The Olive Tree and the Fig Tree

Aesop

An Olive-tree taunted a Fig-tree with the loss of her leaves at a certain season of the year.

“You,” she said, “lose your leaves every autumn, and are bare till the spring: whereas I, as you see, remain green and flourishing all the year round.”

Soon afterwards there came a heavy fall of snow, which settled on the leaves of the Olive so that she bent and broke under the weight; but the flakes fell harmlessly through the bare branches of the Fig, which survived to bear many another crop.

From Aesop’s Fables: a new translation by V.S. Vernon Jones, with an introduction by G.K. Chesterton and illustrations by Arthur Rackham. 1912 edition. This work is in the public domain.