The Cock and the Jewel

'The Cock and the Jewel', an illustration by John Vernon Lord 

in Aesop's Fables, Jonathan Cape, 1989, page 123.

Two versions of the text:

first version

The Cock and the Jewel

As a Cock was scratching up the straw in a farm-yard, in search of food for the hens, he hit upon a Jewel that  by some chance had found its way there. “Ho!’ said he, “you are a very fine thing, no doubt, to those who prize you; but give me a barley-corn before all the pearls in the world.”

Moral: Necessity before ornament.

Text: Thomas James (11, 1848).

second version

The Cock Who Discovered a Precious Stone in a Dung Hill

A Cock in search of Food the Dunghill tries,

A sparkling Jewel glistens in his Eyes;

Cry’d he - A Barley-corn wou’d please me more

Than all the Treasures of the Eastern Shore.

Morall

Gay Nonsense does the noisy Fopling please;

Beyond the noblest Arts and Sciences.

Text: Aphra Behn (1, 1687).

Selected Parallels: Phaedrus 3/12. Caxton, Romulus 1/1. La Fontaine 1/20. L’Estrange 1/1. Perry 503 . TMI J1061.1.