The Silver Canary

THE SILVER CANARY
A Chinese fable
RETOLD
BY
MAY FAM
Long, long ago, in a remote part of China lived a farmer and his family. He lived with his wife, 2 sons and a daughter. Living near the edge of a forest he often went hunting with his sons for small games.

One day while looking for a rabbit that he shot with his arrow, he heard a bird in distress. Searching for the bird, he found a beautiful yellow canary lying among the dried leaves. Gently he picked it up and put it in his pouch.
When he got home, he called his wife and children, ‘come, come quickly, see what I found.’ His wife said, ‘This is a beautiful bird, it is also a song bird, it sings beautifully, what is wrong with it?’

The daughter said, ‘Look mama, there are ants on its feet and one of the wing is red. We’ll have to clean it up; I’ll call it Golden Bird, because it is like a lump of gold’.

The farmer made a nice new cage and in a week, the bird was singing everyday. He gave the bird the best grains and changed the water and saw dust every day. He hung the cage on a tree every morning so every one who passed by could hear it sing.

His neighbours said, ‘It is indeed a beautiful singing canary, this is a priceless bird’. Someone asked, ‘Where did you find it?’
The farmer replied, ‘Out in the forest, I was looking for a rabbit and found this bird, I think it must have fallen from its nest.’ The farmer was a proud man showing off his singing bird.

One day an old friend came to see the farmer’s canary, after hearing the canary sing, he said, ‘I think this is not the golden canary everyone is talking about, the colour is not so bright, this is the silver one. So the one I heard singing so beautifully must still be in the forest’

His daughter answered, ‘But papa, this is the Golden Canary, none other can sing better’.

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copyright(c)byMayFam2005.