a vow of silence, to last as long as we are in heaven." So they carried out the plan, but while the two ganders were painfully carrying the turtle over a neighboring city, the people below noticed the spectacle, and there arose a confused buzz of talk as they asked: "What is this cartlike object that two birds are carrying through the atmosphere?"
Hearing this, the doomed turtle was heedless enough to ask: "What are these people chattering about?" The moment he spoke, the poor simpleton lost his grip and fell to the ground. And persons who wanted meat cut him to bits in a moment with sharp knives.
"And that is why I say:
To take advice from kindly friends, . . . .
and the rest of it." And Constance continued:
Forethought and Readywit thrive;
Fatalist can't keep alive.
"How was that?" asked Sprawl. And she told the story of
FORETHOUGHT, READYWIT, AND FATALIST
In a great lake lived three full-grown fishes, whose names were Forethought, Readywit, and Fatalist. Now one day the fish named Forethought overheard passers-by on the bank and fishermen saying: "There
