858. Vir et Vas Melle Plenum. Quidam vas melle plenum supra suum lectum suspendit. Tum ille, uno die accubans, supraque se appensum vasculum intuens, rationem computabat quanti venire posset vasculum posuitque tanti quanti oves duae emerentur. “Et illae,” inquit, “oves binae binas alias parient, tum deinde quarternas quattuor et mox octonas octo.” Pergensque hoc modo ad magnum pervenit gregem et ait, “De pretio illarum domum agrosque mihi comparabo; ita tandem uxorem ducam et suscipiam filium. Verum si filius non obtemperarit monitis meis tum ego illum sic,” inquit, arrepto scipione, “sic illum ego verberabo.” Et inter has cogitationes diversas suas, elatum altius scipionem impegit in vasculum, eoque pertuso, effusum defluxit in stragula mel, hicque consiliorum tam splendidorum fuit exitus: carere ut homo melle, et eluere stragula cogeretur.
Click here for a
SLIDESHOW of all the images from the 1484
Directorium Humanae Vitae.
M0858 (not in Perry). Source: Camerarius 408 (shortened). This fable is not in Perry’s catalog; it is a story found in the Panchatantra tradition. In some versions of this story, it is a pot of oil, not honey, that prompts the man’s wishful thinking. For the famous story of the milkmaid counting her chickens before they are hatched, see #859.
