Humor
Making an Ass of Himself
“I am your ass, my master; but my tale is a strange one. In my youth I was a bad lad, given to all sorts of disgraceful vice.” […]
Animals
Greek and Roman
When Octopuses Attack!
“It struggles with him, embracing him with its tentacles, swallows at him with its many suckers and pulls him apart; it attacks shipwrecked men or men who are diving.” […]
Britons and Celts
Some Dreams End in Death
“It seems to me that dreams are like rumours: you must use your common sense, and then accept some but refuse to believe others.” […]
Greek and Roman
The Dolphins of Tunisia
“Dolphins are not afraid of humans as something alien, but come to meet vessels at sea and play and leap around them; they try to race ships and overtake them even when they are under full sail.” […]
Humor
Who Cares What the Crows Think?
“These crows are hardly four years old, while I have campaigned against the Saracens for more than twenty years and know the science and means of warfare better than them.” […]
Britons and Celts
Scandalous Stallions
“When the stallions were to leap the mares, they were to be brought before such a part of the house, where she had a vidette (a hole to peep out at) to look on them.” […]
Humor
An Exchange of Insults Gets Surreal
“You probably do not remember clearly now when you were the witch on Varinsey and said that you wanted to marry a man and you chose me for the role of husband. And afterward you were a Valkyrie in Asgard and all were on the verge of fighting for your sake. I sired nine wolves on you at Laganess, and I was the father of them all.” […]
Supernatural
Weird Wolves in the Woods
“Sigmund and Sinfjotli put the skins on and could not get them off. And the weird power was there as before: they howled like wolves, both understanding the sounds. They agreed then that they would risk a fight with as many as seven men, but not with more, and that the one being attacked by more would howl with his wolf’s voice.” […]
Britons and Celts
Fear and Loathing in the Church
“And as I was there about, a crow which belike was by nodding asleep on the chimney top, fell down into the chimney over my head, whose flittering in the fall made such a noise, that when I felt his feet upon my head I thought that the devil had been come indeed and seized upon me. And when I cast up my hand to save me and therewith touched him, he called me knave in his language after such a sort that I swooned for fear.” […]
Britons and Celts
A Cat Tricks and is Tricked
“For the old Priest which was so tumbled among them that his face lay upon a boys bare ass, which belike was fallen headlong under him was so astonished; then when the boy (which for fear beshit himself) had raised his face, he neither felt nor smelt it nor removed from him.” […]