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diff --git a/old/2jngb10.txt b/old/2jngb10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..db19b54 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/2jngb10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7664 @@ +Project Gutenberg Etext The Second Jungle Book, Rudyard Kipling +#7 in our series by Rudyard Kipling + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. 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Because +all the text was scanned any mistakes in spelling of the odd +names given to the animals should be rare, but e.&o.e. +The text was formatted to 32 picas, 5-3/8 in, or 13.5 cm and hard +returns were inserted. The program used was Cetus CWordPad (same +as Windows Wordpad but with a spell check which I could not get +to work). + + + + + +THE SECOND JUNGLE BOOK + +by Rudyard Kipling + + + + +CONTENTS +How Fear Came +The Law of the Jungle +The Miracle of Purun Bhagat +A Song of Kabir +Letting in the Jungle +Mowgli's Song against People +The Undertakers +A Ripple Song +The King's Ankus +The Song of the Little Hunter +Quiquern +'Angutivaun Taina' +Red Dog +Chil's Song +The Spring Running +The Outsong + + + + +HOW FEAR CAME + +The stream is shrunk--the pool is dry, +And we be comrades, thou and I; +With fevered jowl and dusty flank +Each jostling each along the bank; +And by one drouthy fear made still, +Forgoing thought of quest or kill. +Now 'neath his dam the fawn may see, +The lean Pack-wolf as cowed as he, +And the tall buck, unflinching, note +The fangs that tore his father's throat. +The pools are shrunk--the streams are dry, +And we be playmates, thou and I, +Till yonder cloud--Good Hunting!--loose +The rain that breaks our Water Truce. + +The Law of the Jungle--which is by far the oldest law in the +world--has arranged for almost every kind of accident that may +befall the Jungle People, till now its code is as perfect as time +and custom can make it. You will remember that Mowgli +spent a great part of his life in the Seeonee Wolf-Pack, +learning the Law from Baloo, the Brown Bear; and it was Baloo +who told him, when the boy grew impatient at the constant +orders, that the Law was like the Giant Creeper, because it +dropped across every one's back and no one could escape. +"When thou hast lived as long as I have, Little Brother, +thou wilt see how all the Jungle obeys at least one Law. +And that will be no pleasant sight," said Baloo. + +This talk went in at one ear and out at the other, for a boy +who spends his life eating and sleeping does not worry about +anything till it actually stares him in the face. But, +one year, Baloo's words came true, and Mowgli saw all the +Jungle working under the Law. + +It began when the winter Rains failed almost entirely, and +Ikki, the Porcupine, meeting Mowgli in a bamboo-thicket, told +him that the wild yams were drying up. Now everybody knows that +Ikki is ridiculously fastidious in his choice of food, and will +eat nothing but the very best and ripest. So Mowgli laughed and +said, "What is that to me?" + +"Not much NOW," said Ikki, rattling his quills in a stiff, +uncomfortable way, "but later we shall see. Is there any +more diving into the deep rock-pool below the Bee-Rocks, +Little Brother?" + +"No. The foolish water is going all away, and I do not wish +to break my head," said Mowgii, who, in those days, was quite +sure that he knew as much as any five of the Jungle People +put together. + +"That is thy loss. A small crack might let in some wisdom." +Ikki ducked quickly to prevent Mowgli from pulling his +nose-bristles, and Mowgli told Baloo what Ikki had said. +Baloo looked very grave, and mumbled half to himself: +"If I were alone I would change my hunting-grounds now, +before the others began to think. And yet--hunting among +strangers ends in fighting; and they might hurt the Man-cub. +We must wait and see how the mohwa blooms." + +That spring the mohwa tree, that Baloo was so fond of, never +flowered. The greeny, cream-coloured, waxy blossoms were +heat-killed before they were born, and only a few bad-smelling +petals came down when he stood on his hind legs and shook +the tree. Then, inch by inch, the untempered heat crept into +the heart of the Jungle, turning it yellow, brown, and at +last black. The green growths in the sides of the ravines +burned up to broken wires and curled films of dead stuff; +the hidden pools sank down and caked over, keeping the last +least footmark on their edges as if it had been cast in iron; +the juicy-stemmed creepers fell away from the trees they clung +to and died at their feet; the bamboos withered, clanking when +the hot winds blew, and the moss peeled off the rocks deep in +the Jungle, till they were as bare and as hot as the quivering +blue boulders in the bed of the stream. + +The birds and the monkey-people went north early in the year, +for they knew what was coming; and the deer and the wild pig +broke far away to the perished fields of the villages, dying +sometimes before the eyes of men too weak to kill them. Chil, +the Kite, stayed and grew fat, for there was a great deal of +carrion, and evening after evening he brought the news to the +beasts, too weak to force their way to fresh hunting-grounds, +that the sun was killing the Jungle for three days" flight in +every direction. + +Mowgli, who had never known what real hunger meant, fell back +on stale honey, three years old, scraped out of deserted +rock-hives--honey black as a sloe, and dusty with dried sugar. +He hunted, too, for deep-boring grubs under the bark of the +trees, and robbed the wasps of their new broods. All the game +in the jungle was no more than skin and bone, and Bagheera +could kill thrice in a night, and hardly get a full meal. But +the want of water was the worst, for though the Jungle People +drink seldom they must drink deep. + +And the heat went on and on, and sucked up all the moisture, +till at last the main channel of the Waingunga was the only +stream that carried a trickle of water between its dead banks; +and when Hathi, the wild elephant, who lives for a hundred +years and more, saw a long, lean blue ridge of rock show dry +in the very centre of the stream, he knew that he was looking +at the Peace Rock, and then and there he lifted up his trunk +and proclaimed the Water Truce, as his father before him had +proclaimed it fifty years ago. The deer, wild pig, and buffalo +took up the cry hoarsely; and Chil, the Kite, flew in great +circles far and wide, whistling and shrieking the warning. + +By the Law of the Jungle it is death to kill at the +drinking-places when once the Water Truce has been declared. +The reason of this is that drinking comes before eating. Every +one in the Jungle can scramble along somehow when only game is +scarce; but water is water, and when there is but one source of +supply, all hunting stops while the Jungle People go there for +their needs. In good seasons, when water was plentiful, those +who came down to drink at the Waingunga--or anywhere else, for +that matter--did so at the risk of their lives, and that risk +made no small part of the fascination of the night's doings. +To move down so cunningly that never a leaf stirred; to wade +knee-deep in the roaring shallows that drown all noise from +behind; to drink, looking backward over one shoulder, every +muscle ready for the first desperate bound of keen terror; +to roll on the sandy margin, and return, wet-muzzled and +well plumped out, to the admiring herd, was a thing that all +tall-antlered young bucks took a delight in, precisely because +they knew that at any moment Bagheera or Shere Khan might leap +upon them and bear them down. But now all that life-and-death +fun was ended, and the Jungle People came up, starved and +weary, to the shrunken river,--tiger, bear, deer, buffalo, +and pig, all together,--drank the fouled waters, and hung above +them, too exhausted to move off. + +The deer and the pig had tramped all day in search of something +better than dried bark and withered leaves. The buffaloes had +found no wallows to be cool in, and no green crops to steal. +The snakes had left the Jungle and come down to the river in +the hope of finding a stray frog. They curled round wet stones, +and never offered to strike when the nose of a rooting pig +dislodged them. The river-turtles had long ago been killed by +Bagheera, cleverest of hunters, and the fish had buried +themselves deep in the dry mud. Only the Peace Rock lay across +the shallows like a long snake, and the little tired ripples +hissed as they dried on its hot side. + +It was here that Mowgli came nightly for the cool and the +companionship. The most hungry of his enemies would hardly have +cared for the boy then, His naked hide made him seem more lean +and wretched than any of his fellows. His hair was bleached to +tow colour by the sun; his ribs stood out like the ribs of a +basket, and the lumps on his knees and elbows, where he was used +to track on all fours, gave his shrunken limbs the look of +knotted grass-stems. But his eye, under his matted forelock, +was cool and quiet, for Bagheera was his adviser in this time +of trouble, and told him to go quietly, hunt slowly, and never, +on any account, to lose his temper. + +"It is an evil time," said the Black Panther, one furnace-hot +evening, "but it will go if we can live till the end. Is thy +stomach full, Man-cub?" + +"There is stuff in my stomach, but I get no good of it. +Think you, Bagheera, the Rains have forgotten us and will +never come again?" + +"Not I! We shall see the mohwa in blossom yet, and the little +fawns all fat with new grass. Come down to the Peace Rock and +hear the news. On my back, Little Brother." + +"This is no time to carry weight. I can still stand alone, +but--indeed we be no fatted bullocks, we two." + +Bagheera looked along his ragged, dusty flank and whispered. +"Last night I killed a bullock under the yoke. So low was I +brought that I think I should not have dared to spring if he +had been loose. WOU!" + +Mowgli laughed. "Yes, we be great hunters now," said he. +"I am very bold--to eat grubs," and the two came down together +through the crackling undergrowth to the river-bank and the +lace-work of shoals that ran out from it in every direction. + +"The water cannot live long," said Baloo, joining them. +"Look across. Yonder are trails like the roads of Man." + +On the level plain of the farther bank the stiff jungle-grass +had died standing, and, dying, had mummied. The beaten tracks +of the deer and the pig, all heading toward the river, had +striped that colourless plain with dusty gullies driven through +the ten-foot grass, and, early as it was, each long avenue was +full of first-comers hastening to the water. You could hear the +does and fawns coughing in the snuff-like dust. + +Up-stream, at the bend of the sluggish pool round the Peace +Rock, and Warden of the Water Truce, stood Hathi, the wild +elephant, with his sons, gaunt and gray in the moonlight, +rocking to and fro--always rocking. Below him a little were the +vanguard of the deer; below these, again, the pig and the wild +buffalo; and on the opposite bank, where the tall trees came +down to the water's edge, was the place set apart for the +Eaters of Flesh--the tiger, the wolves, the panther, the bear, +and the others. + +"We are under one Law, indeed," said Bagheera, wading into the +water and looking across at the lines of clicking horns and +starting eyes where the deer and the pig pushed each other to +and fro. "Good hunting, all you of my blood," he added, lying +own at full length, one flank thrust out of the shallows; and +then, between his teeth, "But for that which is the Law it +would be VERY good hunting." + +The quick-spread ears of the deer caught the last sentence, +and a frightened whisper ran along the ranks. "The Truce! +Remember the Truce!" + +"Peace there, peace!" gurgled Hathi, the wild elephant. +"The Truce holds, Bagheera. This is no time to talk +of hunting." + +"Who should know better than I?" Bagheera answered, rolling his +yellow eyes up-stream. "I am an eater of turtles--a fisher of +frogs. Ngaayah! Would I could get good from chewing branches!" + +"WE wish so, very greatly," bleated a young fawn, who had only +been born that spring, and did not at all like it. Wretched as +the Jungle People were, even Hathi could not help chuckling; +while Mowgli, lying on his elbows in the warm water, laughed +aloud, and beat up the scum with his feet. + +"Well spoken, little bud-horn," Bagheera purred. "When the +Truce ends that shall be remembered in thy favour," and he +looked keenly through the darkness to make sure of recognising +the fawn again. + +Gradually the talking spread up and down the drinking-places. +One could hear the scuffling, snorting pig asking for more +room; the buffaloes grunting among themselves as they lurched +out across the sand-bars, and the deer telling pitiful stories +of their long foot-sore wanderings in quest of food. Now and +again they asked some question of the Eaters of Flesh across +the river, but all the news was bad, and the roaring hot wind +of the Jungle came and went between the rocks and the rattling +branches, and scattered twigs, and dust on the water. + +"The men-folk, too, they die beside their ploughs," said a +young sambhur. "I passed three between sunset and night. +They lay still, and their Bullocks with them. We also shall lie +still in a little." + +"The river has fallen since last night," said Baloo. "O Hathi, +hast thou ever seen the like of this drought?" + +"It will pass, it will pass," said Hathi, squirting water along +his back and sides. + +"We have one here that cannot endure long," said Baloo; and he +looked toward the boy he loved. + +"I?" said Mowgli indignantly, sitting up in the water. "I have +no long fur to cover my bones, but--but if THY hide were taken +off, Baloo----" + +Hathi shook all over at the idea, and Baloo said severely: + +"Man-cub, that is not seemly to tell a Teacher of the Law. +Never have I been seen without my hide." + +"Nay, I meant no harm, Baloo; but only that thou art, as it +were, like the cocoanut in the husk, and I am the same cocoanut +all naked. Now that brown husk of thine----" Mowgli was sitting +cross-legged, and explaining things with his forefinger in his +usual way, when Bagheera put out a paddy paw and pulled him +over backward into the water. + +"Worse and worse," said the Black Panther, as the boy rose +spluttering. "First Baloo is to be skinned, and now he is a +cocoanut. Be careful that he does not do what the ripe +cocoanuts do." + +"And what is that?" said Mowgli, off his guard for the minute, +though that is one of the oldest catches in the Jungle. + +"Break thy head," said Bagheera quietly, pulling him +under again. + +"It is not good to make a jest of thy teacher," said the bear, +when Mowgli had been ducked for the third time. + +"Not good! What would ye have? That naked thing running to +and fro makes a monkey-jest of those who have once been good +hunters, and pulls the best of us by the whiskers for sport." +This was Shere Khan, the Lame Tiger, limping down to the water. +He waited a little to enjoy the sensation he made among the +deer on the opposite to lap, growling: "The jungle has become a +whelping-ground for naked cubs now. Look at me, Man-cub!" + +Mowgli looked--stared, rather--as insolently as he knew how, +and in a minute Shere Khan turned away uneasily. "Man-cub this, +and Man-cub that," he rumbled, going on with his drink, "the +cub is neither man nor cub, or he would have been afraid. Next +season I shall have to beg his leave for a drink. Augrh!" + +"That may come, too," said Bagheera, looking him steadily +between the eyes. "That may come, too--Faugh, Shere Khan!--what +new shame hast thou brought here?" + +The Lame Tiger had dipped his chin and jowl in the water, and +dark, oily streaks were floating from it down-stream. + +"Man!" said Shere Khan coolly, "I killed an hour since." +He went on purring and growling to himself. + +The line of beasts shook and wavered to and fro, and a whisper +went up that grew to a cry. "Man! Man! He has killed Man!" +Then all looked towards Hathi, the wild elephant, but he seemed +not to hear. Hathi never does anything till the time comes, +and that is one of the reasons why he lives so long. + +"At such a season as this to kill Man! Was no other game +afoot?" said Bagheera scornfully, drawing himself out of the +tainted water, and shaking each paw, cat-fashion, as he did so. + +"I killed for choice--not for food." The horrified whisper +began again, and Hathi's watchful little white eye cocked +itself in Shere Khan's direction. "For choice," Shere Khan +drawled. "Now come I to drink and make me clean again. Is +there any to forbid?" + +Bagheera's back began to curve like a bamboo in a high wind, +but Hathi lifted up his trunk and spoke quietly. + +"Thy kill was from choice?" he asked; and when Hathi asks a +question it is best to answer. + +"Even so. It was my right and my Night. Thou knowest, O Hathi." +Shere Khan spoke almost courteously. + +"Yes, I know," Hathi answered; and, after a little silence, +"Hast thou drunk thy fill?" + +"For to-night, yes." + +"Go, then. The river is to drink, and not to defile. None but +the Lame Tiger would so have boasted of his right at this +season when--when we suffer together--Man and Jungle People +alike." Clean or unclean, get to thy lair, Shere Khan!" + +The last words rang out like silver trumpets, and Hathi's three +sons rolled forward half a pace, though there was no need. +Shere Khan slunk away, not daring to growl, for he knew--what +every one else knows--that when the last comes to the last, +Hathi is the Master of the Jungle. + +"What is this right Shere Khan speaks of?" Mowgli whispered in +Bagheera's ear. "To kill Man is always, shameful. The Law says +so. And yet Hathi says----" + +"Ask him. I do not know, Little Brother. Right or no right, if +Hathi had not spoken I would have taught that lame butcher his +lesson. To come to the Peace Rock fresh from a kill of Man--and +to boast of it--is a jackal's trick. Besides, he tainted the +good water." + +Mowgli waited for a minute to pick up his courage, because no +one cared to address Hathi directly, and then he cried: "What +is Shere Khan's right, O Hathi?" Both banks echoed his words, +for all the People of the Jungle are intensely curious, and +they had just seen something that none except Baloo, who looked +very thoughtful, seemed to understand. + +"It is an old tale," said Hathi; "a tale older than the Jungle. +Keep silence along the banks and I will tell that tale." + +There was a minute or two of pushing a shouldering among the +pigs and the buffalo, and then the leaders of the herds +grunted, one after another, "We wait," and Hathi strode +forward, till he was nearly knee-deep in the pool by the Peace +Rock. Lean and wrinkled and yellow-tusked though he was, +he looked what the Jungle knew him to be--their master. + +"Ye know, children," he began, "that of all things ye most fear +Man"; and there was a mutter of agreement. + +"This tale touches thee, Little Brother," said Bagheera +to Mowgli. + +"I? I am of the Pack--a hunter of the Free People," Mowgli +answered. "What have I to do with Man?" + +"And ye do not know why ye fear Man?" Hathi went on. "This is +the reason. In the beginning of the Jungle, and none know when +that was, we of the Jungle walked together, having no fear of +one another. In those days there was no drought, and leaves and +flowers and fruit grew on the same tree, and we ate nothing at +all except leaves and flowers and grass and fruit and bark." + +"I am glad I was not born in those days," said Bagheera. "Bark +is only good to sharpen claws." + +"And the Lord of the Jungle was Tha, the First of the +Elephants. He drew the Jungle out of deep waters with his +trunk; and where he made furrows in the ground with his tusks, +there the rivers ran; and where he struck with his foot, there +rose ponds of good water; and when he blew through his trunk,-- +thus,--the trees fell. That was the manner in which the Jungle +was made by Tha; and so the tale was told to me." + +"It has not lost fat in the telling," Bagheera whispered, and +Mowgli laughed behind his hand. + +"In those days there was no corn or melons or pepper or +sugar-cane, nor were there any little huts such as ye have +all seen; and the Jungle People knew nothing of Man, but lived +in the Jungle together, making one people. But presently they +began to dispute over their food, though there was grazing +enough for all. They were lazy. Each wished to eat where he +lay, as sometimes we can do now when the spring rains are good. +Tha, the First of the Elephants, was busy making new jungles +and leading the rivers in their beds. He could not walk in all +places; therefore he made the First of the Tigers the master +and the judge of the Jungle, to whom the Jungle People should +bring their disputes. In those days the First of the Tigers +ate fruit and grass with the others. He was as large as I am, +and he was very beautiful, in colour all over like the blossom +of the yellow creeper. There was never stripe nor bar upon +his hide in those good days when this the Jungle was new. +All the Jungle People came before him without fear, and his +word was the Law of all the Jungle. We were then, remember ye, +one people. + +"Yet upon a night there was a dispute between two bucks--a +grazing-quarrel such as ye now settle with the horns and the +fore-feet--and it is said that as the two spoke together before +the First of the First of the Tigers lying among the flowers, +a buck pushed him with his horns, and the First of the Tigers +forgot that he was the master and judge of the Jungle, and, +leaping upon that buck, broke his neck. + +"Till that night never one of us had died, and the First of +the Tigers, seeing what he had done, and being made foolish by +the scent of the blood, ran away into the marshes of the North, +and we of the Jungle, left without a judge, fell to fighting +among ourselves; and Tha heard the noise of it and came back. +Then some of us said this and some of us said that, but he saw +the dead buck among the flowers, and asked who had killed, +and we of the Jungle would not tell because the smell of the +blood made us foolish. We ran to and fro in circles, capering +and crying out and shaking our heads. Then Tha gave an order +to the trees that hang low, and to the trailing creepers of +the Jungle, that they should mark the killer of the buck so +that he should know him again, and he said, "Who will now be +master of the Jungle People?" Then up leaped the Gray Ape +who lives in the branches, and said, "I will now be master of +the Jungle." + +At this Tha laughed, and said, "So be it," and went away +very angry. + +"Children, ye know the Gray Ape. He was then as he is now. +At the first he made a wise face for himself, but in a little +while he began to scratch and to leap up and down, and when Tha +came back he found the Gray Ape hanging, head down, from a +bough, mocking those who stood below; and they mocked him +again. And so there was no Law in the Jungle--only foolish +talk and senseless words. + +"Then Tha called us all together and said: 'The first of your +masters has brought Death into the Jungle, and the second +Shame. Now it is time there was a Law, and a Law that ye must +not break. Now ye shall know Fear, and when ye have found him +ye shall know that he is your master, and the rest shall +follow.' Then we of the jungle said, 'What is Fear?' And Tha +said, 'Seek till ye find.' So we went up and down the Jungle +seeking for Fear, and presently the buffaloes----" + +"Ugh!" said Mysa, the leader of the buffaloes, from their +sand-bank. + +"Yes, Mysa, it was the buffaloes. They came back with the news +that in a cave in the Jungle sat Fear, and that he had no hair, +and went upon his hind legs. Then we of the Jungle followed the +herd till we came to that cave, and Fear stood at the mouth of +it, and he was, as the buffaloes had said, hairless, and he +walked upon his hinder legs. When he saw us he cried out, and +his voice filled us with the fear that we have now of that +voice when we hear it, and we ran away, tramping upon and +tearing each other because we were afraid. That night, so it +was told to me, we of the Jungle did not lie down together as +used to be our custom, but each tribe drew off by itself--the +pig with the pig, the deer with the deer; horn to horn, hoof to +hoof,--like keeping to like, and so lay shaking in the Jungle. + +"Only the First of the Tigers was not with us, for he was still +hidden in the marshes of the North, and when word was brought +to him of the Thing we had seen in the cave, he said. 'I will +go to this Thing and break his neck.' So he ran all the night +till he came to the cave; but the trees and the creepers on his +path, remembering the order that Tha had given, let down their +branches and marked him as he ran, drawing their fingers across +his back, his flank, his forehead, and his jowl. Wherever they +touched him there was a mark and a stripe upon his yellow hide. +AND THOSE STRIPES DO THIS CHILDREN WEAR TO THIS DAY! When he +came to the cave, Fear, the Hairless One, put out his hand and +called him 'The Striped One that comes by night,' and the First +of the Tigers was afraid of the Hairless One, and ran back to +the swamps howling." + +Mowgli chuckled quietly here, his chin in the water. + +"So loud did he howl that Tha heard him and said, 'What is the +sorrow?' And the First of the Tigers, lifting up his muzzle to +the new-made sky, which is now so old, said: 'Give me back my +power, O Tha. I am made ashamed before all the Jungle, and I +have run away from a Hairless One, and he has called me a +shameful name.' 