Gratitude

North Africa

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Once upon a time there was a kind man who found a baby snake and decided to keep it. He took it home and fed it, as it was evidently an orphan snake. He lovingly looked after the snake and finally it was fully-grown.

One morning, as he came to greet his pet-snake; which he regarded as his own son, it suddenly coiled itself around his neck and said, "Now I am going to kill you. You know that there is no gratitude in this world."

"Wait!" cried the man. "First let us ask the cow if there is really no gratitude on earth."

The cow answered, "No. There is no gratitude from man. He pulls my udders and I give him milk all my active life. Then he will kill me in the end and eat my flesh. Do you call that gratitude?"

Then they asked the tree. "No," said the tree. "There is no gratitude on earth. People will eat all the fruits I give them every year, but in the end they will cut me down and burn my body."

Then they asked the ox. "No," said the ox. "People are never grateful. Look at me. Every day I have to pull heavy carts full of produce to the market. I suffer blows from the stick and proddings of the goad. After many years of service, man will kill me and tear my

skin off to make shoes for himself, and whips for his other oxen."

Having heard these pronouncements, the snake, who was still wound around the man's neck, made ready to bite him in his jugular vein. At that moment the man's wife came walking out of the house. She had heard the words of the snake and had hastily prepared the snake's favourite dish-creamy pudding. The snake slid down from the man's neck to eat the dish which the woman put on the floor.

"Quickly, kill it," spoke the hedgehog who had also watched the scene. The man took his stick and hit the snake on the head several times until it died. The hedgehog, meanwhile, quickly disappeared into his hole, thinking that it was better not to wait and see whether this man would be any more grateful than his fellow men.

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