Perry's Index to the Aesopica
Fables exist in many versions; here is one version in English:
THE HARE AND THE SPARROW
With this brief fable I will show that it is a foolish thing
to give advice to others while not looking out for oneself.
A hare had been seized by an eagle and was weeping bitter tears. Meanwhile, a
sparrow was making fun of the hare and said, 'So, what became of your fabled
swiftness? How did your feet happen to fail you?' While the sparrow was still
speaking, he was caught off guard by a hawk who killed the sparrow as he was
still shrieking his useless cries of protest. The hare, by now no more than half-alive,
remarked, 'Ah, this makes my dying easier: a moment ago you were making fun of
my misfortune, confident in your own safety, but now you are bewailing your fate
with a lament that matches my own.' |
 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 473: Gibbs (Oxford) 142 [English]
Perry 473: Townsend 245 [English]
Perry 473: Ademar 57 [Latin]
Perry 473: Phaedrus 1.9 [Latin]
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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