On the edge of a town, a rich merchant had begun building a temple in a grove of tall trees. Every day carpenters and masons worked there, sawing great logs of wood, and every afternoon they went into the town for their meal, leaving the half-finished work behind. One huge log lay only partly sawn; to keep the cut from closing, the carpenters had hammered a stout wedge of wood into the gap before they left.
That afternoon a troop of monkeys came swinging through the grove, as monkeys will, chattering and tumbling over the piles of timber. Among them was one young monkey who simply could not keep his hands off anything. The elders of the troop called out their usual warning — leave the men's work alone and play in the trees — but curiosity was already tugging him toward the great half-split log.
He hopped onto it and peered at the wedge sticking up from the cut. What could it be for? He tapped it, wiggled it, then sat down astride the log, gripped the wedge with both hands and began to heave with all his might. Back and forth he rocked it, little knowing that his tail had slipped down into the gap between the two halves of the log. With one last mighty tug the wedge sprang free — and the great log snapped shut like a crocodile's jaws.
The poor monkey was caught fast, and his shrieks brought the whole troop scampering, but no one could prise the mighty log apart, and the meddlesome monkey perished even before the carpenters returned. The old monkeys shook their heads sadly as they led the troop away. “We warned him,” they said. “The work of carpenters is for carpenters. He who pokes his fingers into business that is not his own comes to grief, like our poor brother and the wedge.” And that is the very first story told in the Panchatantra.