Reading: Eastern Stories and Legends by Marie L. Shedlock

These are notes over Eastern Stories and Legends by Marie L. Shedlock. The Bull that Demanded Fair Treatment sparked by curiosity because the image a big, sad bull just wanted to be loved and accepted was rather amusing. Even more than this, it was a benevolent bull; this benevolence became apparent to the reader when the bull decided to let his person know about his strength so that the person could gain from this. The way the man betrayed the ox's trust and gambled with his strength was heartbreaking. It was like when an innocent puppy gets hurt in a film, intolerable. Then, the man speaks unkindly to him. The whole time, the reader is thinking, "wow, how terrible that the pure innocence of the ox is being tarnished by the unkindness of the owner." Then, when he spoke kindly to ox after getting a talking to, the ox immediately pranced along. I liked the emphasis on right speech in this story. I think the author did a good job of illustrating this through an animal; something about an animal having to correct a human for being unkind says two things: being kind should be obvious and animals have minds and feelings too.

Ox from Max Pixel