var currentStory="Aesop\'s Fables";
var myTitle="Aesop\'s Fables";
var sideTitle="Aesop\'s fables - are short moral stories with animals speaking and acting like human beings. ";
var defText="Aesop, a Greek author famous for his fables, is supposed to have lived from about 620 to 560 B.C. Aesop's fables are still taught as moral lessons and used as subjects for various entertainments, especially children's plays and cartoons. Aesop\'s fables are brief, succinct stories featuring animals, plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature which are anthropomorphized (given human qualities), and illustrate moral lessons which may at the end be expressed explicitly in a pithy maxim (saying). Click any chapter on the right. Next, click \"start test\" button and begin typing. ";

var chapter0="A WOLF, meeting with a Lamb astray from the fold, resolved not to lay violent hands on him, but to find some plea to justify to the Lamb the Wolf\'s right to eat him. He thus addressed him: \"Sirrah, last year you grossly insulted me.\" \"Indeed,\" bleated the Lamb in a mournful tone of voice, \"I was not then born.\" Then said the Wolf, \"You feed in my pasture.\" \"No, good sir,\" replied the Lamb, \"I have not yet tasted grass.\" Again said the Wolf, \"You drink of my well.\" \"No,\" exclaimed the Lamb, \"I never yet drank water, for as yet my mother\'s milk is both food and drink to me.\" Upon which the Wolf seized him and ate him up, saying, \"Well! I won\'t remain supperless, even though you refute every one of my imputations.\" --The tyrant will always find a pretext for his tyranny. ";

var chapter1="A BAT who fell upon the ground and was caught by a Weasel pleaded to be spared his life. The Weasel refused, saying that he was by nature the enemy of all birds. The Bat assured him that he was not a bird, but a mouse, and thus was set free. Shortly afterwards the Bat again fell to the ground and was caught by another Weasel, whom he likewise entreated not to eat him. The Weasel said that he had a special hostility to mice. The Bat assured him that he was not a mouse, but a bat, and thus a second time escaped. --It is wise to turn circumstances to good account. ";

var chapter2="A LION was awakened from sleep by a Mouse running over his face. Rising up angrily, he caught him and was about to kill him, when the Mouse piteously entreated, saying: \"If you would only spare my life, I would be sure to repay your kindness.\" The Lion laughed and let him go. It happened shortly after this that the Lion was caught by some hunters, who bound him by ropes to the ground. The Mouse, recognizing his roar, came gnawed the rope with his teeth, and set him free, exclaimed \"You ridiculed the idea of my ever being able to help you, expecting to receive from me any repayment of your favor; I now you know that it is possible for even a Mouse to con benefits on a Lion.\" ";

var chapter3="A CHARCOAL-BURNER carried on his trade in his own house. One day he met a friend, a Fuller, and entreated him to come and live with him, saying that they should be far better neighbors and that their housekeeping expenses would be lessened. The Fuller replied, \"The arrangement is impossible as far as I am concerned, for whatever I should whiten, you would immediately blacken again with your charcoal.\" --Like will draw like. ";

var chapter4="A BOY was hunting for locusts. He had caught a goodly number, when he saw a Scorpion, and mistaking him for a locust, reached out his hand to take him. The Scorpion, showing his sting, said: \"If you had but touched me, my friend, you would have lost me, and all your locusts too!\" ";

var chapter5="A COCK, scratching for food for himself and his hens, found a precious stone and exclaimed: \"If your owner had found thee, and not I, he would have taken thee up, and have set thee in thy first estate; but I have found thee for no purpose. I would rather have one barleycorn than all the jewels in the world.\" ";

var chapter6="THE BEASTS of the field and forest had a Lion as their king. He was neither wrathful, cruel, nor tyrannical, but just and gentle as a king could be. During his reign he made a royal proclamation for a general assembly of all the birds and beasts, and drew up conditions for a universal league, in which the Wolf and the Lamb, the Panther and the Kid, the Tiger and the Stag, the Dog and the Hare, should live together in perfect peace and amity. The Hare said, \"Oh, how I have longed to see this day, in which the weak shall take their place with impunity by the side of the strong.\" And after the Hare said this, he ran for his life. ";

var chapter7="A WOLF who had a bone stuck in his throat hired a Crane, for a large sum, to put her head into his mouth and draw out the bone. When the Crane had extracted the bone and demanded the promised payment, the Wolf, grinning and grinding his teeth, exclaimed: \"Why, you have surely already had a sufficient recompense, in having been permitted to draw out your head in safety from the mouth and jaws of a wolf.\" --In serving the wicked, expect no reward, and be thankful if you escape injury for your pains. ";

var chapter8="A FISHERMAN skilled in music took his flute and his nets to the seashore. Standing on a projecting rock, he played several tunes in the hope that the fish, attracted by his melody, would of their own accord dance into his net, which he had placed below. At last, having long waited in vain, he laid aside his flute, and casting his net into the sea, made an excellent haul of fish. When he saw them leaping about in the net upon the rock he said: \"O you most perverse creatures, when I piped you would not dance, but now that I have ceased you do so merrily.\" ";

var chapter9="A CARTER was driving a wagon along a country lane, when the wheels sank down deep into a rut. The rustic driver, stupefied and aghast, stood looking at the wagon, and did nothing but utter loud cries to Hercules to come and help him. Hercules, it is said, appeared and thus addressed him: \"Put your shoulders to the wheels, my man. Goad on your bullocks, and never more pray to me for help, until you have done your best to help yourself, or depend upon it you will henceforth pray in vain.\" --Self-help is the best help. ";

