Michael Peverett: Samaniego: Book I of <em>Fábulas morales</em>

Tuesday, January 05, 2021

Samaniego: Book I of Fábulas morales

Félix María de Samaniego (1745 - 1801)

[Image source: https://www.elcorreo.com/alava/araba/cara-oculta-fabulista-20180408223625-nt.html . From a modern painting by the vitoriano Javier Ortiz de Guinea (b. 1946), based on a portrait from Samaniego´s lifetime.]

A few very swift and free prose translations of verse fables from Book 1 of Félix María de Samaniego, Fábulas morales (1781).

I.14

THE LION AND THE VIXEN

A lion, once powerful but now old and feeble, vainly gave ravenous and savage chase to the suckling calf and yearling lamb, who climbed up the rough mountainside and easily escaped his fury.

Afflicted by hunger to the point of death, he came up with this remedy: he gave it out that he was sick in the palace, and that he wished to be visited by the other beasts.

Some beasts came at once. But the grave illness that laid him low being nothing else than a voracious hunger, his exquisite prescription was simply to gobble up the visitor.

The vixen quietly approached and leaning towards the portal very slowly scrutinized the entrance to that concave palace.

The lion spotted her and instantly called out to her: "Come here, for I sense I am in my life´s final moments; visit me like the others, my dear."

"Like the others! Ah sir, I know they entered, indeed, but not that they came out. Look at the footprints, they tell it plainly. And it isn´t good to enter where none leave."

The prudent make good use of caution.

I.15

THE DOE AND THE FAWN

A doe was addressed by her tender fawn:

"O my mother! How is it possible that a single dog can make you flee like a coward to the wood, though so much smaller and so much less powerful than you! Why don't you behave with more spirit?"

"All is true, my son. And when I think thus, I alone defy twenty dogs together. I see myself battling them, leaving some dead and others dying, trampling on their entrails, and the whole lot flying in vain from death, and me vanquishing them all in the most gallant style. . .

But if while absorbed in these thoughts I hear a dog bark, I flee more swiftly than a javelin, and my victory goes to the devil."

Who lacks a valiant spirit, let him not arm as a soldier. Because no matter that, gazing at his armour in peacetime, he thinks how his bravery will wound and kill all he takes on, yet when he hears the trumpet in the field he will behave like the doe in the story, and Devil take the victory!

I.16

THE FARMER AND THE STORK

A farmer looked at the state of his grain with grief at his heart, because geese and cranes made merry with his wheat. So without further delay he skilfully laid his snares, and into them fell the stork, the cranes and the geese.

"Sir countryman," said the stork trembling, "Release me from these bonds, for I do not merit the pains of the guilty. The Goddess Ceres well knows that far from harming your fields I cleanse them of vermin, of snakes and of vipers."

"So nothing," answered the man angrily. "I found you with villains, and by my hand you shall die with them."

The innocent stork suffered the unfortunate end that the good must expect when they consort with the wicked.

I.17

THE SNAKE AND THE FILE

A snake entered the house of a locksmith one day, and the stupid beast tried to bite a steel file.

The file said to him: The evil, fool, will be all yours. How did you think you could make a dent in me, when I grind metals to powder?

He who unreasonably tries to assail the stronger, is just kicking against the pricks.

I.18

THE BALD MAN AND THE FLY

An annoying fly was stinging the extensive bald head of an old man. Wishing to kill him, the old man raised his hand and aimed a blow, but the fly escaped safely, the blow landing instead on his own round pate.

With immoderate laughter the fly broke out: "Cursed Baldy, if you try to take my life for such a minor crime, to what shame do you condemn your arm, the barbarous executor of such a blow?"

"To the one who acts from malice", the man replied to him prudently, "rigorous justice ought to administer the appropriate punishment; clemency should be exercised on the one who errs inadvertently.

Know, villainous fly, that the human condition appraises an injury according to the hand that dealt it."

The viler the offender, the higher the degree of offence.

I.19

THE TWO FRIENDS AND THE BEAR

A bear appeared to two friends. The one, very fearful, seeks safety in the branches of a tree. The other, abandoned to his fate, hurriedly pretends to be dead.

The bear approaches him slowly, but this beast (so it's said) never feeds off carrion, so without injuring him he inspects and touches him, sniffs his nostrils and his mouth; and not detecting any breath nor the slightest movement he goes away saying guilelessly: "This one's as dead as my grandad."

Then the coward, making show of his great friendship, swiftly jumps down from the tree, runs up and hugs his companion, praises the happy chance of having found him uninjured and ends by saying, "You know, I noticed the bear saying something to you. What could it be?"

"I'll tell you what it was -- two little words in your ear:

Remove your friendship from the person who seeing you in danger abandons you."

I.20

THE EAGLE, THE CAT AND THE SOW

An eagle nested at the top of an oak tree. At its foot a certain sow nursed her young, and a hollow within the thick tree-trunk was the home for a cat and her kittens.

This cat, a great trickster, climbed up to the nest of the haughty eagle and with feigned tears said to her:

"O miserable me! O unhappy! Here's what it is: our neighbour who lives downstairs, as you can see for yourself, spends the day rooting out the foundations of the house. She will destroy them. And then this traitor seeing our children falling to earth will devour them."

After she left the frightened eagle, she quietly descended to the cave below, and said to the sow: "My good friend, you should know that our foe the eagle, when you next take your babies up on the hill, is bent on devouring them, so watch out."

The cat, pretending to be afraid, withdrew to her own room, and did not go out except at night when with cunning skill she provisioned her small chamber.

The sow, receiving this dire information, did not leave her cave. The eagle, fearfully standing sentinel in the branches, had no repose.

Finally, both these families died of hunger, and the cat made food out of them.

O youths, take great care, keep your eyes alert! lest a gossip, a seeming friend, covers his tracks in the cloak of friendship and thus his deceptions cause evil.

[Samaniego means a wild cat and wild boar, both common animals in Spain. (But in English "boar" is a gendered word so it doesn't sound quite right to call the female a "wild boar".) ]

[Image source: http://lapaginadevickylinda.blogspot.com/2009/07/la-aguila-la-gata-y-la-jabalina-fabula.html .]

From Rosario de la Iglesia's introduction:

Libertine, epicurean, moral, cultured, sceptical, Voltairean, licentious, pedagogic, reformist: these are some of the adjectives that appear with greatest frequency in the writings of critics and biographers on the life and work of Samaniego. "A cynic and licentious poet" for Menéndez Pelayo; and, yet, for a long time he was considered required and edifying reading in the colleges of monks and nuns: Samaniego has had the misfortune, common to many other authors in our literature, of being frequently quoted but little known.

He was born in Laguardia (Álava), a small town to the south of Vitoria-Gasteiz. The house where he was born still survives and is now the tourist office. (There is also a Bodega La Fabulista!)