Aesop's Fables
A
KING, whose only son was fond of
martial exercises, had a
dream in which he was warned that his son would be killed by a
lion. Afraid the dream should prove true, he built for his son a pleasant
palace and
adorned its walls for his amusement with all kinds of
life-sized animals, among which was the picture of a lion. When the young
Prince saw this, his
grief at being thus confined burst out
afresh, and, standing near the lion, he said: "O you most
detestable of animals! through a
lying dream of my father's, which he saw in his sleep, I am shut up on your account in this palace
as if I had been a girl: what shall I now do to you?' With these words he stretched out his hands toward a
thorn-tree, meaning to cut a stick from its branches so that he might beat the lion. But one of the tree's prickles
pierced his finger and caused great pain and
inflammation, so that the young Prince fell down in a
fainting fit. A violent fever suddenly set in, from which he died not many days later. We had better
bear our troubles bravely than try to
escape them.