THE FARMER AND THE FOX.

By JAMES ANTHONY FROUDE.

A farmer, whose poultry-yard had suffered severely from the
foxes, succeeded at last in catching one in a trap. "Ah, you
rascal!" said he, as he saw him struggling, "I'll teach you to
steal my fat geese!--you shall hang on the tree yonder, and your
brothers shall see what comes of thieving."

The farmer was twisting a halter to do what he threatened, when
the fox, whose tongue had helped him in hard pinches before,
thought there could be no harm in trying whether it might not do
him one more good turn.

"You will hang me," he said, "to frighten my brother foxes. On
the word of a fox, they won't care; they'll come and look at me,
but they will dine at your expense before they go home again."

"Then I shall hang you for yourself, as a rogue and a rascal,"
said the farmer.

"I am only what nature chose to make me," the fox answered. "I
didn't make myself."

"You stole my geese," said the man.