The Carter in the Mire by Jean de La Fontaine

The Phaëton who drove a load of hay / Once found his cart bemired. / Poor man! the spot was far away / From human help -- retired, / In some rude country place, / In Brittany, as near as I can trace, / Near Quimper Corentan, -- / A town that poet never sang, -- / Which Fate, they say, puts in the traveller's path, / When she would rouse the man to special wrath. / May Heaven preserve us from that route! / But to our carter, hale and stout: -- / Fast stuck his cart; he swore his worst, / And, fill'd with rage extreme, / The mud-holes now he cursed, / And now he cursed his team, / And now his cart and load, -- / Anon, the like upon himself bestow'd. / Upon the god he call'd at length, / Most famous through the world for strength. / 'O, help me, Hercules! ' cried he; / 'For if thy back of yore / This burly planet bore, / Thy arm can set me free. ' / This prayer gone up, from out a cloud there broke / A voice which thus in godlike accents spoke: -- / 'The suppliant must himself bestir, / Ere Hercules will aid confer. / Look wisely in the proper quarter, / To see what hindrance can be found; / Remove the execrable mud and mortar, / Which, axle-deep, beset thy wheels around. / Thy sledge and crowbar take, / And pry me up that stone, or break; / Now fill that rut upon the other side. / Hast done it? ' 'Yes,' the man replied. / 'Well,' said the voice, 'I'll aid thee now; / Take up thy whip. ' 'I have... but, how? / My cart glides on with ease! / I thank thee, Hercules. ' / 'Thy team,' rejoin'd the voice, 'has light ado; / So help thyself, and Heaven will help thee too. '[1]

[1]: Avianus; also Faerno; also Rabelais, Book IV., ch. 23, Bohn's edition.