The Bat and the Two Weasels

A blundering bat enters a wakeful weasel’s bed and is about to be eaten as a mouse, since the weasel hates rats and mice. The bat escapes by claiming to be a bird, pointing to her wings and praising the mice that fly. A few days later, she foolishly rests in another weasel’s nest, where the mistress hates birds and prepares to eat her as one. This time the bat insists that birds are defined by feathers and declares herself related to mice and rats. Her quick changes of identity save her twice. The fable compares her to human strangers who alter their allegiance when in danger, praising either a king or his enemies according to what suits them.

By Jean de La Fontaine · First published 1668 · Genre: Fable, Moral Literature, Animal Fiction · 605 words

First lines

A blundering bat once stuck her head / Into a wakeful weasel's bed; / Whereat the mistress of the house, / A deadly foe of rats and mice, / Was making ready in a trice / To eat the stranger as a mouse. / 'What! do you dare,' she said, 'to creep in / The very bed I sometimes sleep in, / Now, after all the provocation / I've suffer'd from your thievish nation? / Are you not really a mouse, / That gnawing pest of every house, / Your special aim to do the cheese ill? / Ay, that you are, or I'm no weasel. ' / 'I beg your pardon,' said the bat; / 'My kind is very far from that. / What! I a mouse! Who told you such a lie? / Why, ma'am, I am a bird; / And, if you doubt my word, / Just see the wings with which I fly. / Long live the mice that cleave the sky! ' / These reasons had so fair a show, / The weasel let the creature go.

• Open reader

Similar titles

• The Cock And The Fox by Jean De La Fontaine
• The Eagle And The Beetle by Jean De La Fontaine
• The Raven And The Fox by Jean De La Fontaine
• The Grasshopper And The Ant by Jean De La Fontaine
• The Lion And The Ass Hunting by Jean De La Fontaine
• The Ass Loaded With Sponges And The Ass Loaded With Salt by Jean De La Fontaine

Genres

• Fable — The work is a concise animal tale in which speaking creatures enact a moral lesson about opportunism and changing allegiance in danger.
• Moral Literature — Its closing lines explicitly generalize the bat's conduct into a judgment on human behavior, condemning those who alter their loyalties for self-preservation.
• Animal Fiction — A bat and two weasels serve as the principal characters, with their natural traits and enmities adapted into a human-like dramatic conflict.
• Allegory — The bat's claims to be either bird or mouse according to immediate necessity allegorically represent politically and socially expedient people.

Tags

French fable · verse narrative · animal allegory · seventeenth-century literature · Aesopian tradition · bat · weasels · mice and rats · birds · predator and prey · danger · survival

What this Textopian page supports

The Bat and the Two Weasels is listed on Textopian as a fable by Jean de La Fontaine, dated 1668 CE.

This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.

• Work type: Fable
• Author: Jean de La Fontaine
• Date: 1668 CE
• Language: English
• Genres: Fable, Moral Literature, Animal Fiction, Allegory, Satire
• Length: 605 words
• Structure: 1 section, 5 paragraphs
• Reading fit: Easy (6th Grade)

Good citation fit

• Work identity for The Bat and the Two Weasels by Jean de La Fontaine
• Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
• Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
• Readability and classroom-planning context
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More by Jean de La Fontaine

• To Monseigneur the Dauphin (1668)
• The Grasshopper and the Ant (1668)
• The Raven and the Fox (1668)
• The Frog that Wished to be as Big as the Ox (1668)
• The Two Mules (1668)
• The Wolf and the Dog (1668)
• The Heifer, the Goat, and the Sheep, in Company with the Lion (1668)
• The Wallet (1668)
• All works by Jean de La Fontaine