Two friends were walking through a wood together when a bear rushed out upon them. One of the men quickly got up a tree and hid there, but the other, who had nothing to rely upon, lay down flat upon the ground and appeared to breathe no more.
The bear came up and smelling at him, walked off again, for bears will not touch dead flesh. Then the man in the tree slipped down to his comrade and said, What was it that just now passed over you?
It was a bear that gripped my friend, replied he, and came up. What advice did he give you? said the other.
He told me, said the man, never to trust a friend who deserts in the hour of danger.
A true friend is not a friend at all.