Jupiter issued a proclamation to all the beasts of the forest and promised a royal reward to the one whose offspring should be deemed the handsomest. The Monkey came with the rest and presented, with all a mother’s tenderness, a flat-nosed, hairless, ill-featured young Monkey as a candidate for the premised reward. A general laugh saluted her on the presentation of her son. She resolutely said: “I know not whether Jupiter will allot the prize to my son, but this I do know, that he is, at least in the eyes of his mother, the dearest, handsomest, and most beautiful of all.”

From Aesop’s Fables, translated by George Fyler Townsend, Collins Classics, London: Harper Press, 2011, p. 73.

Addendum (November 5, 2014)

No prize for guessing who was on my mind when I came across this fable. I even thought of changing its title to something like “My Mother and I.” She would have presented me to Jupiter without any compunction, to be sure. The general laugh would not dismay her one single bit, either. If there would be any problem, it would be with the mother from the fable. The two of them would fight it out one way or another. Chances are that my mother would win, too. Such was her conviction that I was not only the dearest, handsomest, and most beautiful of all, but also the best and the brightest since the beginning of time. And I am hardly exaggerating, as anyone who knew my mother would readily testify. Aesop would have found her a perfect model for his fables, I am quite sure. The mother, as it were.