'And why?' said Tha. 'Because I am smeared with +the mud of the marshes,' said the First of the Tigers. 'Swim, +then, and roll on the wet grass, and if it be mud it will wash +away,' said Tha; and the First of the Tigers swam, and rolled +and rolled upon the grass, till the Jungle ran round and round +before his eyes, but not one little bar upon all his hide was +changed, and Tha, watching him, laughed. Then the First of the +Tigers said: 'What have I done that this comes to me?' +Tha said, 'Thou hast killed the buck, and thou hast let Death +loose in the Jungle, and with Death has come Fear, so that the +people of the Jungle are afraid one of the other, as thou art +afraid of the Hairless One.' The First of the Tigers said, +'They will never fear me, for I knew them since the beginning.' +Tha said, 'Go and see.' And the First of the Tigers ran to and +fro, calling aloud to the deer and the pig and the sambhur and +the porcupine and all the Jungle Peoples, and they all ran away +from him who had been their judge, because they were afraid. + +"Then the First of the Tigers came back, and his pride was +broken in him, and, beating his head upon the ground, he tore up +the earth with all his feet and said: 'Remember that I was once +the Master of the Jungle. Do not forget me, O Tha! Let my +children remember that I was once without shame or fear!' +And Tha said: 'This much I will do, because thou and I together +saw the Jungle made. For one night in each year it shall be as +it was before the buck was killed--for thee and for thy +children. In that one night, if ye meet the Hairless One--and +his name is Man--ye shall not be afraid of him, but he shall he +afraid of you, as though ye were judges of the Jungle and +masters of all things. Show him mercy in that night of his +fear, for thou hast known what Fear is.' + +"Then the First of the Tigers answered, 'I am content'; +but when next he drank he saw the black stripes upon his flank +and his side, and he remembered the name that the Hairless One +had given him, and he was angry. For a year he lived in the +marshes waiting till Tha should keep his promise. And upon a +night when the jackal of the Moon [the Evening Star] stood +clear of the Jungle, he felt that his Night was upon him, +and he went to that cave to meet the Hairless One. Then it +happened as Tha promised, for the Hairless One fell down before +him and lay along the ground, and the First of the Tigers +struck him and broke his back, for he thought that there was +but one such Thing in the Jungle, and that he had killed Fear. +Then, nosing above the kill, he heard Tha coming down from the +woods of the North, and presently the voice of the First of the +Elephants, which is the voice that we hear now----" + +The thunder was rolling up and down the dry, scarred hills, but +it brought no rain--only heat--lightning that flickered along +the ridges--and Hathi went on: "THAT was the voice he heard, +and it said: 'Is this thy mercy?' The First of the Tigers +licked his lips and said: 'What matter? I have killed Fear.' +And Tha said: 'O blind and foolish! Thou hast untied the feet +of Death, and he will follow thy trail till thou diest. +Thou hast taught Man to kill!' + +"The First of the Tigers, standing stiffly to his kill, said. +'He is as the buck was. There is no Fear. Now I will judge the +Jungle Peoples once more.' + +"And Tha said: 'Never again shall the Jungle Peoples come to +thee. They shall never cross thy trail, nor sleep near thee, +nor follow after thee, nor browse by thy lair. Only Fear shall +follow thee, and with a blow that thou canst not see he shall +bid thee wait his pleasure. He shall make the ground to open +under thy feet, and the creeper to twist about thy neck, +and the tree-trunks to grow together about thee higher than +thou canst leap, and at the last he shall take thy hide to wrap +his cubs when they are cold. Thou hast shown him no mercy, +and none will he show thee.' + +"The First of the Tigers was very bold, for his Night was still +on him, and he said: 'The Promise of Tha is the Promise of Tha. +He will not take away my Night?' And Tha said: 'The one Night is +thine, as I have said, but there is a price to pay. +Thou hast taught Man to kill, and he is no slow learner.' + +"The First of the Tigers said: 'He is here under my foot, and +his back is broken. Let the Jungle know I have killed Fear.' + +"Then Tha laughed, and said: 'Thou hast killed one of many, but +thou thyself shalt tell the Jungle--for thy Night is ended.' + +"So the day came; and from the mouth of the cave went out +another Hairless One, and he saw the kill in the path, and the +First of the Tigers above it, and he took a pointed stick----" + +"They throw a thing that cuts now," said Ikki, rustling down +the bank; for Ikki was considered uncommonly good eating by +the Gonds--they called him Ho-Igoo--and he knew something of +the wicked little Gondee axe that whirls across a clearing +like a dragon-fly. + +"It was a pointed stick, such as they put in the foot of a +pit-trap," said Hathi, "and throwing it, he struck the First +of the Tigers deep in the flank. Thus it happened as Tha said, +for the First of the Tigers ran howling up and down the Jungle +till he tore out the stick, and all the Jungle knew that the +Hairless One could strike from far off, and they feared more +than before. So it came about that the First of the Tigers +taught the Hairless One to kill--and ye know what harm that has +since done to all our peoples--through the noose, and the +pitfall, and the hidden trap, and the flying stick and the +stinging fly that comes out of white smoke [Hathi meant the +rifle], and the Red Flower that drives us into the open. +Yet for one night in the year the Hairless One fears the Tiger, +as Tha promised, and never has the Tiger given him cause to be +less afraid. Where he finds him, there he kills him, +remembering how the First of the Tigers was made ashamed. +For the rest, Fear walks up and down the Jungle by day +and by night." + +"Ahi! Aoo!" said the deer, thinking of what it all meant +to them. + +"And only when there is one great Fear over all, as there is +now, can we of the Jungle lay aside our little fears, and meet +together in one place as we do now." + +"For one night only does Man fear the Tiger?" said Mowgli. + +"For one night only," said Hathi. + +"But I--but we--but all the Jungle knows that Shere Khan kills +Man twice and thrice in a moon." + +"Even so. THEN he springs from behind and turns his head aside +as he strikes, for he is full of fear. If Man looked at him he +would run. But on his one Night he goes openly down to the +village. He walks between the houses and thrusts his head into +the doorway, and the men fall on their faces, and there he does +his kill. One kill in that Night." + +"Oh!" said Mowgli to himself, rolling over in the water. "NOW I +see why it was Shere Khan bade me look at him! He got no good +of it, for he could not hold his eyes steady, and--and I +certainly did not fall down at his feet. But then I am not a +man, being of the Free People." + +"Umm!" said Bagheera deep in his furry throat. "Does the Tiger +know his Night?" + +"Never till the Jackal of the Moon stands clear of the evening +mist. Sometimes it falls in the dry summer and sometimes in the +wet rains--this one Night of the Tiger. But for the First of +the Tigers, this would never have been, nor would any of us +have known fear." + +The deer grunted sorrowfully and Bagheera's lips curled in a +wicked smile. "Do men know this--tale?" said he. + +"None know it except the tigers, and we, the elephants--the +children of Tha. Now ye by the pools have heard it, and I +have spoken." + +Hathi dipped his trunk into the water as a sign that he did not +wish to talk. + +"But--but--but," said Mowgli, turning to Baloo, "why did not the +First of the Tigers continue to eat grass and leaves and trees? +He did but break the buck's neck. He did not EAT. What led him +to the hot meat?" + +"The trees and the creepers marked him, Little Brother, and made +him the striped thing that we see. Never again would he eat +their fruit; but from that day he revenged himself upon the +deer, and the others, the Eaters of Grass," said Baloo. + +"Then THOU knowest the tale. Heh? Why have I never heard?" + +"Because the Jungle is full of such tales. If I made a +beginning there would never be an end to them. Let go my ear, +Little Brother." + + + +THE LAW OF THE JUNGLE + +Just to give you an idea of the immense variety of the Jungle +Law, I have translated into verse (Baloo always recited them in +a sort of sing-song) a few of the laws that apply to the wolves. +There are, of course, hundreds and hundreds more, but these will +do for specimens of the simpler rulings. + +Now this is the Law of the Jungle--as old and as true as + the sky; +And the Wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the Wolf + that shall break it must die. + +As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk the Law runneth + forward and back-- +For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength + of the Wolf is the Pack. + +Wash daily from nose-tip to tail-tip; drink deeply, but + never too deep; +And remember the night is for hunting, and forget not + the day is for sleep. + +The jackal may follow the Tiger, but, Cub, when thy + whiskers are grown, +Remember the Wolf is a hunter--go forth and get food + of thine own. + +Keep peace with the Lords of the Jungle--the Tiger, the + Panther, the Bear; +And trouble not Hathi the Silent, and mock not the Boar + in his lair. + +When Pack meets with Pack in the Jungle, and neither + will go from the trail, +Lie down till the leaders have spoken--it may be fair + words shall prevail. + +When ye fight with a Wolf of the Pack, ye must + fight him alone and afar, +Lest others take part in the quarrel, and the Pack be + diminished by war. + +The Lair of the Wolf is his refuge, and where he has + made him his home, +Not even the Head Wolf may enter, not even the Council + may come. + +The Lair of the Wolf is his refuge, but where he has + digged it too plain, +The Council shall send him a message, and so he shall + change it again. + +If ye kill before midnight, be silent, and wake not the + woods with your bay, +Lest ye frighten the deer from the crops, and the brothers + go empty away. + +Ye may kill for yourselves, and your mates, and your cubs + as they need, and ye can; +But kill not for pleasure of killing, and SEVEN TIMES NEVER + KILL MAN. + +If ye plunder his Kill from a weaker, devour not all in + thy pride; +Pack-Right is the right of the meanest; so leave him the + head and the hide. + +The Kill of the Pack is the meat of the Pack. Ye must + eat where it lies; +And no one may carry away of that meat to his lair, or + he dies. + +The Kill of the Wolf is the meat of the Wolf. He may + do what he will, +But, till he has given permission, the Pack may not eat + of that Kill. + +Cub-Right is the right of the Yearling. From all of his + Pack he may claim +Full-gorge when the killer has eaten; and none may + refuse him the same. + +Lair-Right is the right of the Mother. From all of her + year she may claim +One haunch of each kill for her litter, and none may + deny her the same. + +Cave-Right is the right of the Father--to hunt by himself + for his own. +He is freed of all calls to the Pack; he is judged by the + Council alone. + +Because of his age and his cunning, because of his gripe + and his paw, +In all that the Law leaveth open, the word of the Head + Wolf is Law. + +Now these are the Laws of the Jungle, and many and + mighty are they; +But the head and the hoof of the Law and the haunch + and the hump is--Obey! + + + + THE MIRACLE OF PURUN BHAGAT + +The night we felt the earth would move + We stole and plucked him by the hand, +Because we loved him with the love + That knows but cannot understand. + +And when the roaring hillside broke, + And all our world fell down in rain, +We saved him, we the Little Folk; + But lo! he does not come again! + +Mourn now, we saved him for the sake + Of such poor love as wild ones may. +Mourn ye! Our brother will not wake, + And his own kind drive us away! + + Dirge of the Langurs. + + +There was once a man in India who was Prime Minister of one of +the semi-independent native States in the north-western part of +the country. He was a Brahmin, so high-caste that caste ceased +to have any particular meaning for him; and his father had been +an important official in the gay-coloured tag-rag and bobtail of +an old-fashioned Hindu Court. But as Purun Dass grew up he felt +that the old order of things was changing, and that if any one +wished to get on in the world he must stand well with the +English, and imitate all that the English believed to be good. +At the same time a native official must keep his own master's +favour. This was a difficult game, but the quiet, close-mouthed +young Brahmin, helped by a good English education at a Bombay +University, played it coolly, and rose, step by step, to be +Prime Minister of the kingdom. That is to say, he held more real +power than his master the Maharajah. + +When the old king--who was suspicious of the English, their +railways and telegraphs--died, Purun Dass stood high with his +young successor, who had been tutored by an Englishman; and +between them, though he always took care that his master should +have the credit, they established schools for little girls, +made roads, and started State dispensaries and shows of +agricultural implements, and published a yearly blue-book on +the "Moral and Material Progress of the State," and the Foreign +Office and the Government of India were delighted. Very few +native States take up English progress altogether, for they will +not believe, as Purun Dass showed he did, that what was good for +the Englishman must be twice as good for the Asiatic. The Prime +Minister became the honoured friend of Viceroys, and Governors, +and Lieutenant-Governors, and medical missionaries, and common +missionaries, and hard-riding English officers who came to shoot +in the State preserves, as well as of whole hosts of tourists +who travelled up and down India in the cold weather, showing how +things ought to be managed. In his spare time he would endow +scholarships for the study of medicine and manufactures on +strictly English lines, and write letters to the "Pioneer", +the greatest Indian daily paper, explaining his master's aims +and objects. + +At last he went to England on a visit, and had to pay enormous +sums to the priests when he came back; for even so high-caste a +Brahmin as Purun Dass lost caste by crossing the black sea. +In London he met and talked with every one worth knowing-- +men whose names go all over the world--and saw a great deal +more than he said. He was given honorary degrees by learned +universities, and he made speeches and talked of Hindu social +reform to English ladies in evening dress, till all London +cried, "This is the most fascinating man we have ever met at +dinner since cloths were first laid." + +When he returned to India there was a blaze of glory, for +the Viceroy himself made a special visit to confer upon the +Maharajah the Grand Cross of the Star of India--all diamonds +and ribbons and enamel; and at the same ceremony, while the +cannon boomed, Purun Dass was made a Knight Commander of the +Order of the Indian Empire; so that his name stood Sir Purun +Dass, K.C.I.E. + +That evening, at dinner in the big Viceregal tent, he stood up +with the badge and the collar of the Order on his breast, +and replying to the toast of his master's health, made a speech +few Englishmen could have bettered. + +Next month, when the city had returned to its sun-baked quiet, +he did a thing no Englishman would have dreamed of doing; +for, so far as the world's affairs went, he died. The jewelled +order of his knighthood went back to the Indian Government, +and a new Prime Minister was appointed to the charge of affairs, +and a great game of General Post began in all the subordinate +appointments. The priests knew what had happened, and the people +guessed; but India is the one place in the world where a man can +do as he pleases and nobody asks why; and the fact that Dewan +Sir Purun Dass, K.C.I.E., had resigned position, palace, and +power, and taken up the begging-bowl and ochre-coloured dress of +a Sunnyasi, or holy man, was considered nothing extraordinary. +He had been, as the Old Law recommends, twenty years a youth, +twenty years a fighter,--though he had never carried a weapon in +his life,--and twenty years head of a household. He had used his +wealth and his power for what he knew both to be worth; he had +taken honour when it came his way; he had seen men and cities +far and near, and men and cities had stood up and honoured him. +Now he would let those things go, as a man drops the cloak he no +longer needs. + +Behind him, as he walked through the city gates, an antelope +skin and brass-handled crutch under his arm, and a begging-bowl +of polished brown coco-de-mer in his hand, barefoot, alone, with +eyes cast on the ground--behind him they were firing salutes +from the bastions in honour of his happy successor. Purun Dass +nodded. All that life was ended; and he bore it no more ill-will +or good-will than a man bears to a colourless dream of the +night. He was a Sunnyasi--a houseless, wandering mendicant, +depending on his neighbours for his daily bread; and so long as +there is a morsel to divide in India, neither priest nor beggar +starves. He had never in his life tasted meat, and very seldom +eaten even fish. A five-pound note would have covered his +personal expenses for food through any one of the many years in +which he had been absolute master of millions of money. Even +when he was being lionised in London he had held before him his +dream of peace and quiet--the long, white, dusty Indian road, +printed all over with bare feet, the incessant, slow-moving +traffic, and the sharp-smelling wood smoke curling up under +the fig-trees in the twilight, where the wayfarers sit at their +evening meal. + +When the time came to make that dream true the Prime Minister +took the proper steps, and in three days you might more easily +have found a bubble in the trough of the long Atlantic seas, +than Purun Dass among the roving, gathering, separating millions +of India. + +At night his antelope skin was spread where the darkness +overtook him--sometimes in a Sunnyasi monastery by the roadside; +sometimes by a mud-pillar shrine of Kala Pir, where the Jogis, +who are another misty division of holy men, would receive him as +they do those who know what castes and divisions are worth; +sometimes on the outskirts of a little Hindu village, where +the children would steal up with the food their parents had +prepared; and sometimes on the pitch of the bare grazing- +grounds, where the flame of his stick fire waked the drowsy +camels. It was all one to Purun Dass--or Purun Bhagat, as he +called himself now. Earth, people, and food were all one. But +unconsciously his feet drew him away northward and eastward; +from the south to Rohtak; from Rohtak to Kurnool; from Kurnool +to ruined Samanah, and then up-stream along the dried bed of the +Gugger river that fills only when the rain falls in the hills, +till one day he saw the far line of the great Himalayas. + +Then Purun Bhagat smiled, for he remembered that his mother was +of Rajput Brahmin birth, from Kulu way--a Hill-woman, always +home-sick for the snows--and that the least touch of Hill blood +draws a man in the end back to where he belongs. + +"Yonder," said Purun Bhagat, breasting the lower slopes of +the Sewaliks, where the cacti stand up like seven-branched +candlesticks-"yonder I shall sit down and get knowledge"; +and the cool wind of the Himalayas whistled about his ears +as he trod the road that led to Simla. + +The last time he had come that way it had been in state, with +a clattering cavalry escort, to visit the gentlest and most +affable of Viceroys; and the two had talked for an hour together +about mutual friends in London, and what the Indian common folk +really thought of things. This time Purun Bhagat paid no calls, +but leaned on the rail of the Mall, watching that glorious view +of the Plains spread out forty miles below, till a native +Mohammedan policeman told him he was obstructing traffic; and +Purun Bhagat salaamed reverently to the Law, because he knew the +value of it, and was seeking for a Law of his own. Then he moved +on, and slept that night in an empty hut at Chota Simla, which +looks like the very last end of the earth, but it was only the +beginning of his journey. He followed the Himalaya-Thibet road, +the little ten-foot track that is blasted out of solid rock, +or strutted out on timbers over gulfs a thousand feet deep; +that dips into warm, wet, shut-in valleys, and climbs out +across bare, grassy hill-shoulders where the sun strikes like +a burning-glass; or turns through dripping, dark forests where +the tree-ferns dress the trunks from head to heel, and the +pheasant calls to his mate. And he met Thibetan herdsmen with +their dogs and flocks of sheep, each sheep with a little bag of +borax on his back, and wandering wood-cutters, and cloaked and +blanketed Lamas from Thibet, coming into India on pilgrimage, +and envoys of little solitary Hill-states, posting furiously on +ring-streaked and piebald ponies, or the cavalcade of a Rajah +paying a visit; or else for a long, clear day he would see +nothing more than a black bear grunting and rooting below in the +valley. When he first started, the roar of the world he had left +still rang in his ears, as the roar of a tunnel rings long after +the train has passed through; but when he had put the Mutteeanee +Pass behind him that was all done, and Purun Bhagat was alone +with himself, walking, wondering, and thinking, his eyes on the +ground, and his thoughts with the clouds. + +One evening he crossed the highest pass he had met till then--it +had been a two-day's climb--and came out on a line of snow-peaks +that banded all the horizon--mountains from fifteen to twenty +thousand feet high, looking almost near enough to hit with a +stone, though they were fifty or sixty miles away. The pass was +crowned with dense, dark forest--deodar, walnut, wild cherry, +wild olive, and wild pear, but mostly deodar, which is the +Himalayan cedar; and under the shadow of the deodars stood a +deserted shrine to Kali--who is Durga, who is Sitala, who is +sometimes worshipped against the smallpox. + +Purun Dass swept the stone floor clean, smiled at the grinning +statue, made himself a little mud fireplace at the back of the +shrine, spread his antelope skin on a bed of fresh pine-needles, +tucked his bairagi--his brass-handled crutch--under his armpit, +and sat down to rest. + +Immediately below him the hillside fell away, clean and cleared +for fifteen hundred feet, where a little village of stone-walled +houses, with roofs of beaten earth, clung to the steep tilt. +All round it the tiny terraced fields lay out like aprons of +patchwork on the knees of the mountain, and cows no bigger than +beetles grazed between the smooth stone circles of the +threshing-floors. Looking across the valley, the eye was +deceived by the size of things, and could not at first realise +that what seemed to be low scrub, on the opposite mountain- +flank, was in truth a forest of hundred-foot pines. Purun Bhagat +saw an eagle swoop across the gigantic hollow, but the great +bird dwindled to a dot ere it was half-way over. A few bands of +scattered clouds strung up and down the valley, catching on a +shoulder of the hills, or rising up and dying out when they were +level with the head of the pass. And "Here shall I find peace," +said Purun Bhagat. + +Now, a Hill-man makes nothing of a few hundred feet up or down, +and as soon as the villagers saw the smoke in the deserted +shrine, the village priest climbed up the terraced hillside to +welcome the stranger. + +When he met Purun Bhagat's eyes--the eyes of a man used to +control thousands--he bowed to the earth, took the begging-bowl +without a word, and returned to the village, saying, "We have at +last a holy man. Never have I seen such a man. He is of the +Plains--but pale-coloured--a Brahmin of the Brahmins." Then all +the housewives of the village said, "Think you he will stay with +us?" and each did her best to cook the most savoury meal for the +Bhagat. Hill-food is very simple, but with buckwheat and Indian +corn, and rice and red pepper, and little fish out of the stream +in the valley, and honey from the flue-like hives built in the +stone walls, and dried apricots, and turmeric, and wild ginger, +and bannocks of flour, a devout woman can make good things, and +it was a full bowl that the priest carried to the Bhagat. Was +he going to stay? asked the priest. Would he need a chela-- +a disciple--to beg for him? Had he a blanket against the cold +weather? Was the food good? + +Purun Bhagat ate, and thanked the giver. It was in his mind to +stay. That was sufficient, said the priest. Let the begging-bowl +be placed outside the shrine, in the hollow made by those two +twisted roots, and daily should the Bhagat be fed; for the +village felt honoured that such a man--he looked timidly into +the Bhagat's face--should tarry among them. + +That day saw the end of Purun Bhagat's wanderings. He had come +to the place appointed for him--the silence and the space. After +this, time stopped, and he, sitting at the mouth of the shrine, +could not tell whether he were alive or dead; a man with control +of his