Aesop's Fables

The Jay and the Peacocks

One day, a Jay decided that it would be a mighty fine idea to fancy himself up. He gathered some discarded tail feathers from the peacock flock and tied them to his own tail, before parading proudly up and down.
"What a fine fellow I am," he crowed.
The peacocks heard and gathered around him, eyeballing him suspiciously. Who was this little imposter who thought himself worth their equal? As one they attacked him, tugging the peacock feathers from the tail and giving him a thorough beating in the process. Dejected and bedraggled, the Jay staggered back to where his fellow jays had been watching. They greeted him with raucous peels of laughter and mocked him:

"It is not only fine feathers that make fine birds."

The Bat and the Weasels

Once a bat fell upon the ground and was pounced upon a weasel.
"Please do not eat me," the bat he begged.
"I must," boosted the weasel, "for I am sworn death to every bird."
"But I am not a bird," the bat besieged, "I am a mouse."
"Oh," said the weasel. "I do not like mice. Their fur sticks in my throat." And with that he let the bat go.
It was not long before again, the poor bat suffered another capture, from a different weasel. Once again, he pleaded for his life.
"Oh but I love mice," the weasel chortled. "So tasty and so sweet."
"I am not a mouse," the bat he begged, "I am a bat. We are not nearly so tasty and our meat is very rank."
The weasel sniffed him and saw that this was true. Disgusted, he rose his paw and let the bat flutter free.

It is wise to turn circumstances to good account.