The Rooster Story

Long ago in a village by a river there lived a rich farmer. He had many fields where he grew corn and wheat and vegetables and fruits and he had many animals on the farm. Many cows, many bullocks, many dogs, many buffaloes, many ducks, many hens, but just one rooster.

As time went by the rooster became very proud of being the only rooster on the big farm. All the hens on the farm were his wives and he was the only rooster in all the farms of the neighborhood with so many wives. He would puff out his chest and strut around all over the farm and every once in a while crow loudly “CoccoCoCooo”, startling any animal or bird that was nearby. All his wives obeyed him and would come running with a “CcoCcoCcoCco” when he found something he thought they would like to eat. He punished the wives who didn’t listen to him by pecking them hard. All the other animals on the farm thought that it was time someone taught him a lesson not to be so arrogant.

There were also many other animals living on the farm whom the farmer did not have to feed. Birds and insects and small animals like tortoises and rats. Of the birds the largest numbers were the crows. They were somewhat noisy themselves but all of them thought that the loud arrogant rooster needed to be taught a lesson. One day a mother crow got the chance to do that. And this is how it happened.

When the rooster was passing by under the mother crow’s nest one of the baby crows asked, ‘Mother what is that?’

The mother crow looked down carefully and said, ‘Well it looks like a strange sort of animal. Perhaps a pig with feathers.’

The rooster heard her but didn’t think they were talking about him. The baby crow asked again, ‘But mother it looks like a bird.’

The crow said, ‘It must be a pig. Birds fly you know and I’ve never seen this animal flying. And you know pigs don’t fly.’

The rooster realized they were talking about him and became very angry.

‘Hey you foolish crow, I am also a bird like you. What nonsense are you teaching your children?’ asked the rooster.

‘Well’, said the crow, ‘You are the fool. Don’t you know all birds can fly? I have never seen YOU fly so how can you be a bird? If you are not a pig then you must be a cat with a beak.’

Now the rooster could fly a bit but of course not like the other birds. However, like I said, he was a proud and foolish bird. He said:

‘Let me show you. Tell me where you want me to fly to?’

The crow told him to fly to a low branch of a nearby tree. The rooster flapped his wings loudly and managed to reach the branch with a lot of effort. He sat on the branch swaying slightly and trying to balance himself without falling down. The crow flew to a branch just above the rooster’s head and looked down at him and said, ‘Well, I still don’t believe you. You look like a pig that has jumped on to this low branch.’

The rooster asked the crow to show a higher branch. The crow did and the rooster with a heroic effort managed to reach it. The crow did this several times till the rooster was sitting on the top of the tallest tree in the farm before he became less angry and realized he didn’t know how to come down. The crow flapped her wings in his face and said ‘Ok, you may be a bird but you fly very badly. You need to practice more.’

By this time everybody on the farm knew that the rooster had been fooled and was on top of a tree and didn’t know how to come down. The rooster sat on top holding on tightly to the branch he was sitting on and every time it swayed in the wind he felt giddy and he sat there all day and well into the night when he fell asleep and lost his grip and fell through the tree flapping his wings and landed, bruised and tired and not very proud at all.

(Illustrated by daughter Aditi)