Master raven, on a perched tree,
Holds a cheese in his beak.
Master fox, by the enticing smell,
He held more or less this language:
Hey hello, sir of the raven.
How pretty you are! you seem to me beautiful!
No lie, if your ramage
relates to your plumage,
You are the phoenix of the hosts of these woods.
At these words, the crow does not feel joy;
And, to show his beautiful voice,
he opens a wide beak, drops his prey.
The fox seizes it, and says: My good sir,
Learn that every flatterer
Lives at the expense of the one who listens to him:
This lesson is well worth a cheese, no doubt.
The raven, ashamed and confused,
Jura, but a little late, that he would not be caught there again.
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