The Butterfly and the Snail

A fable retold from Harrison Weir

This fable comes from Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse, a Victorian collection by Harrison Weir, an illustrator and writer who retold classic moral tales for children. The story teaches that it is wrong to look down on others when you were once in the same place yourself. Fables like this one use animals to show truths about how people behave—here, the butterfly's pride and the snail's wise reminder that everyone has a humble beginning. This text reflects its era; a few period terms have been modernised.

Band

Purple · Pre-readers and first readers, about 4 to 5

Length

short · about 316 words in 5 sections · 4 pictures

Source

Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse, Harrison Weir · Project Gutenberg

First published

see the About page in the reader

Regions

Canada · United States

Included formats

• · Web reader and PDF
• · EPUB for e-readers
• · Home-print sheet
• · Folded booklet
• · Binder edition (8.5 × 11)
• · Worksheet
• · Quick Check (6 questions) with answer key
• · Read-aloud script

Readers are engineered from the original public-domain text with AI under HummingRead’s published canon and Content Philosophy, checked by automated audit and sampled by a person. Pictures are made with AI to HummingRead’s brief for each story. How a reader is made.