Misadventures in the Land of Fables #15
The Frogs Who Rode Snakeback appears in Book Three of the Panchatantra. Book Three describes an extended conflict between Crows and Owls. The crows hatch a plan to spy on their enemy. A crow poses as a traitor and joins the other side, when he returns his king praises him for his fortitude, but the crows says he accepted the “great tribulation” of living with their enemies because of the benefits it would bring. He relates this fable to illustrate his point:
An old snake, knowing it could no longer hunt its prey, presents itself to the frogs and solicits their pity with a tale of misfortune and a curse laid upon it by a holy man. The curse condemns the snake to becoming a beast of burden to its former prey, the frogs, and to live only what they might afford him. The king of the frogs makes the snake his mount and pledges to keep it suitably fed and watered. The snake endures this subjugation so that it may eat well in its old age.
AN ODD NARRATIVE
The character of the aging predator who tricks its prey into providing for it turns up in Aesop as well, where they meet with varying degrees of success—here we witness a notably subdued outcome. And the advice is more strategic than the clear or self-evident morals found in Aesop.
But it’s an odd narrative structure for a fable. Half the action occurs in flashback, in a story within a story, that persuades the frogs to provide for it: the snake confesses to an accidental attack on a young boy, after chasing a frog into his house; but he boy was the son of a holy man and the holy man lays a curse upon the snake. Back in the present, all that remains is for the king of the frogs to make his decision.
This is a confidence trick. A pitch, a deal, larded with emotion and pretended low-status. The frogs believe the snake because his proposition flatters them, by comparison; they feel superior, and the king seizes the opportunity for aggrandisement. Thus they agree to let the snake eat some of their number.
THE ORDINARY FOLK PAY THE PRICE
The vanity of the king was the grit that worked its way into my soft grey matter. The price of this vanity was the slaughter (of some) of his subjects. In Calila and Dimna, they agree terms: two frogs a day; in the Panchatantra, the snake’s trick is structured so that his need for food is explicitly tied to his ability to perform as the king’s mount, once the king becomes attached to the arrangement he allows the snake to eat its fill of the plebeian frogs.
It’s troubling enough in the Lion and the Hares when the animals of the forest agree to offer themselves to placate the rampaging lion. It’s an atrocity. But when it is enacted merely for the glory and gratification of the king, it is obscene. Maybe in ancient history calculated loss of life for your monarch was less controversial. It is not something I can countenance.
Confidence tricks and self-aggrandizing leaders are not anachronisms, unfortunately.
Read my version here: the Frog King and the Snake