var chapter10="A TRAVELER about to set out on a journey saw his Dog stand at the door stretching himself. He asked him sharply: \"Why do you stand there gaping? Everything is ready but you, so come with me instantly.\" The Dog, wagging his tail, replied: \"O, master! I am quite ready; it is you for whom I am waiting.\" --The loiterer often blames delay on his more active friend. ";

var chapter11="A HARE one day ridiculed the short feet and slow pace of the Tortoise, who replied, laughing: \"Though you be swift as the wind, I will beat you in a race.\" The Hare, believing her assertion to be simply impossible, assented to the proposal; and they agreed that the Fox should choose the course and fix the goal. On the day appointed for the race the two started together. The Tortoise never for a moment stopped, but went on with a slow but steady pace straight to the end of the course. The Hare, lying down by the wayside, fell fast asleep. At last waking up, and moving as fast as he could, he saw the Tortoise had reached the goal, and was comfortably dozing after her fatigue. --Slow but steady wins the race. ";

var chapter12="A FARMER placed nets on his newly-sown plowlands and caught a number of Cranes, which came to pick up his seed. With them he trapped a Stork that had fractured his leg in the net and was earnestly beseeching the Farmer to spare his life. \"Pray save me, Master,\" he said, \"and let me go free this once. My broken limb should excite your pity. Besides, I am no Crane, I am a Stork, a bird of excellent character; and see how I love and slave for my father and mother. Look too, at my feathers-they are not the least like those of a Crane.\" The Farmer laughed aloud and said, \"It may be all as you say, I only know this: I have taken you with these robbers, the Cranes, and you must die in their company.\" --Birds of a feather flock together. ";

var chapter13="One winter a FARMER found a Snake stiff and frozen with cold. He had compassion on it, and taking it up, placed it in his bosom. The Snake was quickly revived by the warmth, and resuming its natural instincts, bit its benefactor, inflicting on him a mortal wound. \"Oh,\" cried the Farmer with his last breath, \"I am rightly served for pitying a scoundrel.\" --The greatest kindness will not bind the ungrateful. ";

var chapter14="A young FAWN once said to his Mother, \"You are larger than a dog, and swifter, and more used to running, and you have your horns as a defense; why, then, O Mother! do the hounds frighten you so?\" She smiled, and said: \"I know full well, my son, that all you say is true. I have the advantages you mention, but when I hear even the bark of a single dog I feel ready to faint, and fly away as fast as I can.\" --No arguments will give courage to the coward. ";

var chapter15="A TORTOISE, lazily basking in the sun, complained to the sea-birds of her hard fate, that no one would teach her to fly. An Eagle, hovering near, heard her lamentation and demanded what reward she would give him if he would take her aloft and float her in the air. \"I will give you,\" she said, \"all the riches of the Red Sea.\" \"I will teach you to fly then,\" said the Eagle; and taking her up in his talons he carried her almost to the clouds suddenly he let her go, and she fell on a lofty mountain, dashing her shell to pieces. The Tortoise exclaimed in the moment of death: \"I have deserved my present fate; for what had I to do with wings and clouds, who can with difficulty move about on the earth?\' --If men had all they wished, they would be often ruined. ";

var chapter16="A number of FLIES were attracted to a jar of honey which had been overturned in a housekeeper\'s room, and placing their feet in it, ate greedily. Their feet, however, became so smeared with the honey that they could not use their wings, nor release themselves, and were suffocated. Just as they were expiring, they exclaimed, \"O foolish creatures that we are, for the sake of a little pleasure we have destroyed ourselves.\" --Pleasure bought with pains, hurts. ";

var chapter17="Some CRANES made their feeding grounds on some plowlands newly sown with wheat. For a long time the Farmer, brandishing an empty sling, chased them away by the terror he inspired; but when the birds found that the sling was only swung in the air, they ceased to take any notice of it and would not move. The Farmer, on seeing this, charged his sling with stones, and killed a great number. The remaining birds at once forsook his fields, crying to each other, \"It is time for us to be off to Liliput: for this man is no longer content to scare us, but begins to show us in earnest what he can do.\" --If words suffice not, blows must follow. ";

var chapter18="A controversy prevailed among the BEASTS of the field as to which of the animals deserved the most credit for producing the greatest number of whelps at a birth. They rushed clamorously into the presence of the Lioness and demanded of her the settlement of the dispute. \"And you,\" they said, \"how many sons have you at a birth?\' The Lioness laughed at them, and said: \"Why! I have only one; but that one is altogether a thoroughbred Lion.\" --The value is in the worth, not in the number. ";

var chapter19="A SNAKE, having made his hole close to the porch of a cottage, inflicted a mortal bite on the Cottager\'s infant son. Grieving over his loss, the Father resolved to kill the Snake. The next day, when it came out of its hole for food, he took up his axe, but by swinging too hastily, missed its head and cut off only the end of its tail. After some time the Cottager, afraid that the Snake would bite him also, endeavored to make peace, and placed some bread and salt in the hole. The Snake, slightly hissing, said: \"There can henceforth be no peace between us; for whenever I see you I shall remember the loss of my tail, and whenever you see me you will be thinking of the death of your son.\" --No one truly forgets injuries in the presence of him who caused the injury. ";

allChapters=new Array(chapter0,chapter1,chapter2,chapter3,chapter4,chapter5,chapter6,chapter7,chapter8,chapter9,chapter10,chapter11,chapter12,chapter13,chapter14,chapter15,chapter16,chapter17,chapter18,chapter19);