On the mountain of Gridhrakuta there was a large fig tree. Many cranes had built their nests on it. In a hollow at its base lived an old snake. It used to climb up the tree and eat up the fledglings of the cranes. The cranes were very distressed. They held a meeting to find some way of stopping the snake from eating their young ones. A mongoose lived in a burrow near the tree. The cranes decided to lure him to the snake’s hollow by throwing the bits of fish along the route to it. “The mongoose will follow the trail and reach the snake. Then it will kill the snake,” said the cranes. So, they began to collect the bits of meat and scatter them on the floor of the forest along the trail where the mongoose was sure to see it.
The Cranes and the Mongoose
