Tradition and story time — not medical advice
The Two Merchants Who Crossed the Desert
Retold for young children from Jataka Tales (retold by Ellen C. Babbitt, 1912), public domain.
Two merchants once set out, separately, to cross a great desert with wagons full of goods to sell. Partway across, strange travelers appeared, riding toward the foolish merchant's caravan, saying they had come from the city ahead, where it had rained — so much rain that there was no need to carry any more water, they said, and he should pour his own away to travel lighter and faster.
The foolish merchant believed them completely and had every water jar emptied onto the sand. But it was a trick: there had been no rain at all, and by the next day his whole caravan, with no water left, was in terrible trouble.
The wise merchant, travelling a little behind, met the very same strangers with the very same story. But he thought it over carefully. "Real rain clouds don't send messengers ahead to boast about it," he said to his own people. "Something about this doesn't add up. We keep every drop of our water."
His caution turned out to be exactly right. Because he'd kept his water, his wagons were able to press on safely all the way to the city, where he sold his goods for a good profit and returned home safely with his whole company.
Talk about it (ours, not from the source): the wise merchant stopped to think, "does this really make sense?" before believing a stranger's story. What's a good question to ask before believing something surprising?
Source: Jataka Tales, retold by Ellen C. Babbitt (1912, The Century Co.) — "The Wise and the Foolish Merchant". Public domain. Read the original.
Why public domain: US: first published 1912, more than 95 years ago, so public domain in the US regardless of the author's death date (Project Gutenberg eBook #62514).