"Look where you're going there, or I'll thrash the life out of you!"
screamed a bird into whose nest he had blundered.

Frantic with fear, the man leapt into the sea.

"By Jove! how you frightened me," said a small shark.

The man was dejected, and felt a sense of injury. He seated himself
moodily on the bottom, braced up his chin with his knees, and thought
for an hour. Then he beckoned to the fish who had made the last
remark.

"See here, I say," said he, "I wish you would just tell me what in
thunder this all means."

"Ever read any fables?" asked the shark.

"No--yes--well, the catechism, the marriage service, and--"

"Oh, bother!" said the fish, playfully, smiling clean back to the
pectoral fins; "get out of this and bolt your Æsop!"

The man did get out and bolted.

[This fable teaches that its worthy author was drunk as a
loon.--TRANSLATOR.]