A Question of Dragons

Many centuries ago, a highly philosophical question was asked. The question pondered was: "Why was the dragon howling in the dead tree?" Much was discussed on this subject, and many scrolls were prepared in an attempt to find an answer to this inquiry. In looking at this today, these many years later, I have to say, I believe those scholars spent too much time on this particular question. In truth, there were two other related questions that needed to be responded to first.

First, what was a dragon doing in a dead tree in the first place? Now I suppose that he probably killed it prior to occupying it, but then, what was the point? A dead tree quickly loses its' ability to support weight and, goodness knows, a dragon does have weight. There simply is no way any dead tree would support a full grown dragon. The damn thing would just snap apart and the dragon would be on the ground in no time.

Now if you're going to suggest, just to be a smart ass that maybe it wasn't a full grown specimen, well, that is just absolutely absurd. Young dragons don't hang around on their own. Their mothers, as we all know, keep them in the nest until they are grown and can fend for themselves. Females travel only in the company of males (after all there are moral standards) and adult males are the only ones ho would be seen on their own.

Besides this, the whole concept of the scorched earth is really one of those western myth and legend things. Dragons are really not a foul breed. The Chinesse and their neighbors have had a lot more contact with them, and for a lot longer, than the Europeans, and they don't go around bad mouthing dragons. By and large, they describe a creature who is fairly peaceful.

Most of the dragon species do not go around scorching their homes and environments. They certainly do not live in an active fire zone as that would make for certain health problems they don't want to put up with, such as lack of decent food, lousy personal hygiene, not to mention the odors.

Second, what is with this howling nonsense? Roar, belch, breathe fire - everyone has read or encountered those attributes in dragons, but when has anyone ever came across any reference to howling in relation to this species. They are not exactly wolves, you know. Howling is not in their bag of tricks; i.e., "the dragon spotted the cute little virgin strolling past his cave, and he howled at her in a lustful manner." No, I really do not think that would happen.

So now, having examined those two issues, let us return to the original question, why was the dragon howling in the dead tree? We have established that dragons do not perch in dead trees and they do not howl. So, in conclusion, we can arrive at a few possibilities. One is that the original poser of the question was just plain nuts. Another is that he was pulling everyone's leg, knowing full well what we know.

Another possibility is that he encountered a dragon suffering from an advanced form of mental illness, who really did not realize he was a dragon, but thought he was a vulture. In which case, sitting in a dead tree was perfectly acceptable behavior. However, that would not explain the howling.

So now we need to alter this last scenario slightly. What we now have is a mentally deranged dragon with multiple personalities. On some occasions, the dragon believes himself to be a vulture sitting in a dead tree waiting for prey. On other occasions, the dragon's personality shifts and he becomes a timber wolf. As a timber wolf, he is not surprised by the presence of the tree, but he knows he should be on the ground, so he climbs done to earth, where he begins to howl, as all wolves do. As a wolf, he is not at all shock to encounter either the vulture or the dragon.

Let us just hope that any one of the three does not turn on one of the others in a fit of hunger. The feeding frenzy would be terrible, especially if one of the others joined in.