It rested, however, just before it reached the window, and the fox felt, with a slight shudder, the claw of the griffiness stroking his back.
"Oh, what a beautiful coat!" quoth she, caressingly.
"You are too kind," said the fox; "but you can feel it more at your leisure when I am once up.

Make haste, I beseech you." "Oh, what a beautiful bushy tail! Never did I feel such a tail." "It is entirely at your service, sweet griffiness," said the fox; "but pray let me in.

Why lose an instant ?" "No, never did I feel such a tail! No wonder you are so successful with the ladies." "Ah, beloved griffiness, my tail is yours to eternity, but you pinch it a little too hard." Scarcely had he said this, when down dropped the basket, but not with the fox in it; he found himself caught by the tail, and dangling half way down the rock, by the help of the very same sort of pulley wherewith he had snared the dog.

I leave you to guess his consternation; he yelped out as loud as he could,--for it hurts a fox exceedingly to be hanged by his tail with his head downwards,--when the door of the rock opened, and out stalked the griffin himself, smoking his pipe, with a vast crowd of all the fashionable beasts in the neighbourhood.
"Oho, brother," said the bear, laughing fit to kill himself; "who ever saw a fox hanged by the tail before ?" "You'll have need of a physician," quoth Doctor Ape.
"A pretty match, indeed; a griffiness for such a creature as you!" said the goat, strutting by him.
The fox grinned with pain, and said nothing.

But that which hurt him most was the compassion of a dull fool of a donkey, who assured him with great gravity that he saw nothing at all to laugh at in his situation! "At all events," said the fox, at last, "cheated, gulled, betrayed as I am, I have played the same trick to the dog.