The Cobra and the Crows

A pair of crows had their home in a tall tree. But a black snake lived in a hole in the same tree, and again and again he had crept up and eaten their chicks.

When the mother crow was about to lay her eggs, she said to her husband, “We have to leave this tree. We will never raise any children while that black snake lives here. A wise bird keeps away from false friends and from a house full of snakes.”

“My dear, don’t be afraid,” said the father crow. “I have put up with him long enough. Now I am going to get rid of him.”

“How can you fight a great black snake like that?” asked his wife.

“Don’t worry,” he answered. “A creature with brains has strength, and a fool is weak, however big he is. Remember the little old hare who got the better of a proud lion?” And he told her that story, about the hare who tricked the lion into leaping at his own reflection in a well.

“I have heard your story,” said the mother crow, “but what is your plan?”

“The king’s son comes to the stream here every day to bathe,” said the father crow. “He takes off his golden anklet and lays it on a stone. When he does, you must snatch it up in your beak, fly back here, and drop it into the hole in our tree.”

Soon afterwards the prince came down to the stream as usual. He took off his clothes and his jewels and laid them on the stone. And the mother crow did just as they had planned. She swooped down, picked up the shining gold anklet, and dropped it into the hole in the tree.

The prince’s servants saw her and ran after it. They searched the hole for the anklet, and there they found the black snake. They killed him at once, and the crows were free to raise their family in peace.

About this story

This fable is retold from Edwin Arnold’s The Book of Good Counsels, his English version of the Sanskrit Hitopadesha, as printed in the collection Hindu Literature (Project Gutenberg #13268). There a scheming jackal named Damanaka tells it to his fellow jackal. He wants to prove that a trick can win where force would fail, and he sums it up in a little rhyme about the crow who finished off the serpent with a chain.

In Arnold’s version the wise crow tells his wife the tale of the lion and the old hare in the middle of this story; that fable has its own page on this site. The same story of the crows and the snake also appears in the Panchatantra.

Read the original: The Book of Good Counsels, Edwin Arnold’s Hitopadesha, in Hindu Literature (Project Gutenberg #13268)

Reading guidance: Ages 9–12; the snake repeatedly eats chicks and is killed by servants. Discuss the violence as well as the strategy.

A closer reading

The mother crow’s question—’what is your plan?’—marks the difference between an encouraging example and a workable response. The hare’s success does not by itself solve the snake problem. The anklet plan works by predicting that the prince’s servants will follow something they value.

The mother performs the risky action, while the father devises it. Reading both roles keeps the victory from becoming a story about one clever male bird. The ending is violent: the servants kill the snake, so using intermediaries changes who applies force, not whether force is used.

Try this with the story

Map the plan with arrows from anklet to crow to hole to servants. Label what each participant wants. Then explain why the hare story encourages the mother but does not answer her practical question.

Talk about it

• Why does the mother ask for a plan after hearing the hare story?
• What motivates the servants to search the hole?
• Which parts of the plan are carried out by each crow?

More stories like this

• The Story of the Lion and the Hare — the tale of the clever hare that the crow tells his wife
• The Sparrow And The Crow — another story about birds and their nest
• The Story of the Terrible Bell — another fable from the Hitopadesha