Excerpt from The Original Fables of La Fontaine: Rendered Into English Prose The mule that carried the silver was proud of his burden, and would not have been relieved of it if he could. As he stepped out he took care that the bells upon his harness should jingle well as became a mule of so much importance. Suddenly a band of robbers burst into the road, pounced upon the treasure mule, seized it by the bridle, and stopped it short. Struggling to defend itself the unhappy creature groaned and sighed: Is this then the fate that has been in store for me, that I must fall and perish whilst my fellow traveller escapes free from danger? About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.