'
'How, in sooth, should Trust and Honor change the evil nature's root?
Though one watered them with nectar, poison-trees bear deadly fruit.'
I have now at least warned your Majesty: if evil comes, the fault is not
mine,'
'It will not do to condemn the Bull without inquiry,' mused the King;
then he said aloud, 'shall we admonish him, think you, Damanaka?'
'No, no, Sire!' exclaimed the Jackal, eagerly; 'that would spoil all our
precautions--
'Safe within the husk of silence guard the seed of counsel so
That it break not--being broken, then the seedling will not grow,'
What is to be done must be done with despatch. After censuring his
treason, would your Majesty still trust the traitor?--
'Whoso unto ancient fondness takes again a faithless friend,
Like she-mules that die conceiving, in his folly finds his end,'
'But wherein can the Bull injure me?' asked Tawny-hide; 'tell me that!'
'Sire,' replied the Jackal, how can I tell it?--
'Ask who his friends are, ere you scorn your foe;
The Wagtail foiled the sea, that did not so,'
'How could that be?' demanded King Tawny-hide.
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