Short Stories » The Crocky and the Monkey

The Crocky and the Monkey - Panchatantra Stories for Kids

Once upon a time, there was a monkey, who lived on the rosy apple trees along the banks of a river. The tree was always full of juicy apples. The monkey was spending his life happily on those trees. One fine day, a crocodile came near the river bank. He said to the monkey, “I am very hungry. I haven’t eaten anything since last 3-4 days, please give me some apples”. The kind monkey offered some apples to the crocodile. Since the crocodile was very hungry, he ate as many apples as he could and happily went on to his home afterwards.

The crocodile started coming near the river bank more and more frequently. In due course of time, they become very good friends and discussed their daily lives with each other. The monkey was very open-hearted, he always gave plenty of apples to the crocodile. In return, the crocodile offered free rides to the monkey on his strong broad back. They were spending their time happily. However, during this time, the crocodile got married. Being a good friend of the monkey, the crocodile invited him on his marriage. But the monkey politely said to him “No”, as the monkey was afraid of deep waters. The crocodile accepted his excuse happily.

After marriage, the crocodile came every day as usual. The Monkey was very glad because the crocodile’s marriage didn’t affect their friendship. One day the monkey gave some fresh rosy red apples for crocodile’s wife as a gift. The crocodile was very glad about the rosy red apples and he took the gift home to his wife and narrated the entire story of his friendship to his wife.

After eating juicy red apples, the crocodile’s wife thought: “If these apples are so rosy, juicy and tasty, the monkey who eats these juicy apples must have a much tastier and yummy heart”. Therefore, the crocodile’s wife thought of an evil plan. After a few days, she pretended to be unwell. The crocodile asked her to go see a doctor and get medicine. Hence, the next day, she started crying and when the crocodile asked her what was wrong? She replied- “my dear husband, I have very few days to live since I have a very rare disease. The only medicine is the red heart of a monkey. If you love me please bring me your friend monkey’s heart”. The crocodile was totally shocked but he was left with no other option.

The Next day, the crocodile went to meet the monkey as usual. He said to the monkey that his wife had invited him to a dinner party. So, please sit on my back and we’ll go home. The monkey agreed and quickly jumped & sat on his back. The crocodile started to swim and after reaching deep waters he started to lower himself under water. The monkey started getting scared, so he asked “where are you taking me?” The crocodile replied, that his wife wants to eat his heart after drowning him. After listening to this, the clever monkey said to the crocodile, why didn’t you tell me before? I left my heart inside the tree’s burrow. Please take me back so that I can gift my heart for your wife. The foolish crocodile swam back to the river banks and reached the tree. The intelligent monkey quickly jumped onto the tree and told him. “Don’t you know that heart lies only inside the body? I told you a lie to save my life from a cunning friend like you and decided to teach you a lesson instead. Please don’t ever come back, I don’t need friends like you anymore.” The crocodile had learned a valuable lesson and left quietly.

MORAL: Beware of fake friends.