Parents and those older than us who care about us often advise us not to stand and talk to strangers, or give them great safety and trust when we know nothing about them. The world is full of evildoers who can harm us. In addition to that, listening to parents’ advice makes us dutiful to them, for they know best that in life there are evil people who may attract us with sweet talk and excessive praise until we fall into their traps, and they can attack us later. This is likely what happened to the poor crow.
In the beautiful forest with tall trees and the clear river, the cunning fox was wandering right and left searching for food to eat, but he walked a lot in vain. He sat to take shade under one of the trees until sleep began to play with his eyes and he slept a little.
A few hours passed then the cunning fox woke up in extreme hunger. But as soon as he opened his eyes, he spotted the crow standing on the branch of the tree under which he was staying. The crow was carrying a piece of delicious cheese in his mouth. Here the cunning ideas began playing in the fox’s mind, and he started planning how he could get that piece of cheese from the crow. Then a cunning idea came to him.
The cunning fox raised his head upward and spoke to the crow, saying to him: Peace be upon you, oh beautiful crow. I am Thulub the fox. I live with you in this same beautiful forest. Can I get to know you? You can sing something for me, for I have heard that your voice is very beautiful and I desire to listen to it.
The fox’s plan required that he talk to the crow and gain his trust within minutes, then tempt him to sing with false praise for him. The crow would begin singing and the piece of cheese would fall from his small mouth, and the fox would get it. The fox cannot fly as we know, and that was the idea in trying to drop the piece of bread.
Of course, the crow felt arrogance and was taken with pride with sin and believed the fox’s false praise of him and his voice. He began thinking to himself that he was a beautiful and distinctive bird with a melodious voice! Oh, what arrogance! The crow decided to open his mouth and begin singing. But before he did, he was extremely clever and remembered his mother’s talk a lot about the cunning fox and his many tricks to trap his prey and victims. He decided to shake off the arrogance and save himself. He took the piece of cheese out of his mouth, placed it under his wing, and began singing.
The crow’s voice was extremely ugly, and he insisted on doing this until the cunning fox realized that the crow was not stupid and that he could annoy him and not be prey to him. The fox plugged his ears with his hands and said to him: Well, I have learned the lesson. I must search for my food myself and not steal it from others.