The Farmer and his Sons
The Farmer and his Sons is a story of Greek origin that is included among Aesop's Fables and is listed as 42 in the Perry Index. It illustrates both the value of hard work and the need to temper parental advice with practicality.

The Fable
As a farmer neared death, he called his sons to see him. The father knew a family secret and told them there is a treasure hidden on the land and if the sons dig the soil, they will find it and told them to find it. After the father dies, the sons went out and dug the land, but they never found a treasure. Later as their grapevines grew, they discovered the plants created the best crop they have ever seen. Their digging improved the soil for the plants and that was the treasure. 

The fable is rare in dealing directly with the human situation, rather than through the intermediary of animals. Although it has long been accepted as one of Aesop's, and appeared as his in early European collections, the story has also been ascribed to the philosopher Socrates. The Neo-Latin poets Gabriele Faerno and Hieronymus Osius both wrote poetic versions, as did Jean de la Fontaine in French.

There is no consistency of titling. Greek sources make the father a farmer (Γεωργὸς), while Osius calls him a peasant (rusticus). Caxton's description is labourer, as is La Fontaine's, although the French laboureur has the meaning of an independent husbandman, the term used by Samuel Croxall. The nature of the ground cultivated differs as well. The 15th century illustrations in the Medici Manuscript and in Heinrich Steinhowel's collection make it a vineyard, as it is also described in the poems by Faerno and Osius, but other versions are not always so specific.

The moral of the story appears pithily in La Fontaine's version as le travail est un trésor (work is wealth), as is also made explicit in the Greek (ὁ κάματος θησαυρός ἐστι) and in Faerno's Latin (thesaurus est labor). English versions have been more roundabout and long-winded. Caxton prefaces the story with the opinion that "He that laboureth and werketh contynuelly maye not faylle to haue plente of goodes”. Croxall prefaces his long application with, "Labour and Industry, well applied, seldom fail of finding a Treasure”, while Thomas Bewick's edition contains the verse “Assiduous pains the swelling coffers fill”. However, Bewick's main comment is on the value of the father’s advice and the craft by which he conveyed it. This also is what attracts the attention of Roger L'Estrange: “Good Counsel is the best Legacy a Father can leave to a Child”.

References

External links
Books illustration from the 15th to the 19th centuries

Aesop's Fables
La Fontaine's Fables
Fictional farmers
Fictional families