The Tortoise and the Eagle

A tortoise, dissatisfied with his lowly life, when he beheld so many of the birds, his neighbors, disporting themselves in the clouds, and thinking that, if he could but once get up into the air, he could soar with the best of them, called one day upon an eagle and offered him all the treasures of the ocean if he could only teach him to fly.

The eagle would have declined the task, assuring him that the thing was not only absurd but impossible. Being further pressed by the entreaties and promises of the tortoise, he at length consented to do for him the best he could.

The eagle took the tortoise up to a great height in the air and loosed his hold upon him. "Now, then!" cried the eagle. But the tortoise, before he could answer him a word, fell plump upon a rock and was dashed to pieces.