One day a fox was hungry. He did not know what to think. He saw a
shepherd pass every day with his flock, and he said to himself that
he ought to steal his milk and his cheese, and to have a good feast;
but he needed some one to help him in order to effect anything. So
he goes off to find a wolf, and he says to him,
"Wolf, wolf! we ought to have a feast with such a shepherd's milk
and cheese. You, you shall go to where the flocks are feeding, and
from a distance you must howl, 'Uhur, uhur, uhur.' The man, after
having milked his sheep, drives them into the field, with his dog,
very early in the morning, and he stops at home to do his work, and
then he makes his cheese; and, when you have begun to howl 'Uhur,
uhur,' and the dog to bark, the shepherd will leave everything else,
and will go off full speed. During this time I will steal the milk,
and we will share it when you come to me."
The wolf agreed to have a feast, and set out. He did just what the
fox had told him. The dog began to bark when the wolf approached. And
when the man heard that he went off, leaving everything, and our fox
goes and steals the vessel in which the curdled milk was. What does
he do then, before the arrival of the wolf? He gently, gently takes
off the cream, thinly, thinly, and he eats all the contents of the
jug. After he has eaten all, he fills it up with dirt, and puts back
the cream on the top, and he awaits the wolf at the place where he
had told him. The fox says to him, since it is he who is to make the
division, that as the top is much better than the underneath part,
the one who should choose that should have only that, and the other
all the rest. "Choose now which you would like."
The wolf says to him,
"I will not have the top; I prefer what is at the bottom."
The fox then takes the top, and gives the poor wolf the vessel full
of dirt. [37] When he saw that, the wolf got angry; but the fox said
to him,
"It is not my fault. Apparently the shepherd makes it like that."
And the fox goes off well filled.
Another day he was again very hungry, and did not know what to
contrive. Every day he saw a boy pass by on the road with his father's
dinner. He says to a blackbird,
"Blackbird, you don't know what we ought to do? We ought to have a
good dinner. A boy will pass by here directly. You will go in front
of him, and when the boy goes to catch you, you will go on a little
farther, limping, and when you shall have done that a little while
the boy will get impatient, and he will put down his basket in order
to catch you quicker. I will take the basket, and will go to such a
spot, and we will share it, and will make a good dinner."