FABLES FROM KRILOF

            "Shall  not my  fable   censure vice,

    Because a   Knave   is  over-nice?

            And,    lest    the guilty  hear    and dread,

    Shall   not the decalogue   be  read?"

JOHN GAY

FABLES FROM KRILOF

The Education of the Lion

To the Lion, king of the forests, was given a son.

Among us, a child a year old, even if it belong to a royal family, is small and
weak. But, by the time it has lived a twelve-month, a lion-cub has long ago left
off its baby-clothes.

So, at the end of a year, the Lion began to consider that he must not allow his
royal son to remain ignorant, that the dignity of the kingdom be not degraded,
and that when the son's turn should come to govern the kingdom the nation
should have no cause to reproach the father on his account.

But whom should he entreat, or compel, or induce by rewards, to instruct the
czarevitch to become a czar?

The Fox is clever, but it is terribly addicted to lying, and a liar is perpetually
getting into trouble. "No," thought the Lion, "the science of falsehood is not one
which princes ought to study."