It is told that one day there lived a rabbit in the forest. While he was playing in the forest, he felt hungry. The rabbit ran and kept jumping here and there among the forest trees, searching for food. He saw a lone apple at the top of an apple tree. The rabbit rejoiced and tried to catch it.
The apple was high for the rabbit, and he could not reach it. Suddenly, he heard the sound of a crow on a nearby tree. The rabbit called out: Oh crow, can you help me pick this apple? Indeed, the crow flew until he reached the tree and began pecking at the apple with his beak until it fell to the ground and began rolling. The rabbit jumped behind the apple and kept chasing it until it fell on the back of a hedgehog that was playing in the forest.
The apple settled on the hedgehog’s back and settled on its spines. The hedgehog tried to take the apple, but the rabbit called out to him: Oh hedgehog, stop. The hedgehog stopped and asked the rabbit: What do you want? The rabbit answered: I want my apple.
The hedgehog asked: Which apple? The rabbit answered: The one on your back. The hedgehog answered: But it is my apple, I found it on my back. The rabbit answered: No, it is my apple, I searched inside the forest until I saw it on the tree.
Here, the crow came and intervened in the conversation, saying to them: This apple is mine, I bore the trouble of picking it from the tree with my beak. Each of the three insisted that he was the owner of the apple and no one else. The conversation between them intensified until it turned into a fight, and each of them began to use his weapons against the other. The crow began pecking them with his beak, the hedgehog wounding them with his spines, while the rabbit jumped until all of them were exhausted with fatigue. While they were quarreling, a kind bear passed by them.
He stopped and asked them: What is wrong with you, why are you quarreling? The three stopped fighting and hurried toward the bear with the apple, asking him to judge between them with justice. They told him the story, so the bear said: The rabbit is the one who saw the apple, the crow picked it, and the hedgehog caught it, so each of you has a right to the apple.
Divide the apple into three equal parts, and let each of you take a piece. The three rejoiced and shouted at the same time: How did we not know this solution before? The rabbit took the apple and divided it into four parts, saying: And the fourth part is for you, oh kind bear, because you reconciled us and taught us wisdom. If we had thought from the beginning, we would not have had to fight from the beginning.