Aesop's Fables, translated by Laura Gibbs (2002)
570. THE MAN AND HIS ILL-TEMPERED WIFE
Perry 95 (Chambry
49 *)
A man had a wife who was hostile towards all the members of their household.
He wondered if she treated the members of her father's household the same
way, so he found a plausible excuse to send her away to her father's house.
When she returned a few days later, he asked her how she had been received.
His wife replied, 'The cowherds and the shepherds gave me dirty looks!'
The husband then remarked, 'My wife, if you have hostile relations with
those men who drive their flocks out at dawn and don't come back until
late in the evening, then what kind of treatment can you expect from people
who must spend the entire day in your company?'
The fable shows that great things can be detected in small things,
and invisible things can be seen in what is visible.
Source:
Aesop's Fables. A new translation by Laura
Gibbs.
Oxford University Press (World's Classics): Oxford, 2002.
NOTE: New
cover, with new ISBN, published in 2008; contents of book unchanged.
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