After more wanderings that same jay came across a pack that was nipping at a large herd of buffalo. They darted in and then darted out again before the thundering hooves could annilihate them. The jay watched for a bit and saw that, for all their effort, the wolves had not seemed to bring down any of the buffalo. When one wolf trotted out of the press for a breather, tongue lolling, the jay struck up a conversation. “I suppose,” he said, “that you are another one of these packs that resent the buffalo as interlopers and hope to drive them off your range.”

“Yes,” said the wolf.

“And I suppose,” said the jay archly, “you cannot slaughter them head on but instead are whittling down their numbers little by little.”

“You could say that,” said the wolf.

Just then the wolf howled and the spirit of the long harassed herd broke. They took off in a wild stampede with all the wolves howling and nipping behind.

In the direction the wolves chased them the stampede came to a cliff where almost all of them, unable to stop, perished.

Moral: Do the math, but don’t only do the math.