Wild Boar And Ram.

A sheep lay tethered, and her life             Fast ebbing on the butcher's knife;             The silly flock looked on with dread.             A wild boar, passing them, then said:             "O cowards! cowards! will nought make             The courage of your hearts awake?             What, with the butcher in your sight,             Flaying - ere life be parted quite -             Your lambs and dams! O stolid race!             Who ever witnessed souls so base?"             The patriarch ram then answered him:             "My face and bearing are not grim,             But we are not of soul so tame             As to deny Revenge her claim:             We have no whetted tusks to kill,             Yet are not powerless of ill.             Vengeance, the murdering hand pursues,             And retribution claims her dues;             She sends the plagues of war and law,             Where men will battle for a straw -             And our revenge may rest contented,             Since drums and parchment were invented."