at this outrageous
barbarity, ran to an altar, where some country people had been
sacrificing a kid in the open fields, and catching up a firebrand in her
mouth, made towards the tree where the Eagle's nest was, with a
resolution of revenge. She had scarce ascended the first branches, when
the Eagle, terrified with the approaching ruin of herself and family,
begged of the Fox to desist, and, with much submission, returned her the
cub again safe and sound.