limbs, or a part of the hills, and the clouds, and the +shifting rain and sunlight. He would repeat a Name softly to +himself a hundred hundred times, till, at each repetition, he +seemed to move more and more out of his body, sweeping up to the +doors of some tremendous discovery; but, just as the door was +opening, his body would drag him back, and, with grief, he felt +he was locked up again in the flesh and bones of Purun Bhagat. + +Every morning the filled begging-bowl was laid silently in the +crutch of the roots outside the shrine. Sometimes the priest +brought it; sometimes a Ladakhi trader, lodging in the village, +and anxious to get merit, trudged up the path; but, more often, +it was the woman who had cooked the meal overnight; and she +would murmur, hardly above her breath. "Speak for me before the +gods, Bhagat. Speak for such a one, the wife of so-and-so!" +Now and then some bold child would be allowed the honour, and +Purun Bhagat would hear him drop the bowl and run as fast as his +little legs could carry him, but the Bhagat never came down to +the village. It was laid out like a map at his feet. He could +see the evening gatherings, held on the circle of the threshing- +floors, because that was the only level ground; could see the +wonderful unnamed green of the young rice, the indigo blues of +the Indian corn, the dock-like patches of buckwheat, and, in its +season, the red bloom of the amaranth, whose tiny seeds, being +neither grain nor pulse, make a food that can be lawfully eaten +by Hindus in time of fasts. + +When the year turned, the roofs of the huts were all little +squares of purest gold, for it was on the roofs that they +laid out their cobs of the corn to dry. Hiving and harvest, +rice-sowing and husking, passed before his eyes, all embroidered +down there on the many-sided plots of fields, and he thought of +them all, and wondered what they all led to at the long last. + +Even in populated India a man cannot a day sit still before the +wild things run over him as though he were a rock; and in that +wilderness very soon the wild things, who knew Kali's Shrine +well, came back to look at the intruder. The langurs, the big +gray-whiskered monkeys of the Himalayas, were, naturally, the +first, for they are alive with curiosity; and when they had +upset the begging-bowl, and rolled it round the floor, and +tried their teeth on the brass-handled crutch, and made faces +at the antelope skin, they decided that the human being who +sat so still was harmless. At evening, they would leap down +from the pines, and beg with their hands for things to eat, +and then swing off in graceful curves. They liked the warmth +of the fire, too, and huddled round it till Purun Bhagat had +to push them aside to throw on more fuel; and in the morning, +as often as not, he would find a furry ape sharing his blanket. +All day long, one or other of the tribe would sit by his side, +staring out at the snows, crooning and looking unspeakably wise +and sorrowful. + +After the monkeys came the barasingh, that big deer which is +like our red deer, but stronger. He wished to rub off the velvet +of his horns against the cold stones of Kali's statue, and +stamped his feet when he saw the man at the shrine. But Purun +Bhagat never moved, and, little by little, the royal stag edged +up and nuzzled his shoulder. Purun Bhagat slid one cool hand +along the hot antlers, and the touch soothed the fretted beast, +who bowed his head, and Purun Bhagat very softly rubbed and +ravelled off the velvet. Afterward, the barasingh brought his +doe and fawn--gentle things that mumbled on the holy man's +blanket--or would come alone at night, his eyes green in the +fire-flicker, to take his share of fresh walnuts. At last, the +musk-deer, the shyest and almost the smallest of the deerlets, +came, too, her big rabbity ears erect; even brindled, silent +mushick-nabha must needs find out what the light in the shrine +meant, and drop out her moose-like nose into Purun Bhagat's lap, +coming and going with the shadows of the fire. Purun Bhagat +called them all "my brothers," and his low call of "Bhai! Bhai!" +would draw them from the forest at noon if they were within ear +shot. The Himalayan black bear, moody and suspicious--Sona, who +has the V-shaped white mark under his chin--passed that way more +than once; and since the Bhagat showed no fear, Sona showed no +anger, but watched him, and came closer, and begged a share of +the caresses, and a dole of bread or wild berries. Often, in the +still dawns, when the Bhagat would climb to the very crest of +the pass to watch the red day walking along the peaks of the +snows, he would find Sona shuffling and grunting at his heels, +thrusting, a curious fore-paw under fallen trunks, and bringing +it away with a WHOOF of impatience; or his early steps would +wake Sona where he lay curled up, and the great brute, rising +erect, would think to fight, till he heard the Bhagat's voice +and knew his best friend. + +Nearly all hermits and holy men who live apart from the big +cities have the reputation of being able to work miracles with +the wild things, but all the miracle lies in keeping still, in +never making a hasty movement, and, for a long time, at least, +in never looking directly at a visitor. The villagers saw the +outline of the barasingh stalking like a shadow through the +dark forest behind the shrine; saw the minaul, the Himalayan +pheasant, blazing in her best colours before Kali's statue; +and the langurs on their haunches, inside, playing with the +walnut shells. Some of the children, too, had heard Sona singing +to himself, bear-fashion, behind the fallen rocks, and the +Bhagat's reputation as miracle-worker stood firm. + +Yet nothing was farther from his mind than miracles. He believed +that all things were one big Miracle, and when a man knows that +much he knows something to go upon. He knew for a certainty that +there was nothing great and nothing little in this world: and +day and night he strove to think out his way into the heart of +things, back to the place whence his soul had come. + +So thinking, his untrimmed hair fell down about his shoulders, +the stone slab at the side of the antelope skin was dented into +a little hole by the foot of his brass-handled crutch, and the +place between the tree-trunks, where the begging-bowl rested day +after day, sunk and wore into a hollow almost as smooth as the +brown shell itself; and each beast knew his exact place at the +fire. The fields changed their colours with the seasons; the +threshing-floors filled and emptied, and filled again and again; +and again and again, when winter came, the langurs frisked among +the branches feathered with light snow, till the mother-monkeys +brought their sad-eyed little babies up from the warmer valleys +with the spring. There were few changes in the village. The +priest was older, and many of the little children who used to +come with the begging-dish sent their own children now; and when +you asked of the villagers how long their holy man had lived in +Kali's Shrine at the head of the pass, they answered, "Always." + +Then came such summer rains as had not been known in the Hills +for many seasons. Through three good months the valley was +wrapped in cloud and soaking mist--steady, unrelenting downfall, +breaking off into thunder-shower after thunder-shower. Kali's +Shrine stood above the clouds, for the most part, and there was +a whole month in which the Bhagat never caught a glimpse of his +village. It was packed away under a white floor of cloud that +swayed and shifted and rolled on itself and bulged upward, but +never broke from its piers--the streaming flanks of the valley. + +All that time he heard nothing but the sound of a million little +waters, overhead from the trees, and underfoot along the ground, +soaking through the pine-needles, dripping from the tongues of +draggled fern, and spouting in newly-torn muddy channels down +the slopes. Then the sun came out, and drew forth the good +incense of the deodars and the rhododendrons, and that far-off, +clean smell which the Hill people call "the smell of the snows." +The hot sunshine lasted for a week, and then the rains gathered +together for their last downpour, and the water fell in sheets +that flayed off the skin of the ground and leaped back in mud. +Purun Bhagat heaped his fire high that night, for he was sure +his brothers would need warmth; but never a beast came to the +shrine, though he called and called till he dropped asleep, +wondering what had happened in the woods. + +It was in the black heart of the night, the rain drumming like a +thousand drums, that he was roused by a plucking at his blanket, +and, stretching out, felt the little hand of a langur. "It is +better here than in the trees," he said sleepily, loosening a +fold of blanket; "take it and be warm." The monkey caught his +hand and pulled hard. "Is it food, then?" said Purun Bhagat. +"Wait awhile, and I will prepare some." As he kneeled to throw +fuel on the fire the langur ran to the door of the shrine, +crooned and ran back again, plucking at the man's knee. + +"What is it? What is thy trouble, Brother?" said Purun Bhagat, +for the langur's eyes were full of things that he could not +tell. "Unless one of thy caste be in a trap--and none set traps +here--I will not go into that weather. Look, Brother, even the +barasingh comes for shelter!" + +The deer's antlers clashed as he strode into the shrine, clashed +against the grinning statue of Kali. He lowered them in Purun +Bhagat's direction and stamped uneasily, hissing through his +half-shut nostrils. + +"Hai! Hai! Hai!" said the Bhagat, snapping his fingers, "Is THIS +payment for a night's lodging?" But the deer pushed him toward +the door, and as he did so Purun Bhagat heard the sound of +something opening with a sigh, and saw two slabs of the floor +draw away from each other, while the sticky earth below smacked +its lips. + +"Now I see," said Purun Bhagat. "No blame to my brothers that +they did not sit by the fire to-night. The mountain is falling. +And yet-- why should I go?" His eye fell on the empty begging- +bowl, and his face changed. "They have given me good food daily +since--since I came, and, if I am not swift, to-morrow there +will not be one mouth in the valley. Indeed, I must go and warn +them below. Back there, Brother! Let me get to the fire." + +The barasingh backed unwillingly as Purun Bhagat drove a pine +torch deep into the flame, twirling it till it was well lit. +"Ah! ye came to warn me," he said, rising. "Better than that we +shall do; better than that. Out, now, and lend me thy neck, +Brother, for I have but two feet." + +He clutched the bristling withers of the barasingh with his +right hand, held the torch away with his left, and stepped out +of the shrine into the desperate night. There was no breath of +wind, but the rain nearly drowned the flare as the great deer +hurried down the slope, sliding on his haunches. As soon as they +were clear of the forest more of the Bhagat's brothers joined +them. He heard, though he could not see, the langurs pressing +about him, and behind them the uhh! uhh! of Sona. The rain +matted his long white hair into ropes; the water splashed +beneath his bare feet, and his yellow robe clung to his frail +old body, but he stepped down steadily, leaning against the +barasingh. He was no longer a holy man, but Sir Purun Dass, +K.C.I.E., Prime Minister of no small State, a man accustomed +to command, going out to save life. Down the steep, plashy path +they poured all together, the Bhagat and his brothers, down and +down till the deer's feet clicked and stumbled on the wall of a +threshing-floor, and he snorted because he smelt Man. Now they +were at the head of the one crooked village street, and the +Bhagat beat with his crutch on the barred windows of the +blacksmith's house, as his torch blazed up in the shelter of +the eaves. "Up and out!" cried Purun Bhagat; and he did not +know his own voice, for it was years since he had spoken aloud +to a man. "The hill falls! The hill is falling! Up and out, oh, +you within!" + +"It is our Bhagat," said the blacksmith's wife. He stands among +his beasts. Gather the little ones and give the call." + +It ran from house to house, while the beasts, cramped in the +narrow way, surged and huddled round the Bhagat, and Sona +puffed impatiently. + +The people hurried into the street--they were no more than +seventy souls all told--and in the glare of the torches they +saw their Bhagat holding back the terrified barasingh, while +the monkeys plucked piteously at his skirts, and Sona sat on +his haunches and roared. + +"Across the valley and up the next hill!" shouted Purun Bhagat. +"Leave none behind! We follow!" + +Then the people ran as only Hill folk can run, for they knew +that in a landslip you must climb for the highest ground across +the valley. They fled, splashing through the little river at +the bottom, and panted up the terraced fields on the far side, +while the Bhagat and his brethren followed. Up and up the +opposite mountain they climbed, calling to each other by name-- +the roll-call of the village--and at their heels toiled the big +barasingh, weighted by the failing strength of Purun Bhagat. +At last the deer stopped in the shadow of a deep pinewood, five +hundred feet up the hillside. His instinct, that had warned him +of the coming slide, told him he would he safe here. + +Purun Bhagat dropped fainting by his side, for the chill of the +rain and that fierce climb were killing him; but first he called +to the scattered torches ahead, "Stay and count your numbers"; +then, whispering to the deer as he saw the lights gather in a +cluster: "Stay with me, Brother. Stay--till--I--go!" + +There was a sigh in the air that grew to a mutter, and a mutter +that grew to a roar, and a roar that passed all sense of +hearing, and the hillside on which the villagers stood was hit +in the darkness, and rocked to the blow. Then a note as steady, +deep, and true as the deep C of the organ drowned everything for +perhaps five minutes, while the very roots of the pines quivered +to it. It died away, and the sound of the rain falling on miles +of hard ground and grass changed to the muffled drum of water on +soft earth. That told its own tale. + +Never a villager--not even the priest--was bold enough to speak +to the Bhagat who had saved their lives. They crouched under the +pines and waited till the day. When it came they looked across +the valley and saw that what had been forest, and terraced +field, and track-threaded grazing-ground was one raw, red, +fan-shaped smear, with a few trees flung head-down on the scarp. +That red ran high up the hill of their refuge, damming back the +little river, which had begun to spread into a brick-coloured +lake. Of the village, of the road to the shrine, of the shrine +itself, and the forest behind, there was no trace. For one mile +in width and two thousand feet in sheer depth the mountain-side +had come away bodily, planed clean from head to heel. + +And the villagers, one by one, crept through the wood to pray +before their Bhagat. They saw the barasingh standing over him, +who fled when they came near, and they heard the langurs wailing +in the branches, and Sona moaning up the hill; but their Bhagat +was dead, sitting cross-legged, his back against a tree, his +crutch under his armpit, and his face turned to the north-east. + +The priest said: "Behold a miracle after a miracle, for in this +very attitude must all Sunnyasis be buried! Therefore where he +now is we will build the temple to our holy man." + +They built the temple before a year was ended--a little stone- +and-earth shrine--and they called the hill the Bhagat's hill, +and they worship there with lights and flowers and offerings to +this day. But they do not know that the saint of their worship +is the late Sir Purun Dass, K.C.I.E., D.C.L., Ph.D., etc., once +Prime Minister of the progressive and enlightened State of +Mohiniwala, and honorary or corresponding member of more learned +and scientific societies than will ever do any good in this +world or the next. + + + +A SONG OF KABIR + +Oh, light was the world that he weighed in his hands! +Oh, heavy the tale of his fiefs and his lands! +He has gone from the guddee and put on the shroud, +And departed in guise of bairagi avowed! + +Now the white road to Delhi is mat for his feet, +The sal and the kikar must guard him from heat; +His home is the camp, and the waste, and the crowd-- +He is seeking the Way as bairagi avowed! + +He has looked upon Man, and his eyeballs are clear +(There was One; there is One, and but One, saith Kabir); +The Red Mist of Doing has thinned to a cloud-- +He has taken the Path for bairagi avowed! + +To learn and discern of his brother the clod, +Of his brother the brute, and his brother the God. +He has gone from the council and put on the shroud +("Can ye hear?" saith Kabir), a bairagi avowed! + + + + LETTING IN THE JUNGLE + + Veil them, cover them, wall them round-- + Blossom, and creeper, and weed-- + Let us forget the sight and the sound, + The smell and the touch of the breed! + + Fat black ash by the altar-stone, + Here is the white-foot rain, + And the does bring forth in the fields unsown, + And none shall affright them again; + And the blind walls crumble, unknown, o'erthrown + And none shall inhabit again! + + +You will remember that after Mowgli had pinned Shere Khan's hide +to the Council Rock, he told as many as were left of the Seeonee +Pack that henceforward he would hunt in the Jungle alone; and +the four children of Mother and Father Wolf said that they would +hunt with him. But it is not easy to change one's life all in +a minute--particularly in the Jungle. The first thing Mowgli +did, when the disorderly Pack had slunk off, was to go to the +home-cave, and sleep for a day and a night. Then he told Mother +Wolf and Father Wolf as much as they could understand of his +adventures among men; and when he made the morning sun flicker +up and down the blade of his skinning-knife,--the same he had +skinned Shere Khan with,--they said he had learned something. +Then Akela and Gray Brother had to explain their share of the +great buffalo-drive in the ravine, and Baloo toiled up the +hill to hear all about it, and Bagheera scratched himself all +over with pure delight at the way in which Mowgli had managed +his war. + +It was long after sunrise, but no one dreamed of going to sleep, +and from time to time, during the talk, Mother Wolf would throw +up her head, and sniff a deep snuff of satisfaction as the wind +brought her the smell of the tiger-skin on the Council Rock. + +"But for Akela and Gray Brother here," Mowgli said, at the end, +"I could have done nothing. Oh, mother, mother! if thou hadst +seen the black herd-bulls pour down the ravine, or hurry through +the gates when the Man-Pack flung stones at me!" + +"I am glad I did not see that last," said Mother Wolf stiffly. +"It is not MY custom to suffer my cubs to be driven to and fro +like jackals. _I_ would have taken a price from the Man-Pack; +but I would have spared the woman who gave thee the milk. Yes, +I would have spared her alone." + +"Peace, peace, Raksha!" said Father Wolf, lazily. "Our Frog has +come back again--so wise that his own father must lick his feet; +and what is a cut, more or less, on the head? Leave Men alone. +"Baloo and Bagheera both echoed: "Leave Men alone." + +Mowgli, his head on Mother Wolf's side, smiled contentedly, and +said that, for his own part, he never wished to see, or hear, or +smell Man again. + +"But what," said Akela, cocking one ear--"but what if men do not +leave thee alone, Little Brother?" + +"We be FIVE," said Gray Brother, looking round at the company, +and snapping his jaws on the last word. + +"We also might attend to that hunting," said Bagheera, with a +little switch-switch of his tail, looking at Baloo. "But why +think of men now, Akela?" + +"For this reason," the Lone Wolf answered: "when that yellow +chief's hide was hung up on the rock, I went back along our +trail to the village, stepping in my tracks, turning aside, and +lying down, to make a mixed trail in case one should follow us. +But when I had fouled the trail so that I myself hardly knew it +again, Mang, the Bat, came hawking between the trees, and hung +up above me. Said Mang, "The village of the Man-Pack, where they +cast out the Man-cub, hums like a hornet's nest." + +"It was a big stone that I threw," chuckled Mowgli, who had often +amused himself by throwing ripe paw-paws into a hornet's +nest, and racing off to the nearest pool before the hornets +caught him. + +"I asked of Mang what he had seen. He said that the Red Flower +blossomed at the gate of the village, and men sat about it +carrying guns. Now _I_ know, for I have good cause,"--Akela +looked down at the old dry scars on his flank and side,--"that +men do not carry guns for pleasure. Presently, Little Brother, +a man with a gun follows our trail--if, indeed, he be not +already on it." + +"But why should he? Men have cast me out. What more do they +need?" said Mowgli angrily. + +"Thou art a man, Little Brother," Akela returned. "It is not +for US, the Free Hunters, to tell thee what thy brethren do, +or why." + +He had just time to snatch up his paw as the skinning-knife cut +deep into the ground below. Mowgli struck quicker than an +average human eye could follow but Akela was a wolf; and even a +dog, who is very far removed from the wild wolf, his ancestor, +can be waked out of deep sleep by a cart-wheel touching his +flank, and can spring away unharmed before that wheel comes on. + +"Another time," Mowgli said quietly, returning the knife to its +sheath, "speak of the Man-Pack and of Mowgli in TWO breaths-- +not one." + +"Phff! That is a sharp tooth," said Akela, snuffing at the +blade's cut in the earth, "but living with the Man-Pack has +spoiled thine eye, Little Brother. I could have killed a buck +while thou wast striking." + +Bagheera sprang to his feet, thrust up his head as far as he +could, sniffed, and stiffened through every curve in his body. +Gray Brother followed his example quickly, keeping a little +to his left to get the wind that was blowing from the right, +while Akela bounded fifty yards up wind, and, half-crouching, +stiffened too. Mowgli looked on enviously. He could smell things +as very few human beings could, but he had never reached the +hair-trigger-like sensitiveness of a Jungle nose; and his three +months in the smoky village had set him back sadly. However, +he dampened his finger, rubbed it on his nose, and stood erect +to catch the upper scent, which, though it is the faintest, +is the truest. + +"Man!" Akela growled, dropping on his haunches. + +"Buldeo!" said Mowgli, sitting down. "He follows our trail, and +yonder is the sunlight on his gun. Look!" + +It was no more than a splash of sunlight, for a fraction of a +second, on the brass clamps of the old Tower musket, but nothing +in the Jungle winks with just that flash, except when the clouds +race over the sky. Then a piece of mica, or a little pool, or +even a highly-polished leaf will flash like a heliograph. But +that day was cloudless and still. + +"I knew men would follow," said Akela triumphantly. "Not for +nothing have I led the Pack." + +The four cubs said nothing, but ran down hill on their +bellies, melting into the thorn and under-brush as a mole +melts into a lawn. + +"Where go ye, and without word?" Mowgli called. + +"H'sh! We roll his skull here before mid-day!" Gray Brother +answered. + +"Back! Back and wait! Man does not eat Man!" Mowgli shrieked. + +"Who was a wolf but now? Who drove the knife at me for thinking +he might be Man?" said Akela, as the four wolves turned back +sullenly and dropped to heel. + +"Am I to give reason for all I choose to, do?" said Mowgli +furiously. + +"That is Man! There speaks Man!" Bagheera muttered under his +whiskers. "Even so did men talk round the King's cages at +Oodeypore. We of the Jungle know that Man is wisest of all. +If we trusted our ears we should know that of all things he +is most foolish." Raising his voice, he added, "The Man-cub is +right in this. Men hunt in packs. To kill one, unless we know +what the others will do, is bad hunting. Come, let us see what +this Man means toward us." + +"We will not come," Gray Brother growled. "Hunt alone, Little +Brother. WE know our own minds. The skull would have been ready +to bring by now." + +Mowgli had been looking from one to the other of his friends, +his chest heaving and his eyes full of tears. He strode forward +to the wolves, and, dropping on one knee, said: "Do I not know +my mind? Look at me!" + +They looked uneasily, and when their eyes wandered, he called +them back again and again, till their hair stood up all over +their bodies, and they trembled in every limb, while Mowgli +stared and stared. + +"Now," said he, "of us five, which is leader?" + +"Thou art leader, Little Brother," said Gray Brother, and he +licked Mowgli's foot. + +"Follow, then," said Mowgli, and the four followed at his heels +with their tails between their legs. + +"This comes of living with the Man-Pack," said Bagheera, +slipping down after them. "There is more in the Jungle now +than Jungle Law, Baloo." + +The old bear said nothing, but he thought many things. + +Mowgli cut across noiselessly through the Jungle, at right +angles to Buldeo's path, till, parting the undergrowth, he saw +the old man, his musket on his shoulder, running up the trail +of overnight at a dog-trot. + +You will remember that Mowgli had left the village with the +heavy weight of Shere Khan's raw hide on his shoulders, while +Akela and Gray