The Dog and the Shadow
Aesop
A Dog was crossing a plank bridge over a stream with a piece of meat in his mouth, when he happened to see his own reflection in the water.
He thought it was another dog with a piece of meat twice as big; so he let go his own, and flew at the other dog to get the larger piece.
But, of course, all that happened was that he got neither; for one was only a shadow, and the other was carried away by the current.
From Aesop’s Fables: a new translation by V.S. Vernon Jones, with an introduction by G.K. Chesterton and illustrations by Arthur Rackham. 1912 edition. This work is in the public domain.
