A Raven in quest of food, seeing a Serpent basking in the sun, soused
down, seized it with his horny beak, and attempted to carry it off.
But the Serpent, writhing with the pain, twisted its elastic coils so
firmly about the Raven, and bit him with such envenomed fierceness,
that he fell to the ground mortally wounded. In the agonies of death,
the Raven confessed this was a just punishment upon him, for having
attempted to satisfy his greedy appetite at the expence of another’s
welfare.