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FableNº 17

The Goatherd and the Wild Goats

A goatherd drove his goats to pasture and found wild goats mingled with them, and at nightfall he shut them all in his cave. The next day a great storm broke. Unable to lead them to the usual pasture, he tended them indoors; but he gave his own goats only a handful of fodder, just enough to keep them alive, while he piled food on the strangers, hoping to make them his. When the weather cleared and he let them all out, the wild goats made for the mountains and fled. The herdsman reproached them for ingratitude, but they turned and said, "That is all the more reason to be wary of you; for if you treated us, your guests of yesterday, better than your own old flock, plainly you will neglect us too the day other goats come to you."

Do not trust the friendship of those who set their newest friends above their oldest.
Moral

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