Brother trotted behind, so that the triple trail +was very clearly marked. Presently Buldeo came to where Akela, +as you know, had gone back and mixed it all up. Then he sat +down, and coughed and grunted, and made little casts round and +about into the Jungle to pick it up again, and, all the time he +could have thrown a stone over those who were watching him. +No one can be so silent as a wolf when he does not care to be +heard; and Mowgli, though the wolves thought he moved very +clumsily, could come and go like a shadow. They ringed the old +man as a school of porpoises ring a steamer at full speed, and +as they ringed him they talked unconcernedly, for their speech +began below the lowest end of the scale that untrained human +beings can hear. [The other end is bounded by the high squeak of +Mang, the Bat, which very many people cannot catch at all. From +that note all the bird and bat and insect talk takes on.] + +"This is better than any kill," said Gray Brother, as Buldeo +stooped and peered and puffed. "He looks like a lost pig in +the Jungles by the river. What does he say?" Buldeo was +muttering savagely. + +Mowgli translated. "He says that packs of wolves must have +danced round me. He says that he never saw such a trail in +his life. He says he is tired." + +"He will be rested before he picks it up again," said Bagheera +coolly, as he slipped round a tree-trunk, in the game of +blindman's-buff that they were playing. "NOW, what does the +lean thing do?" + +"Eat or blow smoke out of his mouth. Men always play with their +mouths," said Mowgli; and the silent trailers saw the old man +fill and light and puff at a water-pipe, and they took good note +of the smell of the tobacco, so as to be sure of Buldeo in the +darkest night, if necessary. + +Then a little knot of charcoal-burners came down the path, and +naturally halted to speak to Buldeo, whose fame as a hunter +reached for at least twenty miles round. They all sat down and +smoked, and Bagheera and the others came up and watched while +Buldeo began to tell the story of Mowgli, the Devil-child, +from one end to another, with additions and inventions. How he +himself had really killed Shere Khan; and how Mowgli had turned +himself into a wolf, and fought with him all the afternoon, and +changed into a boy again and bewitched Buldeo's rifle, so that +the bullet turned the corner, when he pointed it at Mowgli, +and killed one of Buldeo's own buffaloes; and how the village, +knowing him to be the bravest hunter in Seeonee, had sent him +out to kill this Devil-child. But meantime the village had got +hold of Messua and her husband, who were undoubtedly the father +and mother of this Devil-child, and had barricaded them in +their own hut, and presently would torture them to make them +confess they were witch and wizard, and then they would be +burned to death. + +"When?" said the charcoal-burners, because they would very much +like to be present at the ceremony. + +Buldeo said that nothing would be done till he returned, +because the village wished him to kill the Jungle Boy first. +After that they would dispose of Messua and her husband, and +divide their lands and buffaloes among the village. Messua's +husband had some remarkably fine buffaloes, too. It was an +excellent thing to destroy wizards, Buldeo thought; and people +who entertained Wolf-children out of the Jungle were clearly +the worst kind of witches. + +But, said the charcoal-burners, what would happen if the English +heard of it? The English, they had heard, were a perfectly mad +people, who would not let honest farmers kill witches in peace. + +Why, said Buldeo, the head-man of the village would report that +Messua and her husband had died of snake-bite. THAT was all +arranged, and the only thing now was to kill the Wolf-child. +They did not happen to have seen anything of such a creature? + +The charcoal-burners looked round cautiously, and thanked their +stars they had not; but they had no doubt that so brave a man as +Buldeo would find him if any one could. The sun was getting +rather low, and they had an idea that they would push on to +Buldeo's village and see that wicked witch. Buldeo said that, +though it was his duty to kill the Devil-child, he could not +think of letting a party of unarmed men go through the Jungle, +which might produce the Wolf-demon at any minute, without his +escort. He, therefore, would accompany them, and if the +sorcerer's child appeared--well, he would show them how the best +hunter in Seeonee dealt with such things. The Brahmin, he said, +had given him a charm against the creature that made everything +perfectly safe. + +"What says he? What says he? What says he?" the wolves repeated +every few minutes; and Mowgli translated until he came to the +witch part of the story, which was a little beyond him, and +then he said that the man and woman who had been so kind to him +were trapped. + +"Does Man trap Man?" said Bagheera. + +"So he says. I cannot understand the talk. They are all mad +together. What have Messua and her man to do with me that they +should be put in a trap; and what is all this talk about the +Red Flower? I must look to this. Whatever they would do to +Messua they will not do till Buldeo returns. And so----" Mowgli +thought hard, with his fingers playing round the haft of the +skinning-knife, while Buldeo and the charcoal-burners went off +very valiantly in single file. + +"I go hot-foot back to the Man-Pack," Mowgli said at last. + +"And those?" said Gray Brother, looking hungrily after the brown +backs of the charcoal-burners. + +"Sing them home," said Mowgli, with a grin; I do not wish them +to be at the village gates till it is dark. Can ye hold them?" + +Gray Brother bared his white teeth in contempt. We can head them +round and round in circles like tethered goats--if I know Man." + +"That I do not need. Sing to them a little, lest they be lonely +on the road, and, Gray Brother, the song need not be of the +sweetest. Go with them, Bagheera, and help make that song. +When night is shut down, meet me by the village--Gray Brother +knows the place." + +"It is no light hunting to work for a Man-cub. When shall I +sleep?" said Bagheera, yawning, though his eyes showed that he +was delighted with the amusement. "Me to sing to naked men! +But let us try." + +He lowered his head so that the sound would travel, and cried a +long, long, "Good hunting"--a midnight call in the afternoon, +which was quite awful enough to begin with. Mowgli heard it +rumble, and rise, and fall, and die off in a creepy sort of +whine behind him, and laughed to himself as he ran through the +Jungle. He could see the charcoal-burners huddled in a knot; old +Buldeo's gun-barrel waving, like a banana-leaf, to every point +of the compass at once. Then Gray Brother gave the Ya-la-hi! +Yalaha! call for the buck-driving, when the Pack drives the +nilghai, the big blue cow, before them, and it seemed to come +from the very ends of the earth, nearer, and nearer, and nearer, +till it ended in a shriek snapped off short. The other three +answered, till even Mowgli could have vowed that the full Pack +was in full cry, and then they all broke into the magnificent +Morning-song in the Jungle, with every turn, and flourish, and +grace-note that a deep-mouthed wolf of the Pack knows. This is a +rough rendering of the song, but you must imagine what it sounds +like when it breaks the afternoon hush of the Jungle:-- + +One moment past our bodies cast + No shadow on the plain; +Now clear and black they stride our track, + And we run home again. +In morning hush, each rock and bush + Stands hard, and high, and raw: +Then give the Call: "Good rest to all + That keep The Jungle Law!" + +Now horn and pelt our peoples melt + In covert to abide; +Now, crouched and still, to cave and hill + Our Jungle Barons glide. +Now, stark and plain, Man's oxen strain, + That draw the new-yoked plough; +Now, stripped and dread, the dawn is red + Above the lit talao. + +Ho! Get to lair! The sun's aflare + Behind the breathing grass: +And cracking through the young bamboo + The warning whispers pass. +By day made strange, the woods we range + With blinking eyes we scan; +While down the skies the wild duck cries + "The Day--the Day to Man!" + +The dew is dried that drenched our hide + Or washed about our way; +And where we drank, the puddled bank + Is crisping into clay. +The traitor Dark gives up each mark + Of stretched or hooded claw; +Then hear the Call: "Good rest to all + That keep the Jungle Law!" + +But no translation can give the effect of it, or the yelping +scorn the Four threw into every word of it, as they heard the +trees crash when the men hastily climbed up into the branches, +and Buldeo began repeating incantations and charms. Then they +lay down and slept, for, like all who live by their own +exertions, they were of a methodical cast of mind; and no one +can work well without sleep. + +Meantime, Mowgli was putting the miles behind him, nine to the +hour, swinging on, delighted to find himself so fit after all +his cramped months among men. The one idea in his head was to +get Messua and her husband out of the trap, whatever it was; +for he had a natural mistrust of traps. Later on, he promised +himself, he would pay his debts to the village at large. + +It was at twilight when he saw the well-remembered grazing- +grounds, and the dhak-tree where Gray Brother had waited for him +on the morning that he killed Shere Khan. Angry as he was at the +whole breed and community of Man, something jumped up in his +throat and made him catch his breath when he looked at the +village roofs. He noticed that every one had come in from the +fields unusually early, and that, instead of getting to their +evening cooking, they gathered in a crowd under the village +tree, and chattered, and shouted. + +"Men must always he making traps for men, or they are not +content," said Mowgli. "Last night it was Mowgli--but that +night seems many Rains ago. To-night it is Messua and her man. +To-morrow, and for very many nights after, it will be Mowgli's +turn again." + +He crept along outside the wall till he came to Messua's hut, +and looked through the window into the room. There lay Messua, +gagged, and bound hand and foot, breathing hard, and groaning: +her husband was tied to the gaily-painted bedstead. The door of +the hut that opened into the street was shut fast, and three or +four people were sitting with their backs to it. + +Mowgli knew the manners and customs of the villagers very +fairly. He argued that so long as they could eat, and talk, +and smoke, they would not do anything else; but as soon as +they had fed they would begin to be dangerous. Buldeo would be +coming in before long, and if his escort had done its duty, +Buldeo would have a very interesting tale to tell. So he went +in through the window, and, stooping over the man and the woman, +cut their thongs, pulling out the gags, and looked round the hut +for some milk. + +Messua was half wild with pain and fear (she had been beaten +and stoned all the morning), and Mowgli put his hand over +her mouth just in time to stop a scream. Her husband was only +bewildered and angry, and sat picking dust and things out of +his torn beard. + +"I knew--I knew he would come," Messua sobbed at last. "Now do +I KNOW that he is my son!" and she hugged Mowgli to her heart. +Up to that time Mowgli had been perfectly steady, but now he +began to tremble all over, and that surprised him immensely. + +"Why are these thongs? Why have they tied thee?" he asked, +after a pause. + +"To be put to the death for making a son of thee--what else?" +said the man sullenly. "Look! I bleed." + +Messua said nothing, but it was at her wounds that Mowgli +looked, and they heard him grit his teeth when he saw the blood. + +"Whose work is this?" said he. "There is a price to pay." + +"The work of all the village. I was too rich. I had too many +cattle. THEREFORE she and I are witches, because we gave +thee shelter." + +"I do not understand. Let Messua tell the tale." + +"I gave thee milk, Nathoo; dost thou remember?" Messua said +timidly. "Because thou wast my son, whom the tiger took, and +because I loved thee very dearly. They said that I was thy +mother, the mother of a devil, and therefore worthy of death." + +"And what is a devil?" said Mowgli. "Death I have seen." + +The man looked up gloomily, but Messua laughed. "See!" she said +to her husband, "I knew--I said that he was no sorcerer. He is +my son--my son!" + +"Son or sorcerer, what good will that do us?" the man answered. +"We be as dead already." + +"Yonder is the road to the Jungle"--Mowgli pointed through the +window. "Your hands and feet are free. Go now." + +"We do not know the Jungle, my son, as--as thou knowest," Messua +began. "I do not think that I could walk far." + +"And the men and women would he upon our backs and drag us here +again," said the husband. + +"H'm!" said Mowgli, and he tickled the palm of his hand with the +tip of his skinning-knife; "I have no wish to do harm to any one +of this village--YET. But I do not think they will stay thee. +In a little while they will have much else to think upon. Ah!" +he lifted his head and listened to shouting and trampling +outside. "So they have let Buldeo come home at last?" + +"He was sent out this morning to kill thee," Messua cried. +"Didst thou meet him?" + +"Yes--we--I met him. He has a tale to tell and while he is +telling it there is time to do much. But first I will learn +what they mean. Think where ye would go, and tell me when +I come back." + +He bounded through the window and ran along again outside the +wall of the village till he came within ear-shot of the crowd +round the peepul-tree. Buldeo was lying on the ground, coughing +and groaning, and every one was asking him questions. His hair +had fallen about his shoulders; his hands and legs were skinned +from climbing up trees, and he could hardly speak, but he felt +the importance of his position keenly. From time to time he +said something about devils and singing devils, and magic +enchantment, just to give the crowd a taste of what was coming. +Then he called for water. + +"Bah!" said Mowgli. "Chatter--chatter! Talk, talk! Men are +blood-brothers of the Bandar-log. Now he must wash his mouth +with water; now he must blow smoke; and when all that is done +he has still his story to tell. They are very wise people--men. +They will leave no one to guard Messua till their ears are +stuffed with Buldeo's tales. And--I grow as lazy as they!" + +He shook himself and glided back to the hut. Just as he was at +the window he felt a touch on his foot. + +"Mother," said he, for he knew that tongue well, what dost +THOU here?" + +"I heard my children singing through the woods, and I followed +the one I loved best. Little Frog, I have a desire to see +that woman who gave thee milk," said Mother Wolf, all wet +with the dew. + +"They have bound and mean to kill her. I have cut those ties, +and she goes with her man through the Jungle." + +"I also will follow. I am old, but not yet toothless." Mother +Wolf reared herself up on end, and looked through the window +into the dark of the hut. + +In a minute she dropped noiselessly, and all she said was: +"I gave thee thy first milk; but Bagheera speaks truth: +Man goes to Man at the last." + +"Maybe," said Mowgli, with a very unpleasant look on his face; +"but to-night I am very far from that trail. Wait here, but do +not let her see." + +"THOU wast never afraid of ME, Little Frog," said Mother Wolf, +backing into the high grass, and blotting herself out, as she +knew how. + +"And now," said Mowgli cheerfully, as he swung into the hut +again, "they are all sitting round Buldeo, who is saying that +which did not happen. When his talk is finished, they say they +will assuredly come here with the Red--with fire and burn you +both. And then?" + +"I have spoken to my man," said Messua. Khanhiwara is thirty +miles from here, but at Khanhiwara we may find the English--" + +"And what Pack are they?" said Mowgli. + +"I do not know. They be white, and it is said that they govern +all the land, and do not suffer people to burn or beat each +other without witnesses. If we can get thither to-night, we +live. Otherwise we die." + +"Live, then. No man passes the gates to-night. But what does HE +do?" Messua's husband was on his hands and knees digging up the +earth in one corner of the hut. + +"It is his little money," said Messua. "We can take +nothing else." + +"Ah, yes. The stuff that passes from hand to hand and never +grows warmer. Do they need it outside this place also?" +said Mowgli. + +The man stared angrily. "He is a fool, and no devil," he +muttered. With the money I can buy a horse. We are too bruised +to walk far, and the village will follow us in an hour." + +"I say they will NOT follow till I choose; but a horse is +well thought of, for Messua is tired." Her husband stood up +and knotted the last of the rupees into his waist-cloth. +Mowgli helped Messua through the window, and the cool night +air revived her, but the Jungle in the starlight looked very dark +and terrible. + +"Ye know the trail to Khanhiwara?" Mowgli whispered. + +They nodded. + +'Good. Remember, now, not to be afraid. And there is no need to +go quickly. Only--only there may be some small singing in the +Jungle behind you and before." + +"Think you we would have risked a night in the Jungle through +anything less than the fear of burning? It is better to be +killed by beasts than by men," said Messua's husband; but Messua +looked at Mowgli and smiled. + +"I say," Mowgli went on, just as though he were Baloo repeating +an old Jungle Law for the hundredth time to a foolish cub-- +"I say that not a tooth in the Jungle is bared against you; +not a foot in the Jungle is lifted against you. Neither man +nor beast shall stay you till you come within eye-shot of +Khanhiwara. There will be a watch about you." He turned quickly +to Messua, saying, "HE does not believe, but thou wilt believe?" + +"Ay, surely, my son. Man, ghost, or wolf of the Jungle, +I believe." + +"HE will be afraid when he hears my people singing. Thou wilt +know and understand. Go now, and slowly, for there is no need of +any haste. The gates are shut." + +Messua flung herself sobbing at Mowgli's feet, but he lifted her +very quickly with a shiver. Then she hung about his neck and +called him every name of blessing she could think of, but her +husband looked enviously across his fields, and said: "IF we +reach Khanhiwara, and I get the ear of the English, I will bring +such a lawsuit against the Brahmin and old Buldeo and the others +as shall eat the village to the bone. They shall pay me twice +over for my crops untilled and my buffaloes unfed. I will have +a great justice." + +Mowgli laughed. "I do not know what justice is, but--come next +Rains. and see what is left." + +They went off toward the Jungle, and Mother Wolf leaped from her +place of hiding. + +"Follow!" said Mowgli; "and look to it that all the Jungle knows +these two are safe. Give tongue a little. I would call +Bagheera." + +The long, low howl rose and fell, and Mowgli saw Messua's +husband flinch and turn, half minded to run back to the hut. + +"Go on," Mowgli called cheerfully. "I said there might be +singing. That call will follow up to Khanhiwara. It is Favour +of the Jungle." + +Messua urged her husband forward, and the darkness shut down on +them and Mother Wolf as Bagheera rose up almost under Mowgli's +feet, trembling with delight of the night that drives the Jungle +People wild. + +"I am ashamed of thy brethren," he said, purring. "What? Did +they not sing sweetly to Buldeo?" said Mowgli. + +"Too well! Too well! They made even ME forget my pride, and, +by the Broken Lock that freed me, I went singing through the +Jungle as though I were out wooing in the spring! Didst thou +not hear us?" + +"I had other game afoot. Ask Buldeo if he liked the song. But +where are the Four? I do not wish one of the Man-Pack to leave +the gates to-night." + +"What need of the Four, then?" said Bagheera, shifting from foot +to foot, his eyes ablaze, and purring louder than ever. "I can +hold them, Little Brother. Is it killing at last? The singing +and the sight of the men climbing up the trees have made me very +ready. Who is Man that we should care for him--the naked brown +digger, the hairless and toothless, the eater of earth? I have +followed him all day--at noon--in the white sunlight. I herded +him as the wolves herd buck. I am Bagheera! Bagheera! Bagheera! +As I dance with my shadow, so danced I with those men. Look!" +The great panther leaped as a kitten leaps at a dead leaf +whirling overhead, struck left and right into the empty air, +that sang under the strokes, landed noiselessly, and leaped +again and again, while the half purr, half growl gathered head +as steam rumbles in a boiler. "I am Bagheera--in the jungle-- +in the night, and my strength is in me. Who shall stay my +stroke? Man-cub, with one blow of my paw I could beat thy head +flat as a dead frog in the summer!" + +"Strike, then!" said Mowgli, in the dialect of the village, NOT +the talk of the Jungle, and the human words brought Bagheera to +a full stop, flung back on haunches that quivered under him, his +head just at the level of Mowgli's. Once more Mowgli stared, as +he had stared at the rebellious cubs, full into the beryl-green +eyes till the red glare behind their green went out like the +light of a lighthouse shut off twenty miles across the sea; +till the eyes dropped, and the big head with them--dropped +lower and lower, and the red rasp of a tongue grated on +Mowgli's instep. + +"Brother--Brother--Brother!" the boy whispered, stroking +steadily and lightly from the neck along the heaving back. +"Be still, be still! It is the fault of the night, and no +fault of thine." + +"It was the smells of the night," said Bagheera penitently. +"This air cries aloud to me. But how dost THOU know?" + +Of course the air round an Indian village is full of all kinds +of smells, and to any creature who does nearly all his thinking +through his nose, smells are as maddening as music and drugs are +to human beings. Mowgli gentled the panther for a few minutes +longer, and he lay down like a cat before a fire, his paws +tucked under his breast, and his eyes half shut. + +"Thou art of the Jungle and NOT of the Jungle," he said at +last. "And I am only a black panther. But I love thee, +Little Brother." + +"They are very long at their talk under the tree," Mowgli said, +without noticing the last sentence. "Buldeo must have told many +tales. They should come soon to drag the woman and her man out +of the trap and put them into the Red Flower. They will find +that trap sprung. Ho! ho!" + +"Nay, listen," said Bagheera. "The fever is out of my blood now. +Let them find ME there! Few would leave their houses after +meeting me. It is not the first time I have been in a cage; +and I do not think they will tie ME with cords." + +"Be wise, then," said Mowgli, laughing; for he was beginning to +feel as reckless as the panther, who had glided into the hut. + +"Pah!" Bagheera grunted. "This place is rank with Man, but here +is just such a bed as they gave me to lie upon in the King's +cages at Oodeypore. Now I lie down." Mowgli heard the strings of +the cot crack under the great brute's weight. "By the Broken +Lock that freed me, they will think they have caught big game! +Come and sit beside me, Little Brother; we will give them 'good +hunting' together!" + +"No; I have another thought in my stomach. The Man-Pack shall +not know what share I have in the sport. Make thine own hunt. +I do not wish to see them." + +"Be it so," said Bagheera. "Ah, now they come!" + +The conference under the peepul-tree had been growing noisier +and noisier, at the far end of the village. It broke in wild +yells, and a rush up the street of men and women, waving clubs +and bamboos and sickles and knives. Buldeo and the Brahmin were +at the head of it, but the mob was close at their heels, and +they cried, "The witch and the wizard! Let us see if hot coins +will make them confess! Burn the hut over their heads! We will +teach them to shelter wolf-devils! Nay, beat them first! +Torches! More torches! Buldeo, heat the gun-barrels!" + +Here was some little difficulty with the catch of the door. +It had been very firmly fastened, but the crowd tore it away +bodily, and the light of the torches streamed into the room +where, stretched at full length on the bed, his paws crossed and +lightly hung down over one end, black as the Pit, and terrible +as a demon, was Bagheera. There was one half-minute of desperate +silence, as the front ranks of the crowd clawed and tore their +way back from the threshold, and in that minute Bagheera raised +his head and yawned--elaborately, carefully, and ostentatiously +--as he would yawn when he wished to insult an equal. The +fringed lips drew back and up; the red tongue curled; the lower +jaw dropped and dropped till you could see half-way down the hot +gullet; and the gigantic dog-teeth stood clear to the pit of the +gums till they rang together, upper and under, with the snick of +steel-faced wards shooting home round the edges of a safe. +Next instant the street was empty; Bagheera had leaped back +through the window, and stood at Mowgli's side, while a yelling, +screaming torrent scrambled and tumbled one over another in their +panic haste to get to their own huts. + +"They will not stir till day comes," said Bagheera quietly. +"And now?" + +The silence of the afternoon sleep seemed to have overtaken the +village; but, as they listened, they could hear the sound of +heavy grain-boxes being dragged over earthen floors