Perry 70: Tree and Reed

As I'm gearing up for the publication of Aesop’s Fables in Latin: Ancient Wit and Wisdom from the Animal Kingdom (coming soon from Bolchazy-Carducci!), I'm reviewing the different Perry numbers that will be included in that book. For each of the fables, I'm posting here a Latin version of the fable along with an illustration that can be compared/contrasted with the version in Barlow's book.

Today's fable is Perry #70, the story of the oak tree who defied the powerful winds and was toppled as a result, while a reed yielded to the winds and was still standing at the end of the storm. At the Aesopus wiki, you can see a complete list of the versions of this fable that I have collected. Usually this is a story where the moral is firmly on the side of the pliant reed, but I found an unusual version in Thomas Bewick's fables where the oak still insists on his superiority, even after he has been toppled:

The courage of meeting death in an honorable cause is more commendable than any address or artifice we can make use of to evade it. A conceited Willow had cone the vanity to challenge his mighty neighbor the Oak to a trial of strength. It was to be determined by the next storm; and Aeolus was addressed by both parties to exert his most powerful efforts. This was no sooner asked than granted; and a violent hurricane arose, when the pliant Willow, bending from the blast, or shrinking under her, evaded all its force, while the generous Oak, disdaining to give way, opposed its fury, and was torn up by the roots. Immediately the Willow began to exult, and to claim the victory, when thus the fallen Oak interrupted his exultation: Callest thou this a trial of strength? Poor wretch! not to thy strength, but weakness; not to thy boldly facing danger, but meanly skulking from it, thou owest thy present safety. I am an Oak, though fallen; thou still a Willow, though unhurt: but who, except so mean a wretch as thyself, would prefer an ignominious life, preserved by craft or cowardice, to the glory of meeting death in an honourable cause?

Bewick's moral here, however, is an unusual item. The typical interpretation of the story reads the oak as being foolishly defiant, as opposed to the wise, pliant reed (or willow). Here is that more typical version of the fable from Steinhowel's Aesop:

Qui superbo et duro corde sunt et nolunt se subdere domino suo, solet eis evenire sicut arbori abietis, quae vento veniente noluit se flectere, stetit autem iuxta eam arundo, quae vento veniente flectebat se in quacumque parte ventus eam movebat. Et dixit ad eam abies: Quare non stas firmiter, sicut et ego? Respondit arundo: Non est virtus mea, ut tua. Et dixit ad eam abies: Et ideo scire potes quia fortior sum tibi. Venit autem ventus validus et abietem proiecit in terram, arundinem vero dimisit. Sic saepe elati proiiciuntur, dum humiles maneant erecti.

Here it is written out in segmented style to make it easier to follow, while respecting the Latin word order:

Qui
superbo et duro corde sunt
et nolunt
se subdere domino suo,
solet eis evenire
sicut arbori abietis,
quae
vento veniente
noluit se flectere,
stetit autem iuxta eam
arundo,
quae
vento veniente
flectebat se
in quacumque parte
ventus eam movebat.
Et dixit ad eam abies:
Quare non stas firmiter,
sicut et ego?
Respondit arundo:
Non est virtus mea,
ut tua.
Et dixit ad eam abies:
Et ideo scire potes
quia fortior sum tibi.
Venit autem ventus validus
et abietem proiecit in terram,
arundinem vero dimisit.
Sic saepe elati proiiciuntur,
dum humiles maneant erecti.

For an image of the story, here is an illustration from Steinhowel's Aesop published in 1479:

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