Pratt: The Snake's Eggs.

There was a hen who had no nest of her own. One day she found some little eggs in the field. 'Dear me!" said the kind-hearted old hen. "Here are some little eggs and nobody to care for them! I will take care of them myself." So she sat upon them for several days and kept them warm. By-and-by little snakes began to peep out of the eggs. "Hiss, hiss!" said the little snakes. "Bad luck! bad luck!" cried the hen. "I should say bad luck," answered a swallow from the tree top. "It is a good thing to be kind-hearted. But it is well to be sure what kind of people you are helping." "O what shall I do?" wept the hen. "The best thing you can do now is to get out of their way before they bite you," answered the swallow. And away he flew, saying, "What fools hens are!"

Source: Mara Pratt's Aesop 11.

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