A Cormorant told fish the pond was to be drained. The fish panicked and asked the Cormorant to help them. He moved them to a pool easier to eat them from.
Know your enemy and who to believe.
JBR Collection
A Cormorant, whose eyes were become so dim with age that he could not discern his prey at the bottom of the waters, bethought himself of a stratagem to supply his wants. “Hark you, friend,” said he to a Gudgeon, whom he observed swimming near the surface of a certain canal, “if you have any regard for yourself or your brethren, go this moment, and acquaint them from me that the owner of this piece of water is determined to drag it a week hence.” The Gudgeon immediately swam away, and made his report of this terrible news to a general assembly of the Fishes, who unanimously agreed to send him back as their ambassador to the Cormorant. The purport of his commission was to return him their thanks for the intelligence, and to add their entreaties that, as he had been so good as to inform them of their danger, he would be graciously pleased to put them into the way of escaping it. “That I will, most readily,” replied the artful Cormorant, “and assist you with my best services into the bargain. You have only to collect yourselves together at the top of the water, and I will undertake to transport you, one by one, to my own residence, at the side of a solitary pool, to which no creature but myself ever found the way.” The project was perfectly well approved by the unwary Fishes, and with great expedition performed by the deceitful Cormorant; who having placed them in a shallow piece of water, the bottom of which his eyes could easily discern, they were all devoured by him in their tu1n, as his hunger or luxury required.
