The Fox and the Stork: Aesop's Fable with Moral
Quick answer: The Fox and the Stork retold in full: a dinner served in a shallow dish, and a return invitation with a tall jar. The moral about fair play, its origin, and classroom notes.
A fox invites a stork to dinner and serves thin soup in a flat dish she cannot drink from, and laughs as she goes hungry. A week later the stork returns the invitation. The fable is Aesop's most elegant piece of revenge, and nobody in it raises their voice.
The story
The fox was known for his dinners and for his jokes, and the stork, new to the valley, was pleased to be asked. She arrived at dusk with her feathers smoothed. The fox had set two places on a flat stone and brought out the meal himself: a broth of rabbit and herbs, steaming, which he poured into two wide shallow dishes hardly deeper than a plate.
He set to at once, lapping with his quick tongue. The stork dipped her long beak into the dish, and it clicked against the stone. She tried from the side. She tried tilting her head. The broth lay in a thin bright film she could smell and not swallow, and across the stone the fox lapped and lapped and looked up now and then to say how good it was and to ask why she was not eating. When his dish was clean he licked hers as well. "A pity," he said. "You must come again."
The stork thanked him for the evening and flew home, and said nothing to anyone, and ate frogs alone by the river for a week. Then she sent the fox an invitation.
She had gone to some trouble. The fish was fresh, cooked with wild garlic, and the fox could smell it from the bend of the river. It was served in two tall clay jars with necks no wider than a thumb, and the stork dipped her beak into hers and drew up the fish in long delicate mouthfuls. The fox put his nose to the jar and it stopped at the rim. He pushed his tongue in and reached nothing. He tipped the jar; it was heavy and did not pour. He walked round it. The stork ate steadily and paused only to ask whether he was not hungry, and at the end she said, in the mildest voice, "I hope you will not be offended. I learned the recipe from you."
The moral, and what it really means
The moral is "one bad turn deserves another," or more politely, "do not play tricks you would not like played on you." Underneath is a fable about proportion. The stork does not shout, bite or shame the fox in public. She returns exactly what she was given, in the same form, with the same courtesy. The revenge works because it is a mirror, and a mirror cannot be argued with.
Where it comes from, and why it lasts
This is Perry 426, told in Latin by Phaedrus, where the bird is a crane; the stork arrived with La Fontaine's version. The pairing of shallow dish and tall jar is present from the start.
It lasts because the two dinners are built to match, dish for jar, lap for sip, and the reader enjoys the symmetry as much as the justice.
For young readers and classrooms
Six and up, and useful for talking about revenge versus fairness.
Write your own
The engine is a wrong returned in its own shape. Build the first scene as a trap disguised as hospitality, then rebuild it with the roles reversed and every detail answered. The victim's revenge should be quieter than the original insult, and the last line should be polite.
What writers can take from this
- For exams, name the moral and identify the two dishes as matched symbols.
- Mention Phaedrus and the crane if origin is asked.
- Writers, plan the second scene first and design the first to set it up.
- Keep the avenger courteous throughout; manners sharpen the blade.
- Give the fox no speech at the end; his silence is the stork's dessert.
Try it yourself
Write a story in two dinners. In the first a host humiliates a guest through the way the meal is served. In the second the guest returns the favour in exact reverse, without a raised voice.
Questions
What is the moral of The Fox and the Stork?
One bad turn deserves another, and you should not play tricks you would not want played on you. The fox starves the stork with a shallow dish; the stork starves the fox with a tall jar.
Is it The Fox and the Stork or The Fox and the Crane?
Both. Phaedrus, the Roman fabulist, wrote of a crane; La Fontaine's French version made it a stork, and English collections use both titles for Perry 426.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working writers. Updated September 2026.
Enter a Writory story contest
Enter the Writory Short Story Contest and have your own story read and scored out of 100. Entries close 25 November. That first entry makes you a Writorian.