CUNNING AND IMPUDENCE 89 



turned upon the chatterbox and changed him from 

 white to black : 



u Inter aves albas vetuit consistere corvum." 



" The raven once in snowy plumes was dressed, 

 White as the whitest dove's unsullied breast 

 His tongue, his prating tongue, had changed him quite 

 To sooty blackness from the purest white." 



Another legend, not very creditable to the raven, 

 but interesting, as showing the character for cunning 

 and impudence, for malingering and for greed, 

 which he had, even in those early times, acquired, 

 and which he has not got rid of since, is also told 

 by Ovid. Apollo sent him, with a bowl, to fetch 

 some lustral water from the spring, in honour of a 

 festival to Jupiter. The bird started on his errand, 

 as he was ordered ; but some fine figs hanging over 

 the spring took his fancy, and finding that they were 

 green and hard, he determined to wait till they were 

 ripe. When he had eaten them, he killed a big 

 snake, and carrying it back to his master bowl 

 and lustral water and all held it up in triumph and 

 said, "See, here is the foe who has been fighting me 

 off all this time from the spring and from my duty." 

 The prophet Elisha could hardly have rebuked the 

 greed and falsehood of his servant, Gehazi, with more 



