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THE FARMER AND THE STORK.
A farmer placed nets on his newly-sown land and caught a quantity of cranes which came to pick up his seeds. With the cranes, he caught a stork also, with its leg fractured by the net. He besought[illegible] the farmer to spare his life: "Let me go free this once. Let my broken leg excite your pity. Besides, I am no crane. I am a stork; a very useful bird. Look how loving I am to my father and mother, and how I toil for them. Look, too, at my feathers; they are not in the least like those of a crane." The farmer laughed aloud, and said "It may be all as you say, only know this: I have taken you with these robbers, the cranes, and you must die in their company."
Birds of a feather flock together.
