NCERT Chapter Summary: The Ant and the Cricket (Poem)

NCERT Chapter Summary: The Ant and the Cricket (Poem)

There was a cricket that sang and danced all through the pleasant months of summer and spring. However, when the winter arrived, he became desperate and began to complain.

He hadn’t saved anything and there was no food at home. Even in the spaces beyond his home, he couldn’t find anything that would sustain him. He became worried, not knowing what would become of him and decided to go and meet the ant.

Neither having food nor shelter, he want to meet the ant to seek its help. Explaining his situation and circumstances, the cricket requested the ant to give him food and shelter. He also told the ant that if the ant refused to help him, he would die. The ant felt sorry for him, but told him that ants neither borrowed nor lent. The ant asked him what he did during the warm weather. The cricket replied that he sang and danced. The ant asked him to sing and dance through the winter too.

The poet ends the poem with the moral that some human beings are like the cricket, who save nothing for the bad weather. And, therefore, the tale is not a fable but the truth.