So he gnawed it into
_smithareens_[A] without the slightest injury to his teeth. With his
morals the case was somewhat different. For the file was a file of
newspapers, and his system became so saturated with the "spirit of the
Press" that he went off and called his aged father a "lingering
contemporary;" advised the correction of brief tails by amputation;
lauded the skill of a quack rodentist for money; and, upon what would
otherwise have been his death-bed, essayed a lie of such phenomenal
magnitude that it stuck in his throat, and prevented him breathing
his last. All this crime, and misery, and other nonsense, because he
was too lazy to worry about and find a file of nutritious fables.
This tale shows the folly of eating everything you happen to fancy.
Consider, moreover, the danger of such a course to your neighbour's
wife.
[Footnote A: I confess my inability to translate this word: it may
mean "flinders."--TRANSLATOR.]
LXXIX.
"I should like to climb up you, if you don't mind," cried an ivy to a
young oak.
"Oh, certainly; come along," was the cheerful assent.
So she started up, and finding she could grow faster than he, she
wound round and round him until she had passed up all the line she
had. The oak, however, continued to grow, and as she could not
disengage her coils, she was just lifted out by the root.
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