The Lion and the Mouse

• 3 minute read
• Ages 4-8
• Aesop's Fables

A lion lay asleep in the afternoon heat with his great head resting on his paws.

A mouse, running along in a hurry and not looking where she was going, ran straight up the lion's back and across his nose.

The lion woke up.

Caught

One enormous paw came down and pinned the mouse to the ground. The lion opened his eyes and looked at what he had caught.

"Please," squeaked the mouse. "Please, I am so sorry. I did not see you. Please let me go, and one day I will help you. I promise."

The lion laughed. He laughed so hard that the ground shook under the mouse.

"You?" he said. "You will help me?"

"I will," said the mouse. "One day."

The lion was so amused by the idea that he lifted his paw.

"Go on then," he said. "Go."

And the mouse went.

The net

Some weeks later, hunters came into that part of the forest. They did not want to fight a lion, so instead they stretched a strong rope net between the trees, hid it under leaves, and waited.

The lion walked into it that evening.

He fought it, which only made it worse. Every time he pulled, the ropes drew in tighter, until he could not move his legs at all and could hardly turn his head. He roared until the whole forest could hear him, and the roaring did nothing except tell everyone where he was.

The mouse heard it.

Small teeth

She came out of the grass and found him lying on his side, tangled from shoulder to tail.

"Keep still," she said.

And she began to chew.

She chose one rope, right where the net was tightest, and she gnawed at it until it frayed and split. Then the next one. Then the next. It took a long time. Her jaw ached and the rope was rough and hard.

But one strand at a time, the net came apart.

The lion pulled his shoulder free. Then a leg. Then all of him.

He stood up in the moonlight and looked down at the mouse sitting in the pile of chewed rope.

"You did help me," he said.

"I said I would," said the mouse.