A tale of an Ape medling in that he had no ʃkill.
There was an Ape in our Maiſters woodes, which made manie pretie toys and deuiſes with his handes, for I that carried home the woode from thence ſawe it, and therefore I can be witneſſe of it. But one day being buſie to meddle with an Arte he had no ſkill of in ſteade of a fiſhe he caught a frogge. I ſay therefore that a laboring man of oures went one daye to the woode, and hewed out a lode of woode, which laying on my backe I caried home. It fortuned one daye that he cloue certaine logges or billets not very bigge: and to make them fitte for burdens he hewed them with a long axe, riuings them with wedges out of hand, that the woode opened, ſo that giuing fower ſtrokes with the Betell he layde them on the ground in peeces. Nowe this bleſſed Ape got him up to the top of an oke and looked diligently after what maner this labourer hewed his woode in ſo ſmall pieces, and was verie deſirous (as it ſeemed) to proue it with his owne handes if he coulde likewiſe doe the ſame, and he had his deſire. The woode cleauer hauing clouen one halfe aſunder, left it euen ſo, and went and layde him downe in the ſhadowe to take a nappe: ſo that the wedges and axe remayned in the woode.