and set down +against doors. Bagheera was quite right; the village would not +stir till daylight. Mowgli sat still, and thought, and his face +grew darker and darker. + +"What have I done?" said Bagheera, at last coming to his +feet, fawning. + +"Nothing but great good. Watch them now till the day. I sleep." +Mowgli ran off into the Jungle, and dropped like a dead man +across a rock, and slept and slept the day round, and the night +back again. + +When he waked, Bagheera was at his side, and there was a newly- +killed buck at his feet. Bagheera watched curiously while Mowgli +went to work with his skinning-knife, ate and drank, and turned +over with his chin in his hands. + +"The man and the woman are come safe within eye-shot of +Khanhiwara," Bagheera said. "Thy lair mother sent the word back +by Chil, the Kite. They found a horse before midnight of the +night they were freed, and went very quickly. Is not that well?" + +"That is well," said Mowgli. + +"And thy Man-Pack in the village did not stir till the sun was +high this morning. Then they ate their food and ran back quickly +to their houses." + +"Did they, by chance, see thee?" + +"It may have been. I was rolling in the dust before the gate at +dawn, and I may have made also some small song to myself. Now, +Little Brother, there is nothing more to do. Come hunting with me +and Baloo. He has new hives that he wishes to show, and we +all desire thee back again as of old. Take off that look which +makes even me afraid! The man and woman will not be put into the +Red Flower, and all goes well in the Jungle. Is it not true? +Let us forget the Man-Pack." + +"They shall he forgotten in a little while. Where does Hathi +feed to-night?" + +"Where he chooses. Who can answer for the Silent One? But why? +What is there Hathi can do which we cannot?" + +"Bid him and his three sons come here to me." + +"But, indeed, and truly, Little Brother, it is not--it is not +seemly to say 'Come,' and 'Go,' to Hathi. Remember, he is the +Master of the Jungle, and before the Man-Pack changed the look +on thy face, he taught thee the Master-words of the Jungle." + +"That is all one. I have a Master-word for him now. Bid him come +to Mowgli, the Frog: and if he does not hear at first, bid him +come because of the Sack of the Fields of Bhurtpore." + +"The Sack of the Fields of Bhurtpore," Bagheera repeated two or +three times to make sure. "I go. Hathi can but be angry at the +worst, and I would give a moon's hunting to hear a Master-word +that compels the Silent One." + +He went away, leaving Mowgli stabbing furiously with his +skinning-knife into the earth. Mowgli had never seen human blood +in his life before till he had seen, and--what meant much more +to him--smelled Messua's blood on the thongs that bound her. +And Messua had been kind to him, and, so far as he knew anything +about love, he loved Messua as completely as he hated the rest +of mankind. But deeply as he loathed them, their talk, their +cruelty, and their cowardice, not for anything the Jungle had to +offer could he bring himself to take a human life, and have that +terrible scent of blood back again in his nostrils. His plan was +simpler, but much more thorough; and he laughed to himself when +he thought that it was one of old Buldeo's tales told under the +peepul-tree in the evening that had put the idea into his head. + +"It WAS a Master-word," Bagheera whispered in his ear. +"They were feeding by the river, and they obeyed as though +they were bullocks. Look where they come now!" + +Hathi and his three sons had arrived, in their usual way, +without a sound. The mud of the river was still fresh on their +flanks, and Hathi was thoughtfully chewing the green stem of a +young plantain-tree that he had gouged up with his tusks. +But every line in his vast body showed to Bagheera, who could +see things when he came across them, that it was not the Master +of the Jungle speaking to a Man-cub, but one who was afraid +coming before one who was not. His three sons rolled side by +side, behind their father. + +Mowgli hardly lifted his head as Hathi gave him "Good hunting." +He kept him swinging and rocking, and shifting from one foot to +another, for a long time before he spoke; and when he opened his +mouth it was to Bagheera, not to the elephants. + +"I will tell a tale that was told to me by the hunter ye hunted +to-day," said Mowgli. "It concerns an elephant, old and wise, +who fell into a trap, and the sharpened stake in the pit scarred +him from a little above his heel to the crest of his shoulder, +leaving a white mark." Mowgli threw out his hand, and as Hathi +wheeled the moonlight showed a long white scar on his slaty +side, as though he had been struck with a red-hot whip. +"Men came to take him from the trap," Mowgli continued, "but he +broke his ropes, for he was strong, and went away till his wound +was healed. Then came he, angry, by night to the fields of those +hunters. And I remember now that he had three sons. These things +happened many, many Rains ago, and very far away--among the +fields of Bhurtpore. What came to those fields at the next +reaping, Hathi?" + +"They were reaped by me and by my three sons," said Hathi. + +"And to the ploughing that follows the reaping?" said Mowgli. + +"There was no ploughing," said Hathi. + +"And to the men that live by the green crops on the ground?" +said Mowgli. + +"They went away." + +"And to the huts in which the men slept?" said Mowgli. + +"We tore the roofs to pieces, and the Jungle swallowed up the +walls," said Hathi. + +"And what more?" said Mowgli. + +"As much good ground as I can walk over in two nights from the +east to the west, and from the north to the south as much as I +can walk over in three nights, the Jungle took. We let in the +Jungle upon five villages; and in those villages, and in their +lands, the grazing-ground and the soft crop-grounds, there is +not one man to-day who takes his food from the ground. That was +the Sack of the Fields of Bhurtpore, which I and my three sons +did; and now I ask, Man-cub, how the news of it came to thee?" +said Hathi. + +"A man told me, and now I see even Buldeo can speak truth. +It was well done, Hathi with the white mark; but the second time +it shall be done better, for the reason that there is a man to +direct. Thou knowest the village of the Man-Pack that cast me +out? They are idle, senseless, and cruel; they play with their +mouths, and they do not kill the weaker for food, but for sport. +When they are full-fed they would throw their own breed into the +Red Flower. This I have seen. It is not well that they should +live here any more. I hate them!" + +"Kill, then," said the youngest of Hathi's three sons, picking +up a tuft of grass, dusting it against his fore-legs, and +throwing it away, while his little red eyes glanced furtively +from side to side. + +"What good are white bones to me?" Mowgli answered angrily. +"Am I the cub of a wolf to play in the sun with a raw head? +I have killed Shere Khan, and his hide rots on the Council Rock; +but--but I do not know whither Shere Khan is gone, and my +stomach is still empty. Now I will take that which I can see +and touch. Let in the Jungle upon that village, Hathi!" + +Bagheera shivered, and cowered down. He could understand, if the +worst came to the worst, a quick rush down the village street, +and a right and left blow into a crowd, or a crafty killing of +men as they ploughed in the twilight; but this scheme for +deliberately blotting out an entire village from the eyes of man +and beast frightened him. Now he saw why Mowgli had sent for +Hathi. No one but the long-lived elephant could plan and carry +through such a war. + +"Let them run as the men ran from the fields of Bhurtpore, +till we have the rain-water for the only plough, and the noise +of the rain on the thick leaves for the pattering of their +spindles--till Bagheera and I lair in the house of the Brahmin, +and the buck drink at the tank behind the temple! Let in the +Jungle, Hathi!" + +"But I--but we have no quarrel with them, and it needs the red +rage of great pain ere we tear down the places where men sleep," +said Hathi doubtfully. + +"Are ye the only eaters of grass in the Jungle? Drive in your +peoples. Let the deer and the pig and the nilghai look to it. +Ye need never show a hand's-breadth of hide till the fields are +naked. Let in the Jungle, Hathi!" + +"There will be no killing? My tusks were red at the Sack of the +Fields of Bhurtpore, and I would not wake that smell again." + +"Nor I. I do not wish even their bones to lie on the clean +earth. Let them go and find a fresh lair. They cannot stay here. +I have seen and smelled the blood of the woman that gave me +food--the woman whom they would have killed but for me. Only the +smell of the new grass on their door-steps can take away that +smell. It burns in my mouth. Let in the Jungle, Hathi!" + +"Ah!" said Hathi. "So did the scar of the stake burn on my hide +till we watched the villages die under in the spring growth. Now +I see. Thy war shall he our war. We will let in the jungle!" + +Mowgli had hardly time to catch his breath--he was shaking all +over with rage and hate before the place where the elephants had +stood was empty, and Bagheera was looking at him with terror. + +"By the Broken Lock that freed me!" said the Black Panther at +last. "Art THOU the naked thing I spoke for in the Pack when all +was young? Master of the Jungle, when my strength goes, speak +for me--speak for Baloo--speak for us all! We are cubs before +thee! Snapped twigs under foot! Fawns that have lost their doe!" + +The idea of Bagheera being a stray fawn upset Mowgli altogether, +and he laughed and caught his breath, and sobbed and laughed +again, till he had to jump into a pool to make himself stop. +Then he swam round and round, ducking in and out of the bars of +the moonlight like the frog, his namesake. + +By this time Hathi and his three sons had turned, each to one +point of the compass, and were striding silently down the +valleys a mile away. They went on and on for two days' march-- +that is to say, a long sixty miles--through the Jungle; and +every step they took, and every wave of their trunks, was known +and noted and talked over by Mang and Chil and the Monkey People +and all the birds. Then they began to feed, and fed quietly for +a week or so. Hathi and his sons are like Kaa, the Rock Python. +They never hurry till they have to. + +At the end of that time--and none knew who had started it--a +rumour went through the Jungle that there was better food and +water to be found in such and such a valley. The pig--who, of +course, will go to the ends of the earth for a full meal--moved +first by companies, scuffling over the rocks, and the deer +followed, with the small wild foxes that live on the dead and +dying of the herds; and the heavy-shouldered nilghai moved +parallel with the deer, and the wild buffaloes of the swamps +came after the nilghai. The least little thing would have turned +the scattered, straggling droves that grazed and sauntered and +drank and grazed again; but whenever there was an alarm some one +would rise up and soothe them. At one time it would be Ikki the +Porcupine, full of news of good feed just a little farther on; +at another Mang would cry cheerily and flap down a glade to show +it was all empty; or Baloo, his mouth full of roots, would +shamble alongside a wavering line and half frighten, half romp +it clumsily back to the proper road. Very many creatures broke +back or ran away or lost interest, but very many were left to go +forward. At the end of another ten days or so the situation was +this. The deer and the pig and the nilghai were milling round +and round in a circle of eight or ten miles radius, while the +Eaters of Flesh skirmished round its edge. And the centre of +that circle was the village, and round the village the crops +were ripening, and in the crops sat men on what they call +machans--platforms like pigeon-perches, made of sticks at the +top of four poles--to scare away birds and other stealers. +Then the deer were coaxed no more. The Eaters of Flesh were +close behind them, and forced them forward and inward. + +It was a dark night when Hathi and his three sons slipped down +from the Jungle, and broke off the poles of the machans with +their trunks; they fell as a snapped stalk of hemlock in bloom +falls, and the men that tumbled from them heard the deep +gurgling of the elephants in their ears. Then the vanguard of +the bewildered armies of the deer broke down and flooded into +the village grazing-grounds and the ploughed fields; and the +sharp-hoofed, rooting wild pig came with them, and what the +deer left the pig spoiled, and from time to time an alarm of +wolves would shake the herds, and they would rush to and fro +desperately, treading down the young barley, and cutting flat +the banks of the irrigating channels. Before the dawn broke the +pressure on the outside of the circle gave way at one point. +The Eaters of Flesh had fallen back and left an open path to +the south, and drove upon drove of buck fled along it. Others, +who were bolder, lay up in the thickets to finish their meal +next night. + +But the work was practically done. When the villagers looked in +the morning they saw their crops were lost. And that meant death +if they did not get away, for they lived year in and year out as +near to starvation as the Jungle was near to them. When the +buffaloes were sent to graze the hungry brutes found that the +deer had cleared the grazing-grounds, and so wandered into the +Jungle and drifted off with their wild mates; and when twilight +fell the three or four ponies that belonged to the village lay +in their stables with their heads beaten in. Only Bagheera could +have given those strokes, and only Bagheera would have thought of +insolently dragging the last carcass to the open street. + +The villagers had no heart to make fires in the fields that +night, so Hathi and his three sons went gleaning among what was +left; and where Hathi gleans there is no need to follow. The men +decided to live on their stored seed-corn until the rains had +fallen, and then to take work as servants till they could catch +up with the lost year; but as the grain-dealer was thinking of +his well-filled crates of corn, and the prices he would levy at +the sale of it, Hathi's sharp tusks were picking out the corner +of his mud-house, and smashing open the big wicker chest, leeped +with cow-dung, where the precious stuff lay. + +When that last loss was discovered, it was the Brahmin's turn to +speak. He had prayed to his own Gods without answer. It might +be, he said, that, unconsciously, the village had offended some +one of the Gods of the Jungle, for, beyond doubt, the Jungle was +against them. So they sent for the head-man of the nearest tribe +of wandering Gonds--little, wise, and very black hunters, living +in the deep Jungle, whose fathers came of the oldest race in +India--the aboriginal owners of the land. They made the Gond +welcome with what they had, and he stood on one leg, his bow in +his hand, and two or three poisoned arrows stuck through his +top-knot, looking half afraid and half contemptuously at the +anxious villagers and their ruined fields. They wished to know +whether his Gods--the Old Gods--were angry with them and what +sacrifices should be offered. The Gond said nothing, but picked +up a trail of the Karela, the vine that bears the bitter wild +gourd, and laced it to and fro across the temple door in the +face of the staring red Hindu image. Then he pushed with his +hand in the open air along the road to Khanhiwara, and went back +to his Jungle, and watched the Jungle People drifting through +it. He knew that when the Jungle moves only white men can hope +to turn it aside. + +There was no need to ask his meaning. The wild gourd would grow +where they had worshipped their God, and the sooner they saved +themselves the better. + +But it is hard to tear a village from its moorings. They stayed +on as long as any summer food was left to them, and they tried +to gather nuts in the Jungle, but shadows with glaring eyes +watched them, and rolled before them even at mid-day; and when +they ran back afraid to their walls, on the tree-trunks they had +passed not five minutes before the bark would be stripped and +chiselled with the stroke of some great taloned paw. The more +they kept to their village, the bolder grew the wild things that +gambolled and bellowed on the grazing-grounds by the Waingunga. +They had no time to patch and plaster the rear walls of the +empty byres that backed on to the Jungle; the wild pig trampled +them down, and the knotty-rooted vines hurried after and threw +their elbows over the new-won ground, and the coarse grass +bristled behind the vines like the lances of a goblin army +following a retreat. The unmarried men ran away first, and +carried the news far and near that the village was doomed. +Who could fight, they said, against the Jungle, or the Gods of +the Jungle, when the very village cobra had left his hole in the +platform under the peepul-tree? So their little commerce with +the outside world shrunk as the trodden paths across the open +grew fewer and fainter. At last the nightly trumpetings of Hathi +and his three sons ceased to trouble them; for they had no more +to be robbed of. The crop on the ground and the seed in the +ground had been taken. The outlying fields were already losing +their shape, and it was time to throw themselves on the charity +of the English at Khanhiwara. + +Native fashion, they delayed their departure from one day to +another till the first Rains caught them and the unmended roofs +let in a flood, and the grazing-ground stood ankle deep, and all +life came on with a rush after the heat of the summer. Then they +waded out--men, women, and children--through the blinding hot +rain of the morning, but turned naturally for one farewell look +at their homes. + +They heard, as the last burdened family filed through the gate, +a crash of falling beams and thatch behind the walls. They saw a +shiny, snaky black trunk lifted for an instant, scattering +sodden thatch. It disappeared, and there was another crash, +followed by a squeal. Hathi had been plucking off the roofs of +the huts as you pluck water-lilies, and a rebounding beam had +pricked him. He needed only this to unchain his full strength, +for of all things in the Jungle the wild elephant enraged is the +most wantonly destructive. He kicked backward at a mud wall that +crumbled at the stroke, and, crumbling, melted to yellow mud +under the torrent of rain. Then he wheeled and squealed, and +tore through the narrow streets, leaning against the huts right +and left, shivering the crazy doors, and crumpling up the caves; +while his three sons raged behind as they had raged at the Sack +of the Fields of Bhurtpore. + +"The Jungle will swallow these shells," said a quiet voice in +the wreckage. "It is the outer wall that must lie down," and +Mowgli, with the rain sluicing over his bare shoulders and arms, +leaped back from a wall that was settling like a tired buffalo. + +"All in good time," panted Hathi. "Oh, but my tusks were red +at Bhurtpore; To the outer wall, children! With the head! +Together! Now!" + +The four pushed side by side; the outer wall bulged, split, and +fell, and the villagers, dumb with horror, saw the savage, +clay-streaked heads of the wreckers in the ragged gap. Then they +fled, houseless and foodless, down the valley, as their village, +shredded and tossed and trampled, melted behind them. + +A month later the place was a dimpled mound, covered with soft, +green young stuff; and by the end of the Rains there was the +roaring jungle in full blast on the spot that had been under +plough not six months before. + + + MOWGLI'S SONG AGAINST PEOPLE + +I will let loose against you the fleet-footed vines-- +I will call in the Jungle to stamp out your lines! + The roofs shall fade before it, + The house-beams shall fall, + And the Karela, the bitter Karela, + Shall cover it all! + +In the gates of these your councils my people shall sing, +In the doors of these your garners the Bat-folk shall cling; + And the snake shall be your watchman, + By a hearthstone unswept; + For the Karela, the bitter Karela, + Shall fruit where ye slept! + +Ye shall not see my strikers; ye shall hear them and guess; +By night, before the moon-rise, I will send for my cess, + And the wolf shall he your herdsman + By a landmark removed, + For the Karela, the bitter Karela, + Shall seed where ye loved! + +I will reap your fields before you at the hands of a host; +Ye shall glean behind my reapers, for the bread that is lost, + And the deer shall be your oxen + By a headland untilled, + For the Karela, the bitter Karela, + Shall leaf where ye build! + +I have untied against you the club-footed vines, +I have sent in the Jungle to swamp out your lines. + The trees--the trees are on you! + The house-beams shall fall, + And the Karela, the bitter Karela, + Shall cover you all! + + + + + THE UNDERTAKERS + + When ye say to Tabaqui, "My Brother!" when ye call the + Hyena to meat, + Ye may cry the Full Truce with Jacala--the Belly that runs + on four feet. + Jungle Law +"Respect the aged!" + +"It was a thick voice--a muddy voice that would have made you +shudder--a voice like something soft breaking in two. There was +a quaver in it, a croak and a whine. + +"Respect the aged! O Companions of the River--respect the aged!" + +Nothing could be seen on the broad reach of the river except a +little fleet of square-sailed, wooden-pinned barges, loaded with +building-stone, that had just come under the railway bridge, and +were driving down-stream. They put their clumsy helms over to +avoid the sand-bar made by the scour of the bridge-piers, and as +they passed, three abreast, the horrible voice began again: + +"O Brahmins of the River--respect the aged and infirm!" + +A boatman turned where he sat on the gunwale, lifted up his +hand, said something that was not a blessing, and the boats +creaked on through the twilight. The broad Indian river, that +looked more like a chain of little lakes than a stream, was as +smooth as glass, reflecting the sandy-red sky in mid-channel, +but splashed with patches of yellow and dusky purple near and +under the low banks. Little creeks ran into the river in the wet +season, but now their dry mouths hung clear above water-line. +On the left shore, and almost under the railway bridge, stood a +mud-and-brick and thatch-and-stick village, whose main street, +full of cattle going back to their byres, ran straight to the +river, and ended in a sort of rude brick pier-head, where people +who wanted to wash could wade in step by step. That was the +Ghaut of the village of Mugger-Ghaut. + +Night was falling fast over the fields of lentils and rice and +cotton in the low-lying ground yearly flooded by the river; +over the reeds that fringed the elbow of the bend, and the +tangled jungle of the grazing-grounds behind the still reeds. +The parrots and crows, who had been chattering and shouting over +their evening drink, had flown inland to roost, crossing the +out-going battalions of the flying-foxes; and cloud upon cloud +of water-birds came whistling and "honking" to the cover of the +reed-beds. There were geese, barrel-headed and black-backed, +teal, widgeon, mallard, and sheldrake, with curlews, and here +and there a flamingo. + +A lumbering Adjutant-crane brought up the rear, flying as though +each slow stroke would be his last. + +"Respect the aged! Brahmins of the River--respect the aged!" + +The Adjutant half turned his head, sheered a little in the +direction of the voice, and landed stiffly on the sand-bar below +the bridge. Then you saw what a ruffianly brute he really was. +His back view was immensely respectable, for he stood nearly six +feet high, and looked rather like a very proper bald-headed +parson. In front it was different, for his Ally Sloper-like head +and neck had not a feather to them, and there was a horrible +raw-skin pouch on his neck under his chin--a hold-all for the +things his pick-axe beak might steal. His legs were long and +thin and skinny, but he moved them delicately, and looked at +them with pride as he preened down his ashy-gray tail-feathers, +glanced over the smooth of his shoulder, and stiffened into +"Stand at attention." + +A mangy little Jackal, who had been yapping hungrily on a low +bluff, cocked up his ears and tail, and scuttered across the +shallows to join the Adjutant. + +He was the lowest of his caste--not that the best of jackals are +good for much, but this one was peculiarly low, being half a +beggar, half a criminal--a cleaner-up of village rubbish-heaps, +desperately timid or wildly bold, everlastingly hungry, and full +of cunning that never did him any good. + +"Ugh!" he said, shaking himself dolefully as he landed. "May the +red mange destroy the dogs of this village! I have three bites +for each flea upon me, and all because I looked--only looked, +mark you--at an old shoe in a cow-byre. Can I eat mud?" +He scratched himself under his left ear. + +"I heard," said the Adjutant, in a voice like a blunt saw going +through a thick board--"I HEARD there was a new-born puppy in +that same shoe." + +"To hear is one thing; to know is another," said the Jackal, who +had a very fair knowledge of proverbs, picked up by listening to +men round the village fires of an evening. + +"Quite true. So, to make sure, I took care of that puppy while +the dogs were busy elsewhere." + +"They were VERY busy," said the Jackal. "Well, I must not go to +the village hunting for scraps yet awhile. And so there truly +was a blind