有一年秋天，山林里住着一群猴子。夜晚，猴王领着猴群到溪边玩耍，忽然看见水潭中央浮着一轮又大又圆的月亮，银光闪闪，煞是好看。"

不好了！月亮掉进水里了！"一只小猴子大声喊道。猴群顿时慌乱起来，纷纷围到潭边张望，谁也不敢相信天上竟然少了月亮。

猴王想了想，说："月亮掉进水里，若不把它捞起来，天上就再也没有光亮了，我们得想办法把它捞上来。"

众猴纷纷附和，可是水潭又深又阔，谁也没有把握。猴王眼珠一转，有了主意："我们一个个手拉着手，从树上垂下去，一直垂到水面，不就能把月亮捞上来了吗？"

于是，猴王率先爬上潭边的老树，倒挂在树枝上，伸出一只手；第二只猴子抓住猴王的脚，也倒挂下去；第三只、第四只……猴子们一个接一个，手脚相连，像一条长长的链子，慢慢垂向水潭中央。

眼看快要碰到水面了，为首的小猴伸手去捞那轮"月亮"，谁知手一碰到水面，月亮的影子就碎成一片片银光，转眼又聚拢回原来的样子，怎么也捞不起来。

正在这时，猴王无意中抬起头，望向天空，只见那轮明月依旧高高地挂在夜空之中，又大又圆，一点也没有缺少。

猴王恍然大悟，笑着喊道："别捞了，别捞了！月亮好好地挂在天上呢，水里的不过是它的影子罢了！"

众猴这才明白，白忙活了一场，都不好意思地笑了起来，一个接一个地爬回树上，望着天上的明月，慢慢往家去了。

One autumn, there was a group of monkeys living in the forest. At night, the Monkey King led his group of monkeys to play by the stream. Suddenly he saw a big, round moon floating in the middle of the pool, with shining silver light, which was really beautiful. " Oh no! The moon fell into the water!" A little monkey shouted loudly. The monkeys suddenly became panicked and gathered around the pool to look around. No one could believe that there was no moon in the sky. The Monkey King thought for a while and said: "The moon fell into the water. If we don't fish it up, there will be no light in the sky anymore. We have to find a way to fish it out." All the monkeys agreed, but the pool was deep and wide, and no one was sure. The Monkey King rolled his eyes and had an idea: "We hold hands one by one and hang down from the tree to the water. Can't we catch the moon?" So, the monkey king took the lead to climb up the old tree by the pool, hung upside down on the branch, and stretched out one hand; the second monkey grabbed the monkey king's feet and hung upside down; the third, fourth... monkeys one after another, connected hand and foot, like a long chain, slowly hanging down to the center of the pool. Seeing that it was about to touch the water, the leader of the little monkeys reached out to fish out the "moon". Unexpectedly, as soon as his hand touched the water, the shadow of the moon shattered into pieces of silver light, and in the blink of an eye it gathered back to its original shape, and it could not be fished out. At this moment, the Monkey King inadvertently raised his head and looked at the sky, only to see that the bright moon was still hanging high in the night sky, big and round, without missing anything. The Monkey King suddenly realized and shouted with a smile: "Don't fish it, don't fish it! The moon is hanging well in the sky, and what's in the water is just its shadow!" The monkeys realized that their work was in vain, and they all laughed in embarrassment, climbed back to the tree one by one, looked at the bright moon in the sky, and slowly walked home.