Explore "The Drunkard and his Wife" by Jean de La Fontaine on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Each has his fault, to which he clings / In spite of shame or fear. / This apophthegm a story brings, / To make its truth more clear. / A sot had lost health, mind, and purse; / And, truly, for that matter, / Sots mostly lose the latter / Ere running half their course. / When wine, one day, of wit had fill'd the room, / His wife inclosed him in a spacious tomb. / There did the fumes evaporate / At leisure from his drowsy pate. / When he awoke, he found / His body wrapp'd around / With grave-clothes, chill and damp, / Beneath a dim sepulchral lamp. / 'How's this? My wife a widow sad? ' / He cried, 'and I a ghost? Dead? dead? ' / Thereat his spouse, with snaky hair, / And robes like those the Furies wear, / With voice to fit the realms below, / Brought boiling caudle to his bier -- / For Lucifer the proper cheer; / By which her husband came to know -- / For he had heard of those three ladies -- / Himself a citizen of Hades. / 'What may your office be? ' / The phantom question'd he. / 'I'm server up of Pluto's meat, / And bring his guests the same to eat. ' / 'Well,' says the sot, not taking time to think, / 'And don't you bring us anything to drink? '[1]
[1]: Aesop.