Aesop's Fables: Phaedrus
Book III - XII. Pullus ad Margaritam (Perry
503)
In sterculino pullus gallinacius
dum quaerit escam margaritam repperit.
"Iaces indigno quanta res" inquit "loco!
Hoc si quis pretii cupidus uidisset tui,
olim redisses ad splendorem pristinum.
Ego quod te inueni, potior cui multo est cibus,
nec tibi prodesse nec mihi quicquam potest."
Hoc illis narro qui me non intellegunt.
The Cock and the Pearl (trans. C. Smart)
A Cock, while scratching all around,
A Pearl upon the dunghill found:
"O splendid thing in foul disgrace,
Had there been any in the place
That saw and knew thy worth when sold,
Ere this thou hadst been set in gold.
But I, who rather would have got
A corn of barley, heed thee not;
No service can there render'd be
From me to you, and you to me."
I write this tale to them alone
To whom in vain my pearls are thrown.
Latin text from Phaedrus at The
Latin Library (Ad Fontes), English translations from The
Fables of Phaedrus Translated into English Verse by Christopher Smart
(London: 1913). Ben Perry, Babrius and Phaedrus (Loeb),
contains the Latin texts of Phaedrus, with a facing English translation, along
with a valuable appendix listing all the Aesop's fables attested in Greek and/or
in Latin. Invaluable.
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