The Cock, the Mouse and the Little Red Hen

The Cock, the Mouse and the Little Red Hen is a European fable first collected by Félicité Lefèvre and published in illustrated form by Grant Richards in 1907.

The secondary moral lesson is to "be prepared for every eventuality" whereby the red hen kept a sewing kit on her person just in case it was ever needed and this saved their lives.

In recent history, the tale has been re-told through different publications with variations in the storyline appearing: - The tale is related to the Little Red Hen, as both stories have a red hen representing an assiduous nature and other animals representing a slothful nature, with a central moral lesson of both stories being that "hard work pays".

[8][9] The significant modern adaptation of this fable has been its simplification for younger readers with the name simply referring to the fox and the hen.

Here the other animals are dropped and the core story focuses on the red hen escaping from the fox because of having the sewing kit on her person.