The Hares and the Frogs

The hares once gathered and began lamenting their lives: — We perish from people, from dogs, from eagles, and from all other beasts. It’s better to die once than to live in fear and suffer—let’s drown ourselves! And the hares hopped off to the lake to drown. The frogs heard the hares and splashed into the water. One hare said: — Stop, friends! Let’s wait before drowning: look at the frogs’ life—it’s clearly even worse than ours: they’re afraid of us too!