puppy in that shoe?" + +"It is here," said the Adjutant, squinting over his beak at his +full pouch. "A small thing, but acceptable now that charity is +dead in the world." + +"Ahai! The world is iron in these days," wailed the Jackal. +Then his restless eye caught the least possible ripple on the +water, and he went on quickly: "Life is hard for us all, and +I doubt not that even our excellent master, the Pride of the +Ghaut and the Envy of the River----" + +"A liar, a flatterer, and a Jackal were all hatched out of the +same egg," said the Adjutant to nobody in particular; for he +was rather a fine sort of a liar on his own account when he +took the trouble. + +"Yes, the Envy of the River," the Jackal repeated, raising his +voice. "Even he, I doubt not, finds that since the bridge has +been built good food is more scarce. But on the other hand, +though I would by no means say this to his noble face, he is so +wise and so virtuous--as I, alas I am not----" + +"When the Jackal owns he is gray, how black must the Jackal be!" +muttered the Adjutant. He could not see what was coming. + +"That his food never fails, and in consequence----" + +There was a soft grating sound, as though a boat had just +touched in shoal water. The Jackal spun round quickly and faced +(it is always best to face) the creature he had been talking +about. It was a twenty-four-foot crocodile, cased in what looked +like treble-riveted boiler-plate, studded and keeled and +crested; the yellow points of his upper teeth just overhanging +his beautifully fluted lower jaw. It was the blunt-nosed Mugger +of Mugger-Ghaut, older than any man in the village, who had +given his name to the village; the demon of the ford before the +railway bridge, came--murderer, man-eater, and local fetish in +one. He lay with his chin in the shallows, keeping his place by +an almost invisible rippling of his tail, and well the Jackal +knew that one stroke of that same tail in the water would carry +the Mugger up the bank with the rush of a steam-engine. + +"Auspiciously met, Protector of the Poor!" he fawned, backing +at every word. "A delectable voice was heard, and we came in +the hopes of sweet conversation. My tailless presumption, while +waiting here, led me, indeed, to speak of thee. It is my hope +that nothing was overheard." + +Now the Jackal had spoken just to be listened to, for he knew +flattery was the best way of getting things to eat, and the +Mugger knew that the Jackal had spoken for this end, and the +Jackal knew that the Mugger knew, and the Mugger knew that +the Jackal knew that the Mugger knew, and so they were all +very contented together. + +The old brute pushed and panted and grunted up the bank, +mumbling, "Respect the aged and infirm!" and all the time his +little eyes burned like coals under the heavy, horny eyelids +on the top of his triangular head, as he shoved his bloated +barrel-body along between his crutched legs. Then he settled +down, and, accustomed as the Jackal was to his ways, he could +not help starting, for the hundredth time, when he saw how +exactly the Mugger imitated a log adrift on the bar. He had +even taken pains to lie at the exact angle a naturally stranded +log would make with the water, having regard to the current of + +he season at the time and place. All this was only a matter of +habit, of course, because the Mugger had come ashore for +pleasure; but a crocodile is never quite full, and if the Jackal +had been deceived by the likeness he would not have lived to +philosophise over it. + +"My child, I heard nothing," said the Mugger, shutting one eye. +"The water was in my ears, and also I was faint with hunger. +Since the railway bridge was built my people at my village have +ceased to love me; and that is breaking my heart." + +"Ah, shame!" said the Jackal. "So noble a heart, too! But men +are all alike, to my mind." + +"Nay, there are very great differences indeed," the Mugger +answered gently. "Some are as lean asboat-poles. Others again +are fat as young ja--dogs. Never would I causelessly revile men. +They are of all fashions, but the long years have shown me that, +one with another, they are very good. Men, women, and children-- +I have no fault to find with them. And remember, child, he who +rebukes the World is rebuked by the World." + +"Flattery is worse than an empty tin can in the belly. But that +which we have just heard is wisdom," said the Adjutant, bringing +down one foot. + +"Consider, though, their ingratitude to this excellent one," +began the Jackal tenderly. + +"Nay, nay, not ingratitude!" the Mugger said. They do not think +for others; that is all. But I have noticed, lying at my station +below the ford, that the stairs of the new bridge are cruelly +hard to climb, both for old people and young children. The old, +indeed, are not so worthy of consideration, but I am grieved-- +I am truly grieved--on account of the fat children. Still, +I think, in a little while, when the newness of the bridge has +worn away, we shall see my people"s bare brown legs bravely +splashing through the ford as before. Then the old Mugger will +be honoured again." + +"But surely I saw Marigold wreaths floating off the edge of the +Ghaut only this noon," said the Adjutant. + +Marigold wreaths are a sign of reverence all India over. + +"An error--an error. It was the wife of the sweetmeat-seller. +She loses her eyesight year by year, and cannot tell a log from +me--the Mugger of the Ghaut. I saw the mistake when she threw +the garland, for I was lying at the very foot of the Ghaut, and +had she taken another step I might have shown her some little +difference. Yet she meant well, and we must consider the spirit +of the offering." + +"What good are marigold wreaths when one is on the rubbish- +heap?" said the Jackal, hunting for fleas, but keeping one wary +eye on his Protector of the Poor. + +"True, but they have not yet begun to make the rubbish-heap that +shall carry ME. Five times have I seen the river draw back from +the village and make new land at the foot of the street. Five +times have I seen the village rebuilt on the banks, and I shall +see it built yet five times more. I am no faithless, fish- +hunting Gavial, I, at Kasi to-day and Prayag to-morrow, as the +saying is, but the true and constant watcher of the ford. It is +not for nothing, child, that the village bears my name, and "he +who watches long," as the saying is, "shall at last have his +reward."" + +"_I_ have watched long--very long--nearly all my life, and my +reward has been bites and blows," said the Jackal. + +"Ho! ho! ho!" roared the Adjutant. + +"In August was the Jackal born; + The Rains fell in September; +"Now such a fearful flood as this," + Says he, "I can"t remember!"" + +There is one very unpleasant peculiarity about the Adjutant. +At uncertain times he suffers from acute attacks of the fidgets +or cramp in his legs, and though he is more virtuous to behold +than any of the cranes, who are all immensely respectable, +he flies off into wild, cripple-stilt war-dances, half opening +his wings and bobbing his bald head up and down; while for +reasons best known to himself he is very careful to time his +worst attacks with his nastiest remarks. At the last word of +his song he came to attention again, ten times adjutaunter +than before. + +The Jackal winced, though he was full three seasons old, but you +cannot resent an insult from a person with a beak a yard long, +and the power of driving it like a javelin. The Adjutant was a +most notorious coward, but the Jackal was worse. + +"We must live before we can learn," said the Mugger, "and there +is this to say: Little jackals are very common, child, but such +a mugger as I am is not common. For all that, I am not proud, +since pride is destruction; but take notice, it is Fate, and +against his Fate no one who swims or walks or runs should say +anything at all. I am well contented with Fate. With good luck, +a keen eye, and the custom of considering whether a creek or a +backwater has an outlet to it ere you ascend, much may be done." + +"Once I heard that even the Protector of the Poor made a +mistake," said the Jackal viciously. + +"True; but there my Fate helped me. It was before I had come to +my full growth--before the last famine but three (by the Right +and Left of Gunga, how full used the streams to be in those +days!). Yes, I was young and unthinking, and when the flood +came, who so pleased as I? A little made me very happy then. +The village was deep in flood, and I swam above the Ghaut and +went far inland, up to the rice-fields, and they were deep in +good mud. I remember also a pair of bracelets (glass they were, +and troubled me not a little) that I found that evening. Yes, +glass bracelets; and, if my memory serves me well, a shoe. +I should have shaken off both shoes, but I was hungry. I learned +better later. Yes. And so I fed and rested me; but when I was +ready to go to the river again the flood had fallen, and I +walked through the mud of the main street. Who but I? Came out +all my people, priests and women and children, and I looked upon +them with benevolence. The mud is not a good place to fight in. +Said a boatman, "Get axes and kill him, for he is the Mugger of +the ford." "Not so," said the Brahmin. "Look, he is driving the +flood before him! He is the godling of the village." Then they +threw many flowers at me, and by happy thought one led a goat +across the road." + +"How good--how very good is goat!" said the Jackal. + +"Hairy--too hairy, and when found in the water more than likely +to hide a cross-shaped hook. But that goat I accepted, and went +down to the Ghaut in great honour. Later, my Fate sent me the +boatman who had desired to cut off my tail with an axe. His boat +grounded upon an old shoal which you would not remember." + +"We are not ALL jackals here," said the Adjutant. Was it the +shoal made where the stone-boats sank in the year of the great +drouth--a long shoal that lasted three floods?" + +"There were two," said the Mugger; "an upper and a lower shoal." + +"Ay, I forgot. A channel divided them, and later dried up +again," said the Adjutant, who prided himself on his memory. + +"On the lower shoal my well-wisher"s craft grounded. He was +sleeping in the bows, and, half awake, leaped over to his +waist--no, it was no more than to his knees--to push off. +His empty boat went on and touched again below the next reach, +as the river ran then. I followed, because I knew men would +come out to drag it ashore." + +"And did they do so?" said the Jackal, a little awe-stricken. +This was hunting on a scale that impressed him. + +"There and lower down they did. I went no farther, but that gave +me three in one day--well-fed manjis (boatmen) all, and, except +in the case of the last (then I was careless), never a cry to +warn those on the bank." + +"Ah, noble sport! But what cleverness and great judgment it +requires!" said the Jackal. + +"Not cleverness, child, but only thought. A little thought in +life is like salt upon rice, as the boatmen say, and I have +thought deeply always. The Gavial, my cousin, the fish-eater, +has told me how hard it is for him to follow his fish, and how +one fish differs from the other, and how he must know them all, +both together and apart. I say that is wisdom; but, on the other +hand, my cousin, the Gavial, lives among his people. MY people +do not swim in companies, with their mouths out of the water, as +Rewa does; nor do they constantly rise to the surface of the +water, and turn over on their sides, like Mohoo and little +Chapta; nor do they gather in shoals after flood, like Batchua +and Chilwa." + +"All are very good eating," said the Adjutant, clattering +his beak. + +"So my cousin says, and makes a great to-do over hunting them, +but they do not climb the banks to escape his sharp nose. +MY people are otherwise. Their life is on the land, in the +houses, among the cattle. I must know what they do, and what +they are about to do; and adding the tail to the trunk, as the +saying is, I make up the whole elephant. Is there a green branch +and an iron ring hanging over a doorway? The old Mugger knows +that a boy has been born in that house, and must some day come +down to the Ghaut to play. Is a maiden to be married? +The old Mugger knows, for he sees the men carry gifts back and +forth; and she, too, comes down to the Ghaut to bathe before +her wedding, and--he is there. Has the river changed its +channel, and made new land where there was only sand before? +The Mugger knows." + +"Now, of what use is that knowledge?" said the Jackal. +"The river has shifted even in my little life." Indian rivers +are nearly always moving about in their beds, and will shift, +sometimes, as much as two or three miles in a season, drowning +the fields on one bank, and spreading good silt on the other. + +"There is no knowledge so useful," said the Mugger, "for new +land means new quarrels. The Mugger knows. Oho! the Mugger +knows. As soon as the water has drained off, he creeps up the +little creeks that men think would not hide a dog, and there he +waits. Presently comes a farmer saying he will plant cucumbers +here, and melons there, in the new land that the river has given +him. He feels the good mud with his bare toes. Anon comes +another, saying he will put onions, and carrots, and sugar-cane +in such and such places. They meet as boats adrift meet, and +each rolls his eye at the other under the big blue turban. +The old Mugger sees and hears. Each calls the other "Brother," +and they go to mark out the boundaries of the new land. +The Mugger hurries with them from point to point, shuffling very +low through the mud. Now they begin to quarrel! Now they say +hot words! Now they pull turbans! Now they lift up their lathis +(clubs), and, at last, one falls backward into the mud, and the +other runs away. When he comes back the dispute is settled, as +the iron-bound bamboo of the loser witnesses. Yet they are not +grateful to the Mugger. No, they cry "Murder!" and their +families fight with sticks, twenty a-side. My people are good +people--upland Jats--Malwais of the Bet. They do not give blows +for sport, and, when the fight is done, the old Mugger waits +far down the river, out of sight of the village, behind the +kikar-scrub yonder. Then come they down, my broad-shouldered +Jats--eight or nine together under the stars, bearing the dead +man upon a bed. They are old men with gray beards, and voices as +deep as mine. They light a little fire--ah! how well I know that +fire!--and they drink tobacco, and they nod their heads together +forward in a ring, or sideways toward the dead man upon the +bank. They say the English Law will come with a rope for this +matter, and that such a man"s family will be ashamed, because +such a man must be hanged in the great square of the Jail. +Then say the friends of the dead, "Let him hang!" and the talk +is all to do over again--once, twice, twenty times in the long +night. Then says one, at last, "The fight was a fair fight. +Let us take blood-money, a little more than is offered by the +slayer, and we will say no more about it." Then do they haggle +over the blood-money, for the dead was a strong man, leaving +many sons. Yet before amratvela (sunrise) they put the fire to +him a little, as the custom is, and the dead man comes to me, +and HE says no more about it. Aha! my children, the Mugger +knows--the Mugger knows--and my Malwah Jats are a good people!" + +"They are too close--too narrow in the hand for my crop," +croaked the Adjutant. "They waste not the polish on the +cow"s horn, as the saying is; and, again, who can glean +after a Malwai?" + +"Ah, I--glean--THEM," said the Mugger. + +"Now, in Calcutta of the South, in the old days," the Adjutant +went on, "everything was thrown into the streets, and we picked +and chose. Those wore dainty seasons. But to-day they keep their +streets as clean as the outside of an egg, and my people fly +away. To be clean is one thing; to dust, sweep, and sprinkle +seven times a day wearies the very Gods themselves." + +"There was a down-country jackal had it from a brother, who told +me, that in Calcutta of the South all the jackals were as fat as +otters in the Rains," said the Jackal, his mouth watering at the +bare thought of it. + +"Ah, but the white-faces are there--the English, and they bring +dogs from somewhere down the river in boats--big fat dogs--to +keep those same jackals lean," said the Adjutant. + +"They are, then, as hard-hearted as these people? I might have +known. Neither earth, sky, nor water shows charity to a jackal. +I saw the tents of a white-face last season, after the Rains, +and I also took a new yellow bridle to eat. The white-faces +do not dress their leather in the proper way. It made me +very sick." + +"That was better than my case," said the Adjutant. "When I was +in my third season, a young and a bold bird, I went down to the +river where the big boats come in. The boats of the English are +thrice as big as this village." + +"He has been as far as Delhi, and says all the people there walk +on their heads," muttered the Jackal. The Mugger opened his left +eye, and looked keenly at the Adjutant. + +"It is true," the big bird insisted. "A liar only lies when he +hopes to be believed. No one who had not seen those boats COULD +believe this truth." + +"THAT is more reasonable," said the Mugger. "And then?" + +"From the insides of this boat they were taking out great pieces +of white stuff, which, in a little while, turned to water. +Much split off, and fell about on the shore, and the rest they +swiftly put into a house with thick walls. But a boatman, +who laughed, took a piece no larger than a small dog, and threw +it to me. I--all my people--swallow without reflection, and that +piece I swallowed as is our custom. Immediately I was afflicted +with an excessive cold which, beginning in my crop, ran down to +the extreme end of my toes, and deprived me even of speech, +while the boatmen laughed at me. Never have I felt such cold. +I danced in my grief and amazement till I could recover my +breath and then I danced and cried out against the falseness of +this world; and the boatmen derided me till they fell down. +The chief wonder of the matter, setting aside that marvellous +coldness, was that there was nothing at all in my crop when I +had finished my lamentings!" + +The Adjutant had done his very best to describe his feelings +after swallowing a seven-pound lump of Wenham Lake ice, off an +American ice-ship, in the days before Calcutta made her ice by +machinery; but as he did not know what ice was, and as the +Mugger and the Jackal knew rather less, the tale missed fire. + +"Anything," said the Mugger, shutting his left eye again-- +"ANYTHING is possible that comes out of a boat thrice the size +of Mugger-Ghaut. My village is not a small one." + +There was a whistle overhead on the bridge, and the Delhi Mail +slid across, all the carriages gleaming with light, and the +shadows faithfully following along the river. It clanked away +into the dark again; but the Mugger and the Jackal were so well +used to it that they never turned their heads. + +"Is that anything less wonderful than a boat thrice the size of +Mugger-Ghaut?" said the bird, looking up. + +"I saw that built, child. Stone by stone I saw the bridge-piers +rise, and when the men fell off (they were wondrous sure-footed +for the most part--but WHEN they fell) I was ready. After the +first pier was made they never thought to look down the stream +for the body to burn. There, again, I saved much trouble. +There was nothing strange in the building of the bridge," said +the Mugger. + +"But that which goes across, pulling the roofed carts! That is +strange," the Adjutant repeated. "It is, past any doubt, a new +breed of bullock. Some day it will not be able to keep its +foothold up yonder, and will fall as the men did. The old Mugger +will then be ready." + +The Jackal looked at the Adjutant and the Adjutant looked at the +Jackal. If there was one thing they were more certain of than +another, it was that the engine was everything in the wide world +except a bullock. The Jackal had watched it time and again from +the aloe hedges by the side of the line, and the Adjutant had +seen engines since the first locomotive ran in India. But the +Mugger had only looked up at the thing from below, where the +brass dome seemed rather like a bullock"s hump. + +"M--yes, a new kind of bullock," the Mugger repeated +ponderously, to make himself quite sure in his own mind; +and "Certainly it is a bullock," said the Jackal. + +"And again it might be----" began the Mugger pettishly. + +"Certainly--most certainly," said the Jackal, without waiting +for the other to finish. + +"What?" said the Mugger angrily, for he could feel that the +others knew more than he did. "What might it be? _I_ never +finished my words. You said it was a bullock." + +"It is anything the Protector of the Poor pleases. I am HIS +servant--not the servant of the thing that crosses the river." + +"Whatever it is, it is white-face work," said the Adjutant; +"and for my own part, I would not lie out upon a place so near +to it as this bar." + +"You do not know the English as I do," said the Mugger. "There +was a white-face here when the bridge was built, and he would +take a boat in the evenings and shuffle with his feet on the +bottom-boards, and whisper: "Is he here? Is he there? Bring me +my gun." I could hear him before I could see him--each sound +that he made--creaking and puffing and rattling his gun, up and +down the river. As surely as I had picked up one of his workmen, +and thus saved great expense in wood for the burning, so surely +would he come down to the Ghaut, and shout in a loud voice that +he would hunt me, and rid the river of me--the Mugger of Mugger- +Ghaut! ME! Children, I have swum under the bottom of his boat +for hour after hour, and heard him fire his gun at logs; and +when I was well sure he was wearied, I have risen by his side +and snapped my jaws in his face. When the bridge was finished he +went away. All the English hunt in that fashion, except when +they are hunted." + +"Who hunts the white-faces?" yapped the Jackal excitedly. + +"No one now, but I have hunted them in my time." + +"I remember a little of that Hunting. I was young then," said +the Adjutant, clattering his beak significantly. + +"I was well established here. My village was being builded for +the third time, as I remember, when my cousin, the Gavial, +brought me word of rich waters above Benares. At first I would +not go, for my cousin, who is a fish-eater, does not always know +the good from the bad; but I heard my people talking in the +evenings, and what they said made me certain." + +"And what did they say?" the Jackal asked. + +"They said enough to make me, the Mugger of Mugger-Ghaut, +leave water and take to my feet. I went by night, using the +littlest streams as they served me; but it was the beginning of +the hot weather, and all streams were low. I crossed dusty +roads; I went through tall grass; I climbed hills in the +moonlight. Even rocks did I climb, children--consider this well. +I crossed the tail of Sirhind, the waterless, before I could +find the set of the little rivers that flow Gungaward. I was a +month"s journey from my own people and the river that I knew. +That was very marvellous!" + +"What food on the way?" said the Jackal, who kept his soul in +his little stomach, and was not a bit impressed by the Mugger"s +land travels. + +"That which I could find--COUSIN," said the Mugger slowly, +dragging each word. + +Now you do not call a man a cousin in India unless you think you +can establish some kind of blood-relationship, and as it is only +in old fairy-tales that the Mugger ever marries a jackal, the +Jackal knew for what reason he had been suddenly lifted into +the Mugger"s family circle. If they had been alone he would +not have cared, but the Adjutant"s eyes twinkled with mirth +at the ugly jest. + +"Assuredly, Father, I might have known," said the Jackal. +A mugger does not care to be called a father of jackals, and the +Mugger of Mugger-Ghaut said as much--and a great deal more which +there is no use in repeating here. + +"The Protector of the Poor has claimed kinship. How can I +remember the precise degree? Moreover, we eat the same food. +He has said it," was the Jackal"s reply. + +That made matters rather worse, for what the Jackal hinted at +was that the Mugger must have eaten his food on that land-march +fresh and fresh every day, instead of keeping it by him till it +was in a fit and proper condition, as every self-respecting +mugger and most wild beasts do when they can. Indeed, one of the +worst terms of contempt along the River-bed is "eater of fresh +meat." It is nearly as bad as calling a man a cannibal. + +"That food was eaten thirty seasons ago," said the Adjutant +quietly. "If we talk for thirty seasons more it will never +come back. Tell us, now, what happened when the good waters were +reached after thy most wonderful land journey. If we listened to +the howling of every jackal the business of the town would stop, +as the saying is. + +The Mugger must have been grateful for the interruption, because +he went on, with a rush: + +"By the Right and Left of Gunga! when I came there never did I +see such waters!" + +"Were they better, then, than the big flood of last season?" +said the Jackal. + +"Better! That flood was no more than comes every five years-- +a handful of drowned strangers, some chickens, and a dead +bullock in muddy water with cross-currents. But the season +I think of, the river was low, smooth, and even, and, as the +Gavial had warned me, the dead English