enlarged. The twelfth book was not added till many years after, and
proved, in fact, the song of the dying swan. It was written for the
special use of the young Duke de Bourgogne, the royal pupil of Fenelon,
to whom it contains frequent allusions. The eleven books now published
sealed the reputation of La Fontaine, and were received with
distinguished regard by the king, who appended to the ordinary protocol
or imprimatur for publication the following reasons: "in order to testify
to the author the esteem we have for his person and his merit, and
because youth have received great advantage in their education from the
fables selected and put in verse, which he has heretofore published." The
author was, moreover, permitted to present his book in person to the
sovereign. For this purpose he repaired to Versailles, and after having
well delivered himself of his compliment to royalty, perceived that he
had forgotten to bring the book which he was to present; he was,
nevertheless, favourably received, and loaded with presents. But it is
added, that, on his return, he also lost, by his absence of mind, the
purse full of gold which the king had given him, which was happily found
under a cushion of the carriage in which he rode.

In his advertisement to the second part of his Fables, La Fontaine
informs the reader that he had treated his subjects in a somewhat
different style. In fact, in his first collection, he had timidly
confined himself to the brevity of Aesop and Phaedrus; but, having
observed that those fables were most popular in which he had given most
scope to his own genius, he threw off the trammels in the second
collection, and, in the opinion of the writer, much for the better. His
subjects, too, in the second part, are frequently derived from the Indian
fabulists, and bring with them the richness and dramatic interest of the
_Hitopadesa_.