The Two Travellers And The Axe

Two travellers find an axe. Who does it belong to?


Two men were journeying together. One of them picked up an axe that lay upon the path, and said, “I have found an axe.” “Nay, my friend,” replied the other, “do not say ‘I,’ but ‘We’ have found an axe.” They had not gone far before they saw the owner of the axe pursuing them, and he who had picked up the axe said, “We are undone.” “Nay,” replied the other, “keep to your first mode of speech, my friend; what you thought right then, think right now. Say ‘I,’ not ‘We’ are undone.”

The moral of the story is: He who shares the danger ought to share the prize.


Wordchecker

  • pursue (verb): to follow or chase
  • mode (noun): manner or method
  • undone (adjective): ruined

The Two Travellers and the Axe is one of the famous Aesop’s Fables. A “fable” is a short story, typically with animals as characters, telling a moral or lesson.

Read by Tara Benwell.

RSS Feed Subscribe to EnglishClub Podcasts

Leave a comment