came down, touching each +other. I got my girth in that season--my girth and my depth. +>From Agra, by Etawah and the broad waters by Allahabad----" + +"Oh, the eddy that set under the walls of the fort at +Allahabad!" said the Adjutant. "They came in there like +widgeon to the reeds, and round and round they swung--thus!" + +He went off into his horrible dance again, while the Jackal +looked on enviously. He naturally could not remember the +terrible year of the Mutiny they were talking about. +The Mugger continued: + +"Yes, by Allahabad one lay still in the slack-water and let +twenty go by to pick one; and, above all, the English were not +cumbered with jewellery and nose-rings and anklets as my women +are nowadays. To delight in ornaments is to end with a rope for +a necklace, as the saying is. All the muggers of all the rivers +grew fat then, but it was my Fate to be fatter than them all. +The news was that the English were being hunted into the +rivers, and by the Right and Left of Gunga! we believed it +was true. So far as I went south I believed it to he true; +and I went down-stream beyond Monghyr and the tombs that look +over the river." + +"I know that place," said the Adjutant. "Since those days +Monghyr is a lost city. Very few live there now." + +"Thereafter I worked up-stream very slowly and lazily, and a +little above Monghyr there came down a boatful of white-faces-- +alive! They were, as I remember, women, lying under a cloth +spread over sticks, and crying aloud. There was never a gun +fired at us, the watchers of the fords in those days. All the +guns were busy elsewhere. We could hear them day and night +inland, coming and going as the wind shifted. I rose up full +before the boat, because I had never seen white-faces alive, +though I knew them well--otherwise. A naked white child kneeled +by the side of the boat, and, stooping over, must needs try to +trail his hands in the river. It is a pretty thing to see how a +child loves running water. I had fed that day, but there was yet +a little unfilled space within me. Still, it was for sport and +not for food that I rose at the child"s hands. They were so +clear a mark that I did not even look when I closed; but they +were so small that though my jaws rang true--I am sure of that-- +the child drew them up swiftly, unhurt. They must have passed +between tooth and tooth--those small white hands. I should have +caught him cross-wise at the elbows; but, as I said, it was only +for sport and desire to see new things that I rose at all. +They cried out one after another in the boat, and presently +I rose again to watch them. The boat was too heavy to push over. +They were only women, but he who trusts a woman will walk on +duckweed in a pool, as the saying is: and by the Right and Left +of Gunga, that is truth!" + +"Once a woman gave me some dried skin from a fish," said +the Jackal. "I had hoped to get her baby, but horse-food is +better than the kick of a horse, as the saying is. What did +thy woman do?" + +"She fired at me with a short gun of a kind I have never seen +before or since. Five times, one after another" (the Mugger must +have met with an old-fashioned revolver); "and I stayed open- +mouthed and gaping, my head in the smoke. Never did I see such +a thing. Five times, as swiftly as I wave my tail--thus!" + +The Jackal, who had been growing more and more interested in +the story, had just time to leap back as the huge tail swung by +like a scythe. + +"Not before the fifth shot," said the Mugger, as though he had +never dreamed of stunning one of his listeners--" not before the +fifth shot did I sink, and I rose in time to hear a boatman +telling all those white women that I was most certainly dead. +One bullet had gone under a neck-plate of mine. I know not if it +is there still, for the reason I cannot turn my head. Look and +see, child. It will show that my tale is true." + +"I?" said the Jackal. "Shall an eater of old shoes, a bone- +cracker, presume, to doubt the word of the Envy of the River? +May my tail be bitten off by blind puppies if the shadow of such +a thought has crossed my humble mind! The Protector of the Poor +has condescended to inform me, his slave, that once in his life +he has been wounded by a woman. That is sufficient, and I will +tell the tale to all my children, asking for no proof." + +"Over-much civility is sometimes no better than over-much +discourtesy, for, as the saying is, one can choke a guest with +curds. I do NOT desire that any children of thine should know +that the Mugger of Mugger-Ghaut took his only wound from a +woman. They will have much else to think of if they get their +meat as miserably as does their father." + +"It is forgotten long ago! It was never said! There never +was a white woman! There was no boat! Nothing whatever happened +at all." + +The Jackal waved his brush to show how completely everything was +wiped out of his memory, and sat down with an air. + +"Indeed, very many things happened," said the Mugger, beaten in +his second attempt that night to get the better of his friend. +(Neither bore malice, however. Eat and be eaten was fair law +along the river, and the Jackal came in for his share of plunder +when the Mugger had finished a meal.) "I left that boat and went +up-stream, and, when I had reached Arrah and the back-waters +behind it, there were no more dead English. The river was empty +for a while. Then came one or two dead, in red coats, not +English, but of one kind all--Hindus and Purbeeahs--then five +and six abreast, and at last, from Arrah to the North beyond +Agra, it was as though whole villages had walked into the water. +They came out of little creeks one after another, as the logs +come down in the Rains. When the river rose they rose also in +companies from the shoals they had rested upon; and the falling +flood dragged them with it across the fields and through the +Jungle by the long hair. All night, too, going North, I heard +the guns, and by day the shod feet of men crossing fords, and +that noise which a heavy cart-wheel makes on sand under water; +and every ripple brought more dead. At last even I was afraid, +for I said: "If this thing happen to men, how shall the Mugger +of Mugger-Ghaut escape?" There were boats, too, that came up +behind me without sails, burning continually, as the cotton- +boats sometimes burn, but never sinking." + +"Ah!" said the Adjutant. "Boats like those come to Calcutta of +the South. They are tall and black, they beat up the water +behind them with a tail, and they----" + +"Are thrice as big as my village. MY boats were low and white; +they beat up the water on either side of them" and were no +larger than the boats of one who speaks truth should be. +They made me very afraid, and I left water and went back to this +my river, hiding by day and walking by night, when I could not +find little streams to help me. I came to my village again, but +I did not hope to see any of my people there. Yet they were +ploughing and sowing and reaping, and going to and fro in their +fields, as quietly as their own cattle." + +"Was there still good food in the river?" said the Jackal. + +"More than I had any desire for. Even I--and I do not eat mud-- +even I was tired, and, as I remember, a little frightened of +this constant coming down of the silent ones. I heard my people +say in my village that all the English were dead; but those that +came, face down, with the current were NOT English, as my people +saw. Then my people said that it was best to say nothing at all, +but to pay the tax and plough the land. After a long time the +river cleared, and those that came down it had been clearly +drowned by the floods, as I could well see; and though it was +not so easy then to get food, I was heartily glad of it. +A little killing here and there is no bad thing--but even the +Mugger is sometimes satisfied, as the saying is." + +"Marvellous! Most truly marvellous!" said the Jackal. "I am +become fat through merely hearing about so much good eating. +And afterward what, if it be permitted to ask, did the Protector +of the Poor do?" + +"I said to myself--and by the Right and Left of Gunga! I locked +my jaws on that vow--I said I would never go roving any more. +So I lived by the Ghaut, very close to my own people, and I +watched over them year after year; and they loved me so much +that they threw marigold wreaths at my head whenever they saw it +lift. Yes, and my Fate has been very kind to me, and the river +is good enough to respect my poor and infirm presence; only----" + +"No one is all happy from his beak to his tail," said the +Adjutant sympathetically. "What does the Mugger of Mugger-Ghaut +need more?" + +"That little white child which I did not get," said the Mugger, +with a deep sigh. "He was very small, but I have not forgotten. +I am old now, but before I die it is my desire to try one new +thing. It is true they are a heavy-footed, noisy, and foolish +people, and the sport would be small, but I remember the old +days above Benares, and, if the child lives, he will remember +still. It may be he goes up and down the bank of some river, +telling how he once passed his hands between the teeth of the +Mugger of Mugger-Ghaut, and lived to make a tale of it. My Fate +has been very kind, but that plagues me sometimes in my dreams-- +the thought of the little white child in the bows of that boat." +He yawned, and closed his jaws. "And now I will rest and think. +Keep silent, my children, and respect the aged." + +He turned stiffly, and shuffled to the top of the sand-bar, +while the Jackal drew back with the Adjutant to the shelter of +a tree stranded on the end nearest the railway bridge. + +"That was a pleasant and profitable life," he grinned, looking +up inquiringly at the bird who towered above him. "And not once, +mark you, did he think fit to tell me where a morsel might have +been left along the banks. Yet I have told HIM a hundred times +of good things wallowing down-stream. How true is the saying, +"All the world forgets the Jackal and the Barber when the news +has been told!" Now he is going to sleep! Arrh!" + +"How can a jackal hunt with a Mugger?" said the Adjutant +coolly. "Big thief and little thief; it is easy to say who +gets the pickings." + +The Jackal turned, whining impatiently, and was going to curl +himself up under the tree-trunk, when suddenly he cowered, and +looked up through the draggled branches at the bridge almost +above his head. + +"What now?" said the Adjutant, opening his wings uneasily. + +"Wait till we see. The wind blows from us to them, but they are +not looking for us--those two men." + +"Men, is it? My office protects me. All India knows I am holy." +The Adjutant, being a first-class scavenger, is allowed to go +where he pleases, and so this one never flinched. + +"I am not worth a blow from anything better than an old shoe," +said the Jackal, and listened again. "Hark to that footfall!" +he went on. "That was no country leather, but the shod foot of +a white-face. Listen again! Iron hits iron up there! It is a +gun! Friend, those heavy-footed, foolish English are coming to +speak with the Mugger." + +"Warn him, then. He was called Protector of the Poor by some one +not unlike a starving Jackal but a little time ago." + +"Let my cousin protect his own hide. He has told me again and +again there is nothing to fear from the white-faces. They must +be white-faces. Not a villager of Mugger-Ghaut would dare to +come after him. See, I said it was a gun! Now, with good luck, +we shall feed before daylight. He cannot hear well out of water, +and--this time it is not a woman!" + +A shiny barrel glittered for a minute in the moonlight on the +girders. The Mugger was lying on the sand-bar as still as his +own shadow, his fore-feet spread out a little, his head dropped +between them, snoring like a--mugger. + +A voice on the bridge whispered: "It's an odd shot--straight +down almost--but as safe as houses. Better try behind the neck. +Golly! what a brute! The villagers will be wild if he's shot, +though. He's the deota [godling] of these parts." + +"Don't care a rap," another voice answered; he took about +fifteen of my best coolies while the bridge was building, +and it's time he was put a stop to. I've been after him in +a boat for weeks. Stand by with the Martini as soon as I've +given him both barrels of this." + +"Mind the kick, then. A double four-bore's no joke." + +"That's for him to decide. Here goes!" + +There was a roar like the sound of a small cannon (the biggest +sort of elephant-rifle is not very different from some +artillery), and a double streak of flame, followed by the +stinging crack of a Martini, whose long bullet makes nothing of +a crocodile's plates. But the explosive bullets did the work. +One of them struck just behind the Mugger's neck, a hand's- +breadth to the left of thle backbone, while the other burst +a little lower down, at the beginning of the tail. In ninety- +nine cases out of a hundred a mortally-wounded crocodile can +scramble to deep water and get away; but the Mugger of Mugger- +Ghaut was literally broken into three pieces. He hardly moved +his head before the life went out of him, and he lay as flat +as the Jackal. + +"Thunder and lightning! Lightning and thunder!" said that +miserable little beast. "Has the thing that pulls the covered +carts over the bridge tumbled at last?" + +"It is no more than a gun," said the Adjutant, though his +very tail-feathers quivered. "Nothing more than a gun. He is +certainly dead. Here come the white-faces." + +The two Englishmen had hurried down from the bridge and across +to the sand-bar, where they stood admiring the length of the +Mugger. Then a native with an axe cut off the big head, and four +men dragged it across the spit. + +"The last time that I had my hand in a Mugger's mouth," said one +of the Englishmen, stooping down (he was the man who had built +the bridge), "it was when I was about five years old--coming +down the river by boat to Monghyr. I was a Mutiny baby, as they +call it. Poor mother was in the boat, too, and she often told me +how she fired dad's old pistol at the beast's head." + +"Well, you've certainly had your revenge on the chief of the +clan--even if the gun has made your nose bleed. Hi, you boatmen! +Haul that head up the bank, and we'll boil it for the skull. +The skin's too knocked about to keep. Come along to bed now. +This was worth sitting up all night for, wasn't it?" + +..... + +Curiously enough, the Jackal and the Adjutant made the very same +remark not three minutes after the men had left. + + + A RIPPLE SONG + +Once a ripple came to land + In the golden sunset burning-- +Lapped against a maiden's hand, + By the ford returning. + +Dainty foot and gentle breast-- + Here, across, be glad and rest. +"Maiden, wait," the ripple saith. + "Wait awhile, for I am Death!" + +"Where my lover calls I go-- + Shame it were to treat him coldly-- +'Twas a fish that circled so, + Turning over boldly." + +Dainty foot and tender heart, + Wait the loaded ferry-cart. +"Wait, ah, wait!" the ripple saith; + "Maiden, wait, for I am Death!" + +"When my lover calls I haste- + Dame Disdain was never wedded!" +Ripple-ripple round her waist, + Clear the current eddied. + +Foolish heart and faithful hand, + Little feet that touched no land. +Far away the ripple sped, + Ripple--ripple--running red! + + + + THE KING'S ANKUS + +These are the Four that are never content, that have never + been filled since the Dews began-- +Jacala's mouth, and the glut of the Kite, and the hands of the + Ape, and the Eyes of Man. + Jungle Saying. + +Kaa, the big Rock Python, had changed his skin for perhaps the +two-hundredth time since his birth; and Mowgli, who never forgot +that he owed his life to Kaa for a night's work at Cold Lairs, +which you may perhaps remember, went to congratulate him. +Skin-changing always makes a snake moody and depressed till the +new skin begins to shine and look beautiful. Kaa never made fun +of Mowgli any more, but accepted him, as the other Jungle People +did, for the Master of the Jungle, and brought him all the news +that a python of his size would naturally hear. What Kaa did not +know about the Middle Jungle, as they call it,--the life that +runs close to the earth or under it, the boulder, burrow, and +the tree-bole life,--might have been written upon the smallest +of his scales. + +That afternoon Mowgli was sitting in the circle of Kaa!s great +coils, fingering the flaked and broken old skin that lay all +looped and twisted among the rocks just as Kaa had left it. +Kaa had very courteously packed himself under Mowgli's broad, +bare shoulders, so that the boy was really resting in a +living arm-chair. + +"Even to the scales of the eyes it is perfect," said Mowgli, +under his breath, playing with the old skin. "Strange to see the +covering of one's own head at one's own feet!" + +"Ay, but I lack feet," said Kaa; "and since this is the custom +of all my people, I do not find it strange. Does thy skin never +feel old and harsh?" + +"Then go I and wash, Flathead; but, it is true, in the great +heats I have wished I could slough my skin without pain, and +run skinless." + +"I wash, and ALSO I take off my skin. How looks the new coat?" + +Mowgli ran his hand down the diagonal checkerings of the immense +back. "The Turtle is harder-backed, but not so gay," he said +judgmatically. "The Frog, my name-bearer, is more gay, but not +so hard. It is very beautiful to see--like the mottling in the +mouth of a lily." + +"It needs water. A new skin never comes to full colour before +the first bath. Let us go bathe." + +"I will carry thee," said Mowgli; and he stooped down, laughing, +to lift the middle section of Kaa's great body, just where the +barrel was thickest. A man might just, as well have tried to +heave up a two-foot water-main; and Kaa lay still, puffing with +quiet amusement. Then the regular evening game began--the Boy in +the flush of his great strength, and the Python in his sumptuous +new skin, standing up one against the other for a wrestling +match--a trial of eye and strength. Of course, Kaa could have +crushed a dozen Mowglis if he had let himself go; but he played +carefully, and never loosed one-tenth of his power. Ever since +Mowgli was strong enough to endure a little rough handling, +Kaa had taught him this game, and it suppled his limbs as +nothing else could. Sometimes Mowgli would stand lapped almost +to his throat in Kaa's shifting coils, striving to get one arm +free and catch him by the throat. Then Kaa would give way +limply, and Mowgli, with both quick-moving feet, would try to +cramp the purchase of that huge tail as it flung backward +feeling for a rock or a stump. They would rock to and fro, +head to head, each waiting for his chance, till the beautiful, +statue-like group melted in a whirl of black-and-yellow coils +and struggling legs and arms, to rise up again and again. +"Now! now! now!" said Kaa, making feints with his head that +even Mowgli's quick hand could not turn aside. "Look! I touch +thee here, Little Brother! Here, and here! Are thy hands numb? +Here again!" + +The game always ended in one way--with a straight, driving blow +of the head that knocked the boy over and over. Mowgli could +never learn the guard for that lightning lunge, and, as Kaa +said, there was not the least use in trying. + +"Good hunting!" Kaa grunted at last; and Mowgli, as usual, was +shot away half a dozen yards, gasping and laughing. He rose with +his fingers full of grass, and followed Kaa to the wise snake's +pet bathing-place--a deep, pitchy-black pool surrounded with +rocks, and made interesting by sunken tree-stumps. The boy +slipped in, Jungle-fashion, without a sound, and dived across; +rose, too, without a sound, and turned on his back, his arms +behind his head, watching the moon rising above the rocks, +and breaking up her reflection in the water with his toes. +Kaa's diamond-shaped head cut the pool like a razor, and came +out to rest on Mowgli's shoulder. They lay still, soaking +luxuriously in the cool water. + +"It is VERY good," said Mowgli at last, sleepily. Now, in the +Man-Pack, at this hour, as I remember, they laid them down upon +hard pieces of wood in the inside of a mud-trap, and, having +carefully shut out all the clean winds, drew foul cloth over +their heavy heads and made evil songs through their noses. +It is better in the Jungle." + +A hurrying cobra slipped down over a rock and drank, gave them +"Good hunting!" and went away. + +"Sssh!" said Kaa, as though he had suddenly remembered +something. "So the Jungle gives thee all that thou hast ever +desired, Little Brother?" + +"Not all," said Mowgli, laughing; "else there would be a new and +strong Shere Khan to kill once a moon. Now, I could kill with my +own hands, asking no help of buffaloes. And also I have wished +the sun to shine in the middle of the Rains, and the Rains to +cover the sun in the deep of summer; and also I have never gone +empty but I wished that I had killed a goat; and also I have +never killed a goat but I wished it had been buck; nor buck but +I wished it had been nilghai. But thus do we feel, all of us." + +"Thou hast no other desire?" the big snake demanded. + +"What more can I wish? I have the Jungle, and the favour of the +Jungle! Is there more anywhere between sunrise and sunset?" + +"Now, the Cobra said----" Kaa began. What cobra? He that went +away just now said nothing. He was hunting." + +"It was another." + +"Hast thou many dealings with the Poison People? I give them +their own path. They carry death in the fore-tooth, and that +is not good--for they are so small. But what hood is this thou +hast spoken with?" + +Kaa rolled slowly in the water like a steamer in a beam sea. +"Three or four moons since," said he, "I hunted in Cold Lairs, +which place thou hast not forgotten. And the thing I hunted fled +shrieking past the tanks and to that house whose side I once +broke for thy sake, and ran into the ground." + +"But the people of Cold Lairs do not live in burrows." Mowgli +knew that Kaa was telling of the Monkey People. + +"This thing was not living, but seeking to live," Kaa replied, +with a quiver of his tongue. "He ran into a burrow that led +very far. I followed, and having killed, I slept. When I +waked I went forward." + +"Under the earth?" + +"Even so, coming at last upon a White Hood [a white cobra], +who spoke of things beyond my knowledge, and showed me many +things I had never before seen." + +"New game? Was it good hunting?" Mowgli turned quickly on +his side. + +"It was no game, and would have broken all my teeth; but the +White Hood said that a man--he spoke as one that knew the +breed--that a man would give the breath under his ribs for only +the sight of those things." + +"We will look," said Mowgli. "I now remember that I was +once a man." + +"Slowly--slowly. It was haste killed the Yellow Snake that ate +the sun. We two spoke together under the earth, and I spoke of +thee, naming thee as a man. Said the White Hood (and he is +indeed as old as the Jungle): 'It is long since I have seen a +man. Let him come, and he shall see all these things, for the +least of which very many men would die.'" + +"That MUST be new game. And yet the Poison People do not tell us +when game is afoot. They are an unfriendly folk." + +"It is NOT game. It is--it is--I cannot say what it is." + +"We will go there. I have never seen a White Hood, and I wish to +see the other things. Did he kill them?" + +"They are all dead things. He says he is the keeper of +them all." + +"Ah! As a wolf stands above meat he has taken to his own lair. +Let us go." + +Mowgli swam to bank, rolled on the grass to dry himself, and the +two set off for Cold Lairs, the deserted city of which you may +have heard. Mowgli was not the least afraid of the Monkey People +in those days, but the Monkey People had the liveliest horror of +Mowgli. Their tribes, however, were raiding in the Jungle, and +so Cold Lairs stood empty and silent in the moonlight. Kaa led +up to the ruins of the queens' pavilion that stood on the +terrace, slipped over the rubbish, and dived down the half- +choked staircase that went underground from the centre of the +pavilion. Mowgli gave the snake-call,--"We be of one blood, +ye and I,"--and followed on his hands and knees. They crawled +a long distance down a sloping passage that turned and twisted +several times, and at last came to where the root of some great +tree, growing thirty feet overhead, had forced out a solid stone +in the wall. They crept through the gap, and found themselves +in a large vault, whose domed roof had been also broken away +by tree-roots so that a few streaks of light dropped down into +the darkness. + +"A safe lair," said Mowgli, rising to his firm feet, "but +over-far to visit daily. And now what do we see?" + +"Am I nothing?" said a voice in the middle of the vault; +and Mowgli saw something white move till, little by little, +there stood up the hugest cobra he had ever set eyes on--a +creature nearly eight feet long, and bleached by being in +darkness to an old ivory-white. Even the spectacle-marks of his +spread hood had faded to faint yellow. His eyes were as red as +rubies, and altogether he was most wonderful. + +"Good hunting!" said Mowgli, who carried his manners with his +knife, and that never left him. + +"What of the city?" said the White Cobra, without answering the +greeting. "What of the great, the walled city--the city of a +hundred elephants and twenty thousand horses, and cattle past +counting--the city of the King of Twenty Kings? I grow deaf +here, and it is long since I heard their war-gongs." + +"The Jungle is above our heads," said Mowgli. I know only Hathi +and his sons among elephants. Bagheera has slain all the horses +in one village, and--what is a King?" + +"I told thee," said Kaa softly to the Cobra,--"I told thee, four +moons ago, that thy city was not." + +"The city--the great city of the forest whose gates are guarded +by the King's towers--can never pass. They builded it before my +father's father came from the egg, and it shall endure when my +son's sons are as white as I! Salomdhi, son of Chandrabija, +son of Viyeja, son of Yegasuri, made it in the days of Bappa +Rawal. Whose cattle are YE?" + +"It is a lost trail," said Mowgli, turning to Kaa. "I know not +his talk." + +"Nor I. He is very old. Father of Cobras, there is only the +Jungle here, as it has been since the beginning." + +"Then who is HE," said the White Cobra, "sitting down before +me, unafraid, knowing not the name of the King, talking our +talk through a man's lips? Who is he with the knife and the +snake's tongue?" + +"Mowgli they call me," was the answer. "I am of the Jungle. +The wolves are my people, and Kaa here is my brother. Father +of Cobras, who art thou?" + +"I am the Warden of the King's Treasure. Kurrun Raja builded the +stone above me, in the days when my skin was dark, that I might +teach death to those who came to steal. Then they let down the +treasure through the stone, and I heard the song of the Brahmins +my masters." + +"Umm!" said Mowgli to himself. "I have dealt with one Brahmin +already, in the Man-Pack, and--I know what I know. Evil comes +here in a little." + +"Five times since I came here has the stone been lifted, but +always to let down more, and never to take away. There are no +riches like these riches--the treasures of a hundred kings. +But it is long and long since the stone was last moved, and +I think that my city has forgotten." + +"There is no city. Look up. Yonder are roots of the great trees +tearing the stones apart. Trees and men do not grow together," +Kaa insisted. + +"Twice and thrice have men found their way here," the White +Cobra answered savagely; "but they never spoke till I came upon +them groping in the dark, and then they cried only a little +time. But ye come with lies, Man and Snake both, and would have +me believe the city is not, and that my wardship ends. Little do +men change in the years. But I change never! Till the stone is +lifted, and the Brahmins come down singing the songs that +I know, and feed me with warm milk, and take me to the light +again, I--I--_I_, and no other, am the Warden of the King's +Treasure! The city is dead, ye say, and here are the roots of +the trees? Stoop down, then, and take what ye will. Earth has no +treasure like to these. Man with the snake's tongue, if thou +canst go alive by the way that thou hast entered it, the lesser +Kings will be thy servants!" + +"Again the trail is lost," said Mowgli coolly. "Can any jackal +have burrowed so deep and bitten this great White Hood? He is +surely mad. Father of Cobras, I see nothing here to take away." + +"By the Gods of the Sun and Moon, it is the madness of death +upon the boy!" hissed the Cobra. "Before thine eyes close I will +allow thee this favour. Look thou, and see what man has never +seen before!" + +"They do not well in the Jungle who speak to Mowgli of favours," +said the boy, between his teeth; "but the dark changes all, as I +know. I will look, if that please thee." + +He stared with puckered-up eyes round the vault, and then lifted +up from the floor a handful of something that glittered. + +"Oho!" said he, "this is like the stuff they play with in the +Man-Pack: only this is yellow and the other was brown." + +He let the gold pieces fall, and move forward. The floor of the +vault was buried some five or six feet deep in coined gold and +silver that had burst from the sacks it had been originally +stored in, and, in the long years, the metal had packed and +settled as sand packs at low tide. On it and in it and rising +through it, as wrecks lift through the sand, were jewelled +elephant-howdahs of embossed silver, studded with plates of +hammered gold, and adorned with carbuncles and turquoises. +There were palanquins and litters for carrying queens, framed +and braced with silver and enamel, with jade-handled poles and +amber curtain-rings; there were golden candlesticks hung with +pierced emeralds that quivered on the branches; there were +studded images, five feet high, of forgotten gods, silver with +jewelled eyes; there were coats of mail, gold inlaid on steel, +and fringed with rotted and blackened seed-pearls; there were +helmets, crested and beaded with pigeon's-blood rubies; there +were shields of lacquer, of tortoise-shell and rhinoceros-hide, +strapped and bossed with red gold and set with emeralds at the +edge; there were sheaves of diamond-hilted swords, daggers, and +hunting-knives; there were golden sacrificial bowls and ladles, +and portable altars of a shape that never sees the light of day; +there were jade cups and bracelets; there were incense-burners, +combs, and pots for perfume, henna, and eye-powder, all in +embossed gold; there were nose-rings, armlets, head-bands, +finger-rings, and girdles past any counting; there were belts, +seven fingers broad, of square-cut diamonds and rubies, and +wooden boxes, trebly clamped with iron, from which the wood had +fallen away in powder, showing the pile of uncut star-sapphires, +opals, cat's-eyes, sapphires, rubies, diamonds, emeralds, and +garnets within. + +The White Cobra was right. No mere money would begin to pay the +value of this treasure, the sifted pickings of centuries of war, +plunder, trade, and taxation. The coins alone were priceless, +leaving out of count all the precious stones; and the dead +weight of the gold and silver alone might be two or three +hundred tons. Every native ruler in India to-day, however poor, +has a hoard to which he is always adding; and though, once in +a long while, some enlightened prince may send off forty or +fifty bullock-cart loads of silver to be exchanged for +Government securities, the bulk of them keep their treasure +and the knowledge of it very closely to themselves. + +But Mowgli naturally did not understand what these things meant. +The knives interested him a little, but they did not balance so +well as his own, and so he dropped them. At last he found +something really fascinating laid on the front of a howdah half +buried in the coins. It was a three-foot ankus, or elephant- +goad--something like a small boat-hook. The top was one round, +shining ruby, and eight inches of the handle below it were +studded with rough turquoises close together, giving a most +satisfactory grip. Below them was a rim of jade with a flower- +pattern running round it--only the leaves were emeralds, and the +blossoms were rubies sunk in the cool, green stone. The rest of +the handle was a shaft of pure ivory, while the point--the spike +and hook--was gold-inlaid steel with pictures of elephant- +catching; and the pictures attracted Mowgli, who saw that they +had something to do with his friend Hathi the Silent. + +The White Cobra had been following him closely. + +"Is this not worth dying to behold?" he said. Have I not done +thee a great favour?" + +"I do not understand," said Mowgli. "The things are hard and +cold, and by no means good to eat. But this"--he lifted the +ankus--"I desire to take away, that I may see it in the sun. +Thou sayest they are all thine? Wilt thou give it to me, and +I will bring thee frogs to eat?" + +The White Cobra fairly shook with evil delight. "Assuredly +I will give it," he said. "All that is here I will give thee-- +till thou goest away." + +"But I go now. This place is dark and cold, and I wish to take +the thorn-pointed thing to the Jungle." + +"Look by thy foot! What is that there?" Mowgli picked up +something white and smooth. "It is the bone of a man's head," +he said quietly. "And here are two more." + +"They came to take the treasure away many years ago. I spoke to +them in the dark, and they lay still." + +"But what do I need of this that is called treasure? If thou +wilt give me the ankus to take away, it is good hunting. If not, +it is good hunting none the less. I do not fight with the Poison +People, and I was also taught the Master-word of thy tribe." + +"There is but one Master-word here. It is mine!" + +Kaa flung himself forward with blazing eyes. "Who bade me bring +the Man?" he hissed. + +"I surely," the old Cobra lisped. "It is long since I have seen +Man, and this Man speaks our tongue." + +"But there was no talk of killing. How can I go to the Jungle +and say that I have led him to his death?" said Kaa. + +"I talk not of killing till the time. And as to thy going or +not going, there is the hole in the wall. Peace, now, thou fat +monkey-killer! I have but to touch thy neck, and the Jungle will +know thee no longer. Never Man came here that went away with the +breath under his ribs. I am the Warden of the Treasure of the +King's City!" + +"But, thou white worm of the dark, I tell thee there is neither +king nor city! The Jungle is all about us!" cried Kaa. + +"There is still the Treasure. But this can be done. Wait +awhile, Kaa of the Rocks, and see the boy run. There is room +for great sport here. Life is good. Run to and fro awhile, +and make sport, boy!" + +Mowgli put his hand on Kaa's head quietly. + +"The white thing has dealt with men of the Man-Pack until now. +He does not know me," he whispered. "He has asked for this +hunting. Let him have it." Mowgli had been standing with the +ankus held point down. He flung it from him quickly and it +dropped crossways just behind the great snake's hood, pinning +him to the floor. In a flash, Kaa's weight was upon the writhing +body, paralysing it from hood to tail. The red eyes burned, +and the six spare inches of the head struck furiously right +and left. + +"Kill!" said Kaa, as Mowgli's hand went to his knife. + +"No," he said, as he drew the blade; "I will never kill again +save for food. But look you, Kaa!" He caught the snake behind +the hood, forced the mouth open with the blade of the knife, +and showed the terrible poison-fangs of the upper jaw lying +black and withered in the gum. The White Cobra had outlived his +poison, as a snake will. + +"THUU" ("It is dried up"--Literally, a rotted out tree-stump), +said Mowgli; and motioning Kaa away, he picked up the ankus, +setting the White Cobra free. + +"The King's Treasure needs a new Warden, he said gravely. "Thuu, +thou hast not done well. Run to and fro and make sport, Thuu!" + +"I am ashamed. Kill me!" hissed the White Cobra. + +"There has been too much talk of killing. We will go now. +I take the thorn-pointed thing, Thuu, because I have fought +and worsted thee." + +"See, then, that the thing does not kill thee at last. It is +Death! Remember, it is Death! There is enough in that thing to +kill the men of all my city. Not long wilt thou hold it, Jungle +Man, nor he who takes it from thee. They will kill, and kill, +and kill for its sake! My strength is dried up, but the ankus +will do my work. It is Death! It is Death! It is Death!" + +Mowgli crawled out through the hole into the passage again, and +the last that he saw was the White Cobra striking furiously with +his harmless fangs at the stolid golden faces of the gods that +lay on the floor, and hissing, "It is Death!" + +They were glad to get to the light of day once more; and when +they were back in their own Jungle and Mowgli made the ankus +glitter in the morning light, he was almost as pleased as though +he had found a bunch of new flowers to stick in his hair. + +"This is brighter than Bagheera's eyes," he said delightedly, +as he twirled the ruby. "I will show it to him; but what did +the Thuu mean when he talked of death?" + +"I cannot say. I am sorrowful to my tail's tail that he felt +not thy knife. There is always evil at Cold Lairs--above ground +or below. But now I am hungry. Dost thou hunt with me this +dawn?" said Kaa. + +"No; Bagheera must see this thing. Good hunting!" Mowgli danced +off, flourishing the great ankus, and stopping from time to time +to admire it, till he came to that part of the Jungle Bagheera +chiefly used, and found him drinking after a heavy kill. Mowgli +told him all his adventures from beginning to end, and Bagheera +sniffed at the ankus between whiles. When Mowgli came to the +White Cobra's last words, the Panther purred approvingly. + +"Then the White Hood spoke the thing which is?" Mowgli +asked quickly. + +"I was born in the King's cages at Oodeypore, and it is in my +stomach that I know some little of Man. Very many men would kill +thrice in a night for the sake of that one big red stone alone." + +"But the stone makes it heavy to the hand. My little bright +knife is better; and--see! the red stone is not good to eat. Then +WHY would they kill?" + +"Mowgli, go thou and sleep. Thou hast lived among men, and----" + +"I remember. Men kill because they are not hunting;--for +idleness and pleasure. Wake again, Bagheera. For what use was +this thorn-pointed thing made?" + +Bagheera half opened his eyes--he was very sleepy--with a +malicious twinkle. + +"It was made by men to thrust into the head of the sons of +Hathi, so that the blood should pour out. I have seen the like +in the street of Oodeypore, before our cages. That thing has +tasted the blood of many such as Hathi." + +"But why do they thrust into the heads of elephants?" + +"To teach them Man's Law. Having neither claws nor teeth, +men make these things--and worse." + +"Always more blood when I come near, even to the things the +Man-Pack have made," said Mowgli disgustedly. He was getting a +little tired of the weight of the ankus. "If I had known this, +I would not have taken it. First it was Messua's blood on the +thongs, and now it is Hathi's. I will use it no more. Look!" + +The ankus flew sparkling, and buried itself point down thirty +yards away, between the trees. "So my hands are clean of Death," +said Mowgli, rubbing his palms on the fresh, moist earth. +"The Thuu said Death would follow me. He is old and white +and mad." + +"White or black, or death or life, _I_ am going to sleep, +Little Brother. I cannot hunt all night and howl all day, as +do some folk." + +Bagheera went off to a hunting-lair that he knew, about two +miles off. Mowgli made an easy way for himself up a convenient +tree, knotted three or four creepers together, and in less time +than it takes to tell was swinging in a hammock fifty feet above +ground. Though he had no positive objection to strong daylight, +Mowgli followed the custom of his friends, and used it as little +as he could. When he waked among the very loud-voiced peoples +that live in the trees, it was twilight once more, and he had +been dreaming of the beautiful pebbles he had thrown away. + +"At least I will look at the thing again," he said, and slid +down a creeper to the earth; but Bagheera was before him. +Mowgli could hear him snuffing in the half light. + +"Where is the thorn-pointed thing?" cried Mowgli. + +"A man has taken it. Here is the trail." + +"Now we shall see whether the Thuu spoke truth. If the pointed +thing is Death, that man will die. Let us follow." + +"Kill first," said Bagheera. "An empty stomach makes a careless +eye. Men go very slowly, and the Jungle is wet enough to hold +the lightest mark." + +They killed as soon as they could, but it was nearly three hours +before they finished their meat and drink and buckled down to +the trail. The Jungle People know that nothing makes up for +being hurried over your meals. + +"Think you the pointed thing will turn in the man's hand and +kill him?" Mowgli asked. "The Thuu said it was Death." + +"We shall see when we find," said Bagheera, trotting with his +head low. "It is single-foot" (he meant that there was only one +man), "and the weight of the thing has pressed his heel far into +the ground." + +"Hai! This is as clear as summer lightning," Mowgli answered; +and they fell into the quick, choppy trail-trot in and out +through the checkers of the moonlight, following the marks of +those two bare feet. + +"Now he runs swiftly," said Mowgli. "The toes are spread +apart." They went on over some wet ground. "Now why does +he turn aside here?" + +"Wait!" said Bagheera, and flung himself forward with one +superb bound as far as ever he could. The first thing to do +when a trail ceases to explain itself is to cast forward +without leaving, your own confusing foot-marks on the ground. +Bagheera turned as he landed, and faced Mowgli, crying, +"Here comes another trail to meet him. It is a smaller foot, +this second trail, and the toes turn inward." + +Then Mowgli ran up and looked. "It is the foot of a Gond +hunter," he said. "Look! Here he dragged his bow on the grass. +That is why the first trail turned aside so quickly. Big Foot +hid from Little Foot." + +"That is true," said Bagheera. "Now, lest by crossing each +other's tracks we foul the signs, let each take one trail. +I am Big Foot, Little Brother, and thou art Little Foot, +the Gond." + +Bagheera leaped back to the original trail, leaving Mowgli +stooping above the curious narrow track of the wild little man +of the woods. + +"Now," said Bagheera, moving step by step along the chain of +footprints, "I, Big Foot, turn aside here. Now I hide me behind +a rock and stand still," not daring to shift my feet. Cry thy +trail, Little Brother." + +"Now, I, Little Foot, come to the rock," said Mowgli, running up +his trail. "Now, I sit down under the rock, leaning upon my +right hand, and resting my bow between my toes. I wait long, for +the mark of my feet is deep here." + +"I also, said Bagheera, hidden behind the rock. I wait, +resting the end of the thorn-pointed thing upon a stone. +It slips, for here is a scratch upon the stone. Cry thy trail, +Little Brother." + +"One, two twigs and a big branch are broken here," said Mowgli, +in an undertone. "Now, how shall I cry THAT? Ah! It is plain +now. I, Little Foot, go away making noises and tramplings so +that Big Foot may hear me." He moved away from the rock pace by +pace among the trees, his voice rising in the distance as he +approached a little cascade. "I--go--far--away--to--where--the-- +noise--of--falling-water--covers--my--noise; and--here--I--wait. +Cry thy trail, Bagheera, Big Foot!" + +The panther had been casting in every direction to see how Big +Foot's trail led away from behind the rock. Then he gave tongue: + +"I come from behind the rock upon my knees, dragging the thorn- +pointed thing. Seeing no one, I run. I, Big Foot, run swiftly. +The trail is clear. Let each follow his own. I run!" + +Bagheera swept on along the clearly-marked trail, and Mowgli +followed the steps of the Gond. For some time there was silence +in the Jungle. + +"Where art thou, Little Foot?" cried Bagheera. Mowgli's voice +answered him not fifty yards to the right. + +"Um!" said the Panther, with a deep cough. "The two run side by +side, drawing nearer!" + +They raced on another half-mile, always keeping about the same +distance, till Mowgli, whose head was not so close to the ground +as Bagheera's, cried: "They have met. Good hunting--look! +Here stood Little Foot, with his knee on a rock--and yonder +is Big Foot indeed!" + +Not ten yards in front of them, stretched across a pile of +broken rocks, lay the body of a villager of the district, +a long, small-feathered Gond arrow through his back and breast. + +"Was the Thuu so old and so mad, Little Brother?" said Bagheera +gently. "Here is one death, at least." + +"Follow on. But where is the drinker of elephant's blood--the +red-eyed thorn?" + +"Little Foot has it--perhaps. It is single-foot again now." + +The single trail of a light man who had been running quickly +and bearing a burden on his left shoulder held on round a long, +low spur of dried grass, where each footfall seemed, to the +sharp eyes of the trackers, marked in hot iron. + +Neither spoke till the trail ran up to the ashes of a camp-fire +hidden in a ravine. + +"Again!" said Bagheera, checking as though he had been turned +into stone. + +The body of a little wizened Gond lay with its feet in the +ashes, and Bagheera looked inquiringly at Mowgli. + +"That was done with a bamboo," said the boy, after one glance. +"I have used such a thing among the buffaloes when I served in +the Man-Pack. The Father of Cobras--I am sorrowful that I made a +jest of him--knew the breed well, as I might have known. Said I +not that men kill for idleness?" + +"Indeed, they killed for the sake of the red and blue +stones," Bagheera answered. "Remember, I was in the King's +cages at Oodeypore." + +"One, two, three, four tracks," said Mowgli, stooping over the +ashes. "Four tracks of men with shod feet. They do not go so +quickly as Gonds. Now, what evil had the little woodman done to +them? See, they talked together, all five, standing up, before +they killed him. Bagheera, let us go back. My stomach is heavy +in me, and yet it heaves up and down like an oriole's nest at +the end of a branch." + +"It is not good hunting to leave game afoot. Follow!" said the +panther. "Those eight shod feet have not gone far." + +No more was said for fully an hour, as they worked up the broad +trail of the four men with shod feet. + +It was clear, hot daylight now, and Bagheera said, +"I smell smoke." + +Men are always more ready to eat than to run, Mowgli answered, +trotting in and out between the low scrub bushes of the new +Jungle they were exploring. Bagheera, a little to his left, +made an indescribable noise in his throat. + +"Here is one that has done with feeding," said he. A tumbled +bundle of gay-coloured clothes lay under a bush, and round it +was some spilt flour. + +"That was done by the bamboo again," said Mowgli. " See! that +white dust is what men eat. They have taken the kill from this +one,--he carried their food,--and given him for a kill to Chil, +the Kite." + +"It is the third," said Bagheera. + +"I will go with new, big frogs to the Father of Cobras, and feed +him fat," said Mowgli to himself. "The drinker of elephant's +blood is Death himself--but still I do not understand!" + +"Follow!" said Bagheera. + +They had not gone half a mile farther when they heard Ko, +the Crow, singing the death-song in the top of a tamarisk under +whose shade three men were lying. A half-dead fire smoked in the +centre of the circle, under an iron plate which held a blackened +and burned cake of unleavened bread. Close to the fire, and +blazing in the sunshine, lay the ruby-and-turquoise ankus. + +"The thing works quickly; all ends here," said Bagheera. +"How did THESE die, Mowgli? There is no mark on any." + +A Jungle-dweller gets to learn by experience as much as many +doctors know of poisonous plants and berries. Mowgli sniffed the +smoke that came up from the fire, broke off a morsel of the +blackened bread, tasted it, and spat it out again. + +"Apple of Death," he coughed. "The first must have made it +ready in the food for THESE, who killed him, having first +killed the Gond." + +"Good hunting, indeed! The kills follow close," said Bagheera. + +"Apple of Death" is what the Jungle call thorn-apple or dhatura, +the readiest poison in all India. + +"What now?" said the panther. "Must thou and I kill each other +for yonder red-eyed slayer?" + +"Can it speak?" said Mowgli in a whisper. Did I do it a wrong +when I threw it away? Between us two it can do no wrong, for we +do not desire what men desire. If it be left here, it will +assuredly continue to kill men one after another as fast as nuts +fall in a high wind. I have no love to men, but even I would not +have them die six in a night." + +"What matter? They are only men. They killed one another, and +were well pleased," said Bagheera. "That first little woodman +hunted well." + +"They are cubs none the less; and a cub will drown himself to +bite the moon's light on the water. The fault was mine," said +Mowgli, who spoke as though he knew all about everything. +"I will never again bring into the Jungle strange things--not +though they be as beautiful as flowers. This"--he handled the +ankus gingerly--"goes back to the Father of Cobras. But first +we must sleep, and we cannot sleep near these sleepers. Also we +must bury HIM, lest he run away and kill another six. Dig me a +hole under that tree." + +"But, Little Brother," said Bagheera, moving off to the spot, +"I tell thee it is no fault of the blood-drinker. The trouble +is with the men." + +"All one," said Mowgli. "Dig the hole deep. When we wake I will +take him up and carry him back." + +..... + +Two nights later, as the White Cobra sat mourning in the +darkness of the vault, ashamed, and robbed, and alone, +the turquoise ankus whirled through the hole in the wall, +and clashed on the floor of golden coins. + +"Father of Cobras," said Mowgli (he was careful to keep the +other side of the wall), "get thee a young and ripe one of thine +own people to help thee guard the King's Treasure, so that no +man may come away alive any more." + +"Ah-ha! It returns, then. I said the thing was Death. How comes +it that thou art still alive?" the old Cobra mumbled, twining +lovingly round the ankus-haft. + +"By the Bull that bought me, I do not know! That thing has +killed six times in a night. Let him go out no more." + + + + THE SONG OF THE LITTLE HUNTER + +Ere Mor the Peacock flutters, ere the Monkey People cry, + Ere Chil the Kite swoops down a furlong sheer, +Through the Jungle very softly flits a shadow and a sigh-- + He is Fear, O Little Hunter, he is Fear! + +Very softly down the glade runs a waiting, watching shade, + And the whisper spreads and widens far and near; +And the sweat is on thy brow, for he passes even now-- + He is Fear, O Little Hunