The Farmer and his Chickens

The farmer was scattering grain for his chickens, and he wasn't happy about it. "You chickens don't do any work! Look at the ox: he works hard, and all I feed him is hay. But you chickens get this valuable grain!"
"Stop complaining!" replied one of the chickens. "The ox is bigger than we are, but that doesn't mean we aren't important. Don't you take our eggs? And don't you eat us? You profit from the ox's labor and you profit from us as well. You give us grain, but you take that much and more from us in return."


Inspired byMille Fabulae et Una, a collection of Latin fables that I've edited, free to read online. I am not translating the Latin here; instead, I am just telling a 100-word version of the fable.
Notes: This is fable 518 in the book, which is not in Perry's catalog; it is a story from the neo-Latin fabulist Desbillons. The original story has a domesticated dove, but I changed it to a chicken as a more familiar farm animal.


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