a man wished to purchase an ass, and agreed with his owner that he should try him before he bought him. he took the ass home, and put him in the straw-yard with his other asses, upon which the beast left all the others and joined himself at once to the most idle and the greatest eater of them all.

the man put a halter on him, and led him back to his owner: and when he was asked how, in so short a time, he could have made a trial of him, "i do not need," he answered, "a trial; i know that he will be just such another as the one whom of all the rest he chose for his companion."