A History of Sanskrit Literature c24.s1.17

c24.s1.17

The same doubt as to priority constantly occurs;² the story of the jackal which revealed its nature by its cry has a parallel in Phaedrus; so has the story of the ungrateful snake which bit its rescuer; the panther treats the goat as does the wolf the lamb in Phaedrus; the gods of Phaedrus who wish to drink up the stream have their parallel in the crows which would drain dry the sea; the motif of the bald-headed man and the fly, used with comic effect in Phaedrus, is turned to tragedy in the *Jātaka*; we find in Phaedrus the old tale of the eagle and the tortoise, and in India the swans in place of the eagle. The fable of the fox which compels the eagle to restore its young, which Archilochos knew, has been paralleled with a tale in the *Pañcatantra* of a crow and a snake, but the discrepancies are too great; nor is the parallel of the wolf, which a crane helps, in Phaedrus to the tale of the lion and the woodpecker sufficiently close to prove priority on either side.