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Barlow 97. DE CANE ET LUPO

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Saginato Cani occurrit Lupus macilentus, miratus quomodo ille, qui intra parietes privatos clauderetur, tam pinguis evaderet, et ipse tam macilentus foret, qui tot nemora, colles, et pascua de iure suo possideret, ex quibus victum sibi compararet. Respondit Canis se indulgentissimum habuisse Herum, qui cibos illi quotidie de mensa sua porrigebat. Attonitus stetit paulisper Lupus sed, propius cicatrices et collum saucium perspiciens, percontatus est unde haec cruditas acciderit. Respondit Canis haec tantummodo esse catenae indicia, qua interdum perstringebatur. Cui Lupus: “Ne! Tuae non invideo fortunae, nec meae paeniteo. Malim enim, ieiunus et impastus, praesenti frui libertate, quam satur catenis perstringi et fustibus contundi.”

Translation: A thin wolf ran into a well-fattened dog, and was amazed at how the dog, who was shut up inside private walls, turned out so fat, while he himself was so thin - he, who had under his rule so many groves and hills and meadows from which he could obtain food. The dog answered that he had a most generous master who on a daily basis offered the dog from his table. The wolf stood there astounded for a a while, but then he looked more closely at the scars and the wounded neck of the dog and asked what cruelty had befallen him. The dog replied that these were only the marks of the chain with which he was sometimes tied up. The wolf said to the dog, "Indeed! I do not envy your fortune, nor do I regret my own; I would rather be starving with an empty stomach while able to enjoy my actual freedom, rather than to be full but tied up with chains and to be beaten with sticks."

[This translation is meant as a help in understanding the story, not as a "crib" for the Latin. I have not hesitated to change the syntax to make it flow more smoothly in English, altering the verb tense consistently to narrative past tense, etc.]

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