High in the mountains, a narrow path crossed a deep ravine, with a drop on either side and barely room for one to pass. It was the only way from the eastern meadow to the western one. Every animal who used it knew the rule: look first, and let others cross before you start.
One bright morning, two goats stepped onto the path at the same time, from opposite ends — a big gray billy goat from the east, and a big brown billy goat from the west. They met, nose to nose, exactly in the middle.
"Move aside," said the gray goat. "I was here first." "You most certainly were not," said the brown goat. "Step back and let me pass." Neither goat would move. They lowered their horns. They stamped their hooves. The path was far too narrow to squeeze past one another, and far too high to climb around.
"I will not back down," said the gray goat. "Nor will I," said the brown. And so they stood, horn to horn, the morning slipping away, both of them stuck and going nowhere at all.
The sun climbed high. The goats grew hot and tired and hungry, but pride held them fast. Other animals gathered at each end of the path, waiting to cross, calling out advice that neither goat would take. "If you butt each other," warned a wise old ewe, "you will both fall. The ravine does not care who was right."
The two goats looked down at the long, long drop on either side. For the first time, their anger cooled into something more sensible: fear, and then thought.
It was the brown goat who spoke first, in a smaller voice. "What if," he said slowly, "I lie down — flat on the path — and you walk gently over me? Then we both get where we are going, and neither of us falls." The gray goat blinked. It was a humble thing to offer, to be stepped over. But it was also clever, and kind, and brave.
So the brown goat folded his legs and lay down low, and the gray goat stepped carefully, gratefully, right over his back.
In a moment it was done. The gray goat continued east, the brown goat rose and continued west, and both reached their meadows in time for supper. The watching animals cheered, for they had seen something far rarer than a fight: they had seen two stubborn creatures choose to get along.
"A battle leaves both sides on the ground," the wise old ewe told her lambs that night. "But a little bending lets everyone get home."
And from then on, no one was ever stuck on the narrow path again — because the goats had shown them that yielding is not the same as losing.