als danced on ahead, and the Lion stalked behind. They
led him to a place where there was a round, deep well of clear water.
They went round on one side of it, and the Lion stalked up to the other.

"He lives down there, Father Lion!" said the little Jackal. "He lives
down there!"

The Lion came close and looked down into the water,--and a lion's face
looked back at him out of the water!

When he saw that, the Lion roared and shook his mane and showed his
teeth. And the lion in the water shook his mane and showed his teeth.
The Lion above shook his mane again and growled again, and made a
terrible face. But the lion in the water made just as terrible a one,
back. The Lion above couldn't stand that. He leaped down into the well
after the other lion.

But, of course, as you know very well, there wasn't any other lion! It
was only the reflection in the water!

So the poor old Lion floundered about and floundered about, and as he
couldn't get up the steep sides of the well, he was at last drowned. And
when he was drowned, the little Jackals took hold of hands and danced
round the well, and sang,--

"The Lion is dead! The Lion is dead!

"We have killed the great Lion who would have killed us!

"The Lion is dead! The Lion is dead!

"Ao! Ao! Ao!"

FOOTNOTES:

[12] The four stories of the little Jackal, in this book, are adapted
from stories in _Old Deccan Days_, by Mary Frere (John Murray), a
collection of orally transmitted Hindu folk tales, which every teacher
would gain by knowing. In the Hindu animal legends the Jackal seems to
play the role assigned in Germanic lore to Reynard the Fox, and to
"Bre'r Rabbit" in the negro stories of Southern America; he is the
clever and humorous trickster who usually comes out of an encounter with
a whole skin, and turns the laugh on his enemy, however mighty he may
be.[A]

THE COUNTRY MOUSE AND THE CITY MOUSE[13]

Once a little mouse who lived in the country invited a little mouse
from the city to visit him. When the little City Mouse sat down to
dinner he was surprised to find that the Country Mouse had nothing to
eat except barley and grain.

"Really," he said, "you do not live well at all; you should see how I
live! I have all sorts of fine things to eat every day. You must come to
visit me and see how nice it is to live in the city."

The little Country Mouse was glad to do this, and after a while he went
to the city to visit his friend.

The very first p