The Two Dogs and the Dead Ass

The Virtues should be sisters, hand in hand, / Since banded brothers all the Vices stand: / When one of these our hearts attacks, / All come in file; there only lacks, / From out the cluster, here and there, / A mate of some antagonizing pair, / That can't agree the common roof to share. / But all the Virtues, as a sisterhood, / Have scarcely ever in one subject stood. / We find one brave, but passionate; / Another prudent, but ingrate. / Of beasts, the dog may claim to be / The pattern of fidelity; / But, for our teaching little wiser, / He's both a fool and gormandiser. / For proof, I cite two mastiffs, that espied / A dead ass floating on a water wide. / The distance growing more and more, / Because the wind the carcass bore, -- / 'My friend,' said one, 'your eyes are best; / Pray let them on the water rest: / What thing is that I seem to see? / An ox, or horse? what can it be? ' / 'Hey! ' cried his mate; 'what matter which, / Provided we could get a flitch? / It doubtless is our lawful prey: / The puzzle is to find some way / To get the prize; for wide the space / To swim, with wind against your face.[1] / Let's drink the flood; our thirsty throats / Will gain the end as well as boats. / The water swallow'd, by and bye / We'll have the carcass, high and dry -- / Enough to last a week, at least. ' / Both drank as some do at a feast; / Their breath was quench'd before their thirst, / And presently the creatures burst!

[1]: _With the wind against your face_. -- Did La Fontaine, to enhance the folly of these dogs, make them bad judges of the course of the wind, or did he forget what he had said a few lines above? -- Translator.