The story was widespread in Classical times and there is an early Greek version by Babrius (Fable 108). After hearing this, the country mouse decides to return home, preferring security to opulence or, as the 13th-century preacher Odo of Cheriton phrased it, "I'd rather gnaw a bean than be gnawed by continual fear". Town mouse tells country mouse that the cat killed his mother and father and that he is frequently the target of attacks. But their rich feast is interrupted by a cat which forces the rodent cousins to abandon their meal and retreat back into their mouse hole for safety. The country mouse offers the city mouse a meal of simple country cuisine, at which the visitor scoffs and invites the country mouse back to the city for a taste of the "fine life" and the two cousins dine on white bread and other fine foods. In the original tale, a proud town mouse visits his cousin in the country. Like several other elements in Aesop's fables, 'town mouse and country mouse' has become an English idiom. It is number 352 in the Perry Index and type 112 in Aarne–Thompson's folk tale index. " The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse" is one of Aesop's Fables.
Aesops Fables (1912), illustrated by Arthur Rackham.
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