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The awful waves with mournful roar were striking against the rock. And the dead body of the hawk was lost without trace at the foot of the precipice.
II.
Lying in the cleft of the rock, the snake was thinking for some time of the bird’s death, and of his yearning skyward.
Then he looked into the far distance, which eternally deludes us by the illusion of happiness.
What did he see, this dead hawk, in that endless space? And why do such as he torment their souls with the desire of soaring upwards to the sky? What attracts them there? I could also know everything if I would only soar for a while to the sky, he said, and straightway tried to accomplish it. Having rolled himself up, he jumped upwards and, like a ribbon, glittered in the sun-
