Only a few days,
however, had passed before the shepherd, happening to mount a knoll,
saw at a little distance the self-same wolf eagerly devouring the warm
remains of a lamb.
"Villain! villain!" he shouted, in great wrath, "is this the way you
keep your oath? Did not you swear to mind your own business?"
"I am minding it," said the wolf, with a grin; "it is my business to eat
lambs; it should be yours not to believe in wolves' promises."
So saying, he seized upon the last fragment of the Iamb, and ran away as
fast as his legs would carry him.
_Moral_.--Shepherds who make compromises with wolves sell their mutton
at an exceedingly cheap market.
Now just such short-witted shepherds are we, the people of these free
American States, invited by numbers of citizens to become. Just such, do
I say? A thousand times more silly than such. Our national wolf meets us
with jaws that drip blood and eyes that glare hunger for more. Instead
of professing sanctity and innocence, it only howls immitigable hate and
steadfast resolution to devour. "Give me," it howls, "half the pasture
and flock for my own, with, of course, a supervision over the rest, and
a child or two when I am dainty; and I will be content,--until I want
more!"
In speaking of our "national wolf," we are using no mere rhetoric, but
are, in truth, getting at the very heart of the matter.
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