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Aesop's Fables, translated by Laura Gibbs (2002)

226. THE FLEA AND THE OX
Perry 273 (Chambry 358)

A flea once asked an ox, 'Given that you are so exceedingly large and strong, why do you suffer this enslavement to people day after day? Look at me: I lacerate their flesh without pity, drinking great gulps of their blood!' The ox said, 'I cannot help but be grateful to the human race, since I am cherished and loved by them to an extraordinary degree, and since they often rub my forehead and shoulders.' The flea admitted, 'Woe is me! This rubbing of which you are so fond is the worst thing that can happen to me: when they do that, I die.'
This fable shows that braggarts can be easily exposed.


Source: Aesop's Fables. A new translation by Laura Gibbs. Oxford University Press (World's Classics): Oxford, 2002.
NOTE: New cover, with new ISBN, published in 2008; contents of book unchanged.