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TALES FOR CHILDREN FROM MANY LANDS

EDITED BY F.C. TILNEY

The heart of Thyrsis left.

PREFACE

If deep wisdom, gentle satire, polite cynicism, and, above all,irresistible humour are qualities which make a book attractive then LaFontaine's Fables should be in the hands of all. Their charm istwo-fold; for whilst they induce pleasurable reflection in the readerthey delight him by the gaiety of their subject matter.

Notwithstanding the fact that the spell of La Fontaine's versenecessarily disappears when another tongue is employed, his Englishtranslators, both Elizur Wright and Walter Thornbury, have courageouslyattempted to do him justice in prosody. In this little book no sucheffort has been made, chiefly for the reason that, for any but theunusually gifted, to snatch at rhythm and rhyme is often to let drop theapt and ready word as Æsop's mastiff dropped his dinner. But there is afurther excuse for the present writer. Verse has little attraction forchildren unless it jingles merrily, and that is a thing as impossible asit is undesirable where the claims of a philosophic original makerestrictions. Since the spirit is more likely to survive if the letteris not exacting, it is difficult to see why custom looks askance uponprose versions of poetry. But this little book may escape such censureon the ground of its being but a selection from the complete Fables ofLa Fontaine. It presents only those of which the great fabulist washimself the originator. A selection of some sort being imperative thereseemed to be a simple and easy choice in the condition of absoluteoriginality; particularly as the older fables are given in anothervolume of this series.

This translation (in which I gratefully acknowledge the assistance of myfriend Mrs. A.H. Beddoe) is neither "free" nor literal. It sometimesamplifies a thought, much as a musician might amplify the harmonies upona master's figured bass. But even this is rarely done, and then onlywith a view to the youthful reader's pleasure and profit. With thatview, further, the social and political introductions to the fables havebeen omitted, as well as the scientific discourses and the allusions tothe unfortunate wars of Louis XIV. and other historical matters, all ofwhich would have neither meaning nor interest but for "grown-ups" of acertain class.

F.C. Tilney.

CONTENTS

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	PAGE
The Two Mules	13
The Hare and the Partridge	15
The Gardener and His Landlord	17
The Man and His Image	20
The Animals Sick of the Plague	22
The Unhappily Married Man	25
The Rat retired from the World	27
The Maiden	29
The Wishes	31
The Dairy-Woman and the Pail of Milk	34
The Priest and the Corpse	36
The Man Who ran after Fortune and the Man who waited for Her in His Bed	38
An Animal in the Moon	42
The Fortune-Tellers	44
The Cobbler and the Financier	47
The Power of Fable	50
The Dog Who carried His Master's Dinner	52
Thyrsis and Amaranth	54
The Rat and the Elephant	56
The Horoscope	57
Jupiter and the Thunderbolts	60
Education	62