The Frog in the Well Fairy Tale

At the bottom of an old well lived a frog. She had never left the well in her whole life. By day she swam about in the water, and by night she slept in a crack between the stones. Above her she could see only a small round patch of sky.

One day a turtle from the sea stopped at the edge of the well. The frog began to boast. "What a wonderful home I have! I can swim when I like and jump when I like. My well is the whole world. Come in and see!"

The turtle tried to climb down. She put in one front foot, but her back leg would not fit, and she got stuck. So the turtle stepped back and began to tell the frog about the sea.

"The sea is so wide that you cannot see where it ends. It is so deep that nobody has ever reached the bottom. Ten years of rain will not make it overflow, and eight years of drought will not make it shallow," said the turtle.

The frog opened her mouth but could not say a word. For the first time she understood that a whole world lay beyond her well.

Ever since, in China a person who sees only a little of the world is called "a frog in a well". To know the world, you have to climb out of your own well.