A mouse looked
through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a
package. "What food might this contain?" He was devastated
to discover it was a mousetrap.
Retreating to
the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning. "There is a mousetrap
in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!"
The chicken clucked
and scratched, raised her head and said, "Mr. Mouse, I can tell
this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me. I
cannot be bothered by it."
The mouse turned
to the pig and told him, "There is a mousetrap in the house."
The pig sympathized,
but said, "I am so very sorry, Mr. Mouse, but there is nothing
I can do about it but
pray. Be assured you are in my prayers."
The mouse turned
to the cow. She said, "Wow, Mr. Mouse. I'm sorry for you, but it's
no skin off my nose."
So, the mouse
returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer's
mousetrap alone.
That very night
a sound was heard throughout the house -- like the sound of a mousetrap
catching its prey.
The farmer's
wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness, she did not see
it was a venomous snake
whose tail the trap had caught.
The snake bit
the farmer's wife. The farmer rushed her to the hospital, and she returned
home with a fever.
Everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer
took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup's main ingredient.
But his wife's
sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around
the clock. To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig.
The farmer's
wife did not get well; she died. So many people came for her funeral
that the farmer had the cow
slaughtered to provide enough meat for all of them.
So, the next
time you hear someone is facing a problem and think it doesn't concern
you, remember -- when one of us is threatened, we are all at risk.