hope to abjure the higher faculties, devoting the remainder of my life
to the cultivation of the propensities."

"Allah be praised!" soliloquized the pig, "there is nothing so godlike
as Intellect, and nothing so ecstatic as intellectual pursuits. I must
hasten to perform this gross material function, that I may retire to
my wallow and resign my soul to philosophical meditation."

This tale has one moral if you are a philosopher, and another if you
are a pig.




LXIII.


"Awful dark--isn't it?" said an owl, one night, looking in upon the
roosting hens in a poultry-house; "don't see how I am to find my way
back to my hollow tree."

"There is no necessity," replied the cock; "you can roost there,
alongside the door, and go home in the morning."

"Thanks!" said the owl, chuckling at the fool's simplicity; and,
having plenty of time to indulge his facetious humour, he gravely
installed himself upon the perch indicated, and shutting his eyes,
counterfeited a profound slumber. He was aroused soon after by a sharp
constriction of the throat.