Perry's Index to the Aesopica
Fables exist in many versions; here is one version in English:
THE BIRD CATCHER AND THE CRICKET
A story about a bird catcher, exhorting us to pay attention
to deeds, not words.
A bird catcher heard a cricket and thought he was going to make a big catch,
estimating its size by the volume of its song. But when he walked up and seized
his prey, he discovered that it was worthless. The bird catcher then denounced
the whole process of deducing from appearances, since it often leads people to
make mistaken judgments.
The fable shows that persons of no value can seem to be greater than they
really are. |
 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.
Perry 397: Gibbs (Oxford) 271 [English]
Perry 397: Aphthonius 4 [Greek]
You can find a compilation of Perry's index to the Aesopica in the gigantic appendix to his
edition of Babrius and Phaedrus for the Loeb Classical Library
(Harvard University Press: Cambridge, 1965). This book is an absolute must for anyone interested
in the Aesopic fable tradition. Invaluable.
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