Chapter 1 — Fables and Folk Tales

Unit 1, titled "Fables and Folk Tales", contains three texts: the prose fable "A Bottle of Dew" by Sudha Murty, the poem "The Raven and the Fox" by Jean de La Fontaine, and the folk tale "Rama to the Rescue" adapted from Amar Chitra Katha.

The unit draws on traditional fables and folk tales to explore themes of wisdom, hard work, the dangers of greed and pride, and how cleverness can solve problems — lessons conveyed through story, poem, and folk narrative.

"A Bottle of Dew" by Sudha Murty tells the story of Rama Natha, a landlord's son obsessed with finding a magic potion that turns things into gold. The sage Mahipati tricks him into spending six years carefully growing a banana plantation to collect dew. At the end, Rama Natha's wife Madhumati reveals a box of gold coins earned from selling bananas, and the sage explains that it was their hard work — not magic — that created the wealth.

The main characters are Rama Natha (a landlord's son who chases after a magic potion), Madhumati (his practical wife who tends the banana crop and sells the produce), and sage Mahipati (the wise man who tricks Rama Natha into working hard on his land).

The sage Mahipati explains the moral directly: there is no magic potion that can turn things into gold; it is hard work and diligence that create wealth. Rama Natha spent six years tending his banana plantation and, without realising it, became prosperous through his own labour.

"The Raven and the Fox" is a four-stanza poem by Jean de La Fontaine. The cunning fox, Reynard, looks up at Mr Raven who is perched on a tree branch holding a morsel of food. Reynard flatters the Raven about his beautiful feathers and suggests that if he sang, the birds of the woods would crown him King. The proud Raven, forgetting that his voice is just a croak, opens his beak to sing and drops the food. The fox laughs and states the lesson: pride is unwise and sweet flattery should be ignored.

The two characters are Mr Raven, a bird perched on a tree limb holding a morsel of food, and Reynard the Fox, who stands below and flatters the Raven to make him drop the food.

After the Raven drops his food, Reynard says: "Ignore sweet words that make you glow. Pride, my friend, is rather unwise." The lesson is that excessive pride makes one vulnerable to flattery and deceit.

"Rama to the Rescue" is a folk tale adapted from Amar Chitra Katha. A man and his wife hear a thief breaking into their home at night. The man devises a plan: his wife calls out the name "Rama" — the name of the village kotwal (police officer) — softly at first and then very loudly. Rama, the kotwal, hears his name being called and rushes to the house, discovers the thief who has dug his way in, and catches him. The couple's quick-witted thinking saves them without a direct confrontation.

Rama is the village kotwal (a local police officer or law-enforcement figure). When the wife calls out his name loudly, he hears it and runs to the house. He discovers that a thief has dug his way in, and the villagers catch the thief and take him to the kotwal.

The man thinks quickly: when the thief has entered the house, he whispers a plan to his wife. She calls out the name "Rama" softly so the thief, thinking they are talking about their money, stays quiet. Then she calls out very loudly, which brings Rama the kotwal running to the house. The thief is caught without any direct fight.

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