Krilof and His Fables/The Peasant and the Snake/2
The Peasant and the Snake.
A Snake once glided up to a Peasant, and said, "Neighbour, let us take to living on friendly terms. You need not be on your guard against me any longer. You can see for yourself that I have changed my skin this spring, and that I have become quite a different creature from what I was."
But the Snake did not convince the Peasant. The Peasant seized a cudgel, and cried,
"Though you've got a new skin, yet your heart is just the same as of old."
And the neighbour's life was straightway knocked out of her.
