A Laborer lay listening to a Nightingale's song throughout the summer night. So pleased was he with it that the next night he set a trap for it and captured it. "Now that I have caught thee," he cried, "thou shalt always sing to me." "We Nightingales never sing in a cage," said the bird. "Then I'll eat thee," said the Laborer. "I have always heard that a nightingale on toast is a dainty morsel." "Nay, kill me not," said the Nightingale, "but let me free, and I'll tell thee three things far better worth than my poor body." The Laborer let him loose, and the Nightingale flew up to a branch of a tree and said: Keep what you have Sorrow not over what is lost forever. |