Long, long ago, before the white man came across the Sea of Peace to
Japan, before the screaming engines frightened the white heron from the
rice fields, and before the sparrows perched on telegraph wires, there
lived two frogs, one in a well at Kioto, the other in a pond at Ozaka.
In the land of Japan there is a proverb that “the frog in the well
knows not the great ocean.” The Kioto frog had heard this said many
times by the maids who came to draw water, and one day he became vexed
at their laughter.
“I shall stay here no longer,” he said to himself. “I shall go at once
to see this great ocean of which they talk. I do not believe it is half
as wide or as deep as my well, where I can see the stars even in the
daytime, but I shall at least know what it looks like.”
Then Mr. Frog told his family that he was going on a journey, going out
to Ozaka to see the great ocean. So Mrs. Frog gave him a package of
boiled rice and snails, and tying it round his neck, he set off on his
journey. When he came out of the well, he saw that the other animals
did not leap, but walked upright on their legs. He thought he must walk
in the same way, so he stood up on his hind legs and waddled off slowly
across the fields.
On this very same day the frog who lived in the pond decided to see
more of the world.
[Illustration: THE WELL AT KIOTO]
“Good-by,” he said to Mrs. Frog, as he jumped from a lily-pad into the
grass, “I am tired of sitting here in the sun thinking and blinking, so
I am going to Kioto.”
It so happened that the Kioto frog and the frog from Ozaka met on a
hill halfway between the two cities.
“Good morning,” said one, bowing his head to the ground three times.
“Good morning,” said the other, also bowing respectfully.
Then they sank down in a shady spot, for they were very tired and lame
from trying to walk on their hind feet.
“Where are you going?” asked the Ozaka frog. “This is a fine day for a
journey.”
“I set out to see the great ocean at Ozaka, of which I have heard so
often,” replied the frog who lived in the well, “but I am so tired that
I think I shall be satisfied with looking at it from the top of this
hill.”
“I am going to Kioto,” said the other frog.
“It is a long journey, my friend,” said the Kioto frog. “Why do you not
look at it from this hill and save yourself the trouble of walking all
the way?”
“That is a good plan, friend,” said the frog from Ozaka.
Then the two frogs climbed to the top of a flat rock, and stood up on
their hind legs, the Kioto frog facing the great ocean at Ozaka, and
the other facing the city of Kioto. A frog’s eyes, as you know very
well, are so placed that when he sits comfortably at home on his
lily-pad, he looks before him. But when he stands on his hind legs with
his head in the air, he sees only what is behind him. Standing in this
way, on top of the rock, the frogs looked long and steadily at the
landscape. At last, being very tired, they sat down again.
[Illustration]
“Ozaka looks exactly like my home,” said the Kioto frog; “and as for
the ocean, I saw nothing larger than the brook I swam across this
morning.”
“You are right,” said the other. “Kioto looks just like Ozaka. They are
as much alike as two grains of rice. I am glad that I met you, for you
have saved me much trouble. I shall return to my pond at once. Good-by,
my friend.”
Then the two frogs jumped to the ground and hurried off, leaping as
a frog should do, and thus reaching home in a short time. That night
they told their friends about their adventures, and still the frog in
the pond thinks he has seen the great world, and “the frog in the well
knows not the great ocean.”
--WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS.
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A good action is never thrown away.