When it was getting on towards grey dawn in the morning, down fell the
snow, with a north wind, and it grew so cold that the little dog stood
and shivered and shook, he was so weary and hungry, "Bow-wow, bow-wow,
bow-wow," he called out, and barked and yelped and howled. Then up came
a bear, tramping and tramping along, and thought to himself how he could
get a morsel for breakfast at the very top of the morning, and so he
thought and thought among the boughs and branches, till he, too, went
bump--head over heels down into the pitfall.
So when it got a little farther on in the morning, an old beggar wife
came walking by, who toddled from farm to farm with a bag on her back.
When she set eyes on the little dog that stood there and howled, she
could not help going near to look and see if any wild beasts had fallen
into the pit during the night. So she crawled up on her knees and peeped
down into it.
"Art thou come into the pit at last, Reynard?" she said to the fox, for
he was the first she saw; "a very good place, too, for such a hen-roost
robber as thou; and thou, too, Grey-paw," she said to the wolf; "many a
goat and sheep hast thou torn and rent, and now thou shalt be plagued
and punished to death. Bless my heart! Thou, too, Bruin! Art thou, too,
sitting in this room, thou horse killer? Thee, too, will we strip, and
thee shall we flay, and thy skull shall be nailed up on the wall.
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