A mother tiger has a little baby tiger in her cave. The mother tiger brought a baby fox with her to the cave one day. She wanted the little fox to be friends with the little baby tiger.
The baby fox was very happy in the cave. It had to do nothing at all. The mother tiger took care of its food and so the fox played with the baby tiger all day long.
Soon afterwards the mother tiger brought a calf to the cave. The calf was also brought there to play with the baby tiger.
The fox was however very jealous of this. He thought that everybody else loved the calf more than they loved him.
That was not true but the fox's jealousy prevented him from seeing the truth.
The fox began to plot to get rid of the calf so that things could go back to the way it had been before.
But the fox was not successful.
It so happened that the calf loved to dance and shake its horns daily in the morning. The tiger cub lied down and watched the whole thing.
This annoyed the fox some more but there was nothing he could do to stop the calf.
Soon the mother tiger became very sick.
She called her son and the calf together and told them something very important. "You are both children of different mothers, but you are brothers. Take care of each other and never believe lies that anyone tell you. And do not let others separate you."
After saying this the mother tiger breathed her last.
Now that the mother tiger was not there the fox saw his chance.
Every morning he would whisper to the tiger cub that the calf was practicing his dance and sharpening his horns to hurt the tiger.
Separately the fox would also tell the calf that the tiger was going to kill him one day.
Soon this led to a mistrust between the calf and the tiger.
The calf and the tiger were angry with each other but they did not talk about it openly.
Finally the calf angrily shook his head at the tiger. "If you want to kill me, go ahead!"
The tiger was surprised. "Why would I kill you? It is you who want to hurt me!"
Finally the two animals realized that the fox was trying to turn them against each other.
A few days later a gleeful fox saw that the tiger challenged the calf to a fight. The fox watched the fight unravel from far. That was when the fox saw that the two animals were attacking each other brutally. So he came a little closer to watch the fight better.
The fox was shocked and he did not know how to react when the tiger jumped on him and caught him with his powerful claws.
"You cannot create a fight between me and my brother calf, you silly fox," the tiger told the fox. We pretended to have this fight so that I could catch you. I am warning you. if you do not leave this place now, I will kill you."
The fox realized that the two animals had become wise and were good friends and he silently slunk away from the place, leaving the two good friends in peace.
Folk stories from Tibet
No comments:
Post a Comment