The Dog and the Shadow

A DOG, crossing a bridge over a stream with a piece of flesh in his mouth, saw his own shadow in the water and took it for that of another Dog, with a piece of meat double his own in size.

He immediately let go of his own, and fiercely attacked the other Dog to get his larger piece from him.

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He thus lost both: that which he grasped at in the water, because it was a shadow; and his own, because the stream swept it away.