Dyalogus Creaturarum:

RENAISSANCE WOODCUTS & FABLES

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'M a pretty good sailor, even if I say it myself, and I've been just about everywhere. There was lots of profit to be made if you were brave enough, but you had to fill your ship up pretty full . Usually we managed the waves and the weather pretty well, but it did happen once that we took in so much water, and we had such a heavy cargo, that we could hardly steer our way through the waves.

We made our way to dry land in the end - at least, if you can count rocks as 'land'... and we hit them pretty hard: there wasn't much left of the cargo, but at least we were OK. I guess if I ever get another ship, we'll have to take a bit less on board, but I really don't know if it'll be worth going for the money. But I guess my old sea-bones won't let me stay on land for too long at a time...

I remember once we had a monkey on board: very sharp, he was, and he knew that we had been carrying wine-skins, filled to the brim with the finest Burgundy. Well, OK, it was part water: but not more than half... The merchant who had sold it was sunning himself on deck one day, counting the purse of money he'd taken - and would you believe it?! That monkey crept up behind him, and took the purse right out of his grip, and before you could say Jack Robinson he was way up the top of the mainmast with it. And then nothing would please him but he had to take the gold pieces out one at a time, and he threw one down to the merchant, and one into the sea. Do you think I laughed? And how...! Poetic justice, I call it: half the wine, and half the money...

	Eight Stories: About Laurus, the Sea-Eagle About the Pheasant and the Peacock About the Owl who wanted to rule over the Birds About the Countryman and the Bees About the Lion who built a Priory About the Donkey-Centaur who built a Palace About the Monkey who wrote Books About the Wolf and the Donkey
Introduction	Original editions	Johan Snell's printing