The Bull, the Lion, and the Bridge of Doubt

A wolf, hoping to cause trouble between a lion and a bull who had recently become uneasy allies, told the bull privately that the lion had called him "nothing but slow-witted meat on legs" behind his back.

The bull, hurt and furious, repeated the insult to a fox, who — enjoying the drama — carried it onward, embellishing it slightly each time it passed from animal to animal: "meat on legs" became "worthless livestock," then "an animal not worth keeping alive," until by the time the story reached the lion himself, secondhand, it had become an account of the bull openly mocking the lion's courage to an entire gathering of animals.

Furious and hurt in turn, the lion confronted the bull directly — and it was only because the two of them, despite their anger, chose to speak face to face rather than through a third voice that they discovered neither had ever actually said what the other believed. They traced the insult backward together, animal by animal, until it led straight back to the wolf, who had started the entire quarrel from nothing at all.