[Illustration: THE HORSE AND THE LOADED ASS.]
An idle Horse, and an Ass labouring under a heavy burden, were
travelling the road together; they both belonged to a country fellow,
who trudged it on foot by them. The Ass, ready to faint under his heavy
load, entreated the Horse to assist him, and lighten his burden, by
taking some of it upon his back. The Horse was ill-natured, and refused
to do it; upon which the poor Ass tumbled down in the midst of the
highway, and expired in an instant. The countryman ungirted his
pack-saddle, and tried several ways to relieve him, but all to no
purpose: which, when he perceived, he took the whole burden and laid it
upon the Horse, together with the skin of the dead Ass: so that the
Horse, by his moroseness in refusing to do a small kindness, justly
brought upon himself a great inconvenience.