two fat camels. "They are thin," said
the jackal. "Go change them for others."
He brought two thin ones.
"They are fat," said the jackal. He skinned them, cut some thorns from a
palm-tree, rolled the leather around the lion's paws and fastened it there
with the thorns.
"Ouch!" screamed the lion.
"He who wants to look finely ought not to say, 'Ouch.'"
"Enough, my dear."
"My uncle, I will give you the rest of the slippers and boots." He covered
the lion's skin with the leather and stuck in the thorns. When he reached
the knees, "Enough, my dear," said the lion. "What kind of shoes are
those?"
"Keep still, my uncle, these are slippers, boots, breeches, and clothes."
When he came to the girdle the lion said, "What kind of shoes are those?"
"My uncle, they are slippers, boots, breeches, and clothing." In this way
he reached the lion's neck. "Stay here," he said, "until the leather dries.
When the sun rises look it in the face. When the moon rises, too, look it
in the face."
"It is good," said the lion, and the jackal went away.
The lion remained and did as his companion had told him. But his feet began
to swell, the leather became hard, and he could not get up. When the jackal
came back he asked him, "How are you, my uncle?"
"How am I? Wretch, son of a wretch, you have deceived me. Go, go; I will
recommend you to my children."
The jackal came near and the lion seized him by the tail. The jackal fled,
leaving his tail in the lion's mouth.
"Now," said the lion, "you have no tail. When my feet get well I will catch
you and eat you up."
The jackal called his cousins and said to them, "Let us go and fill our
bellies with onions in a garden that I know." They went with him. Arriving
he tied their tails to the branches of a young palm-tree, and twisted them
well. "Who has tied our tails like this?" they asked. "No one will come
before you have filled your bellies. If you see the master of the garden
approach, struggle and fly. You see that I, too, am bound as you are." But
he had tied an onion-stalk on himself. When the owner of the garden
arrived, the jackal saw him coming. They struggled, their tails were all
torn out, and stayed behind with the branches to which they were fastened.
When the jackal saw the man, he cut the onion stem and escaped the first of
all.
As for the lion, when his feet were cured, he went to take a walk and met
his friend the jackal. He seized him and said, "Now I've go
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