The hans story time

The snail and the deer

Once upon a time the deer and the snail had entered a race. The deer had made fun of the snail because of his slowness. The snail became angry and he challenged the deer to a race. "We will race to the well on the other side of the plaza," said the snail. "All right," replied the deer. They decided to hold the race on the coming Sunday.

So they began their race on Sunday. The swift runner that the deer was, he soon got to the other side of the well. The snail was not there. The deer laughed to himself and called out "O brother Snail, where are you?" "Here I am," came the reply. The amazed deer found the snail, sticking his head up out of the well.

Determined to beat the snail, the deer said: "We will have another race. Let's race to the next well." "All right" said the snail and the race began again. The deer ran as fast as he could to the next well. He was there in a matter of moments, and having reached the spot he called as before, "Brother Snail, are you here yet?"

"Here I am," again answered the snail. "Why have you been so slow? It has almost been ages since I have been waiting here for you." The deer tried again and again, but always with the same result; At last he gave up and accepted defeat to the snail. Little did he know that the snail whom he had entered into race with had not even moved an inch from his place.

He had many cousins in each of the wells of the town all of whom exactly looked like one another. Having heard the crows talking of the proposed race, they were determined to help their cousin to win it. So they perched themselves on the edge of their wells and answered to the deer as he came to each well. The poor deer still thinks that the snail runs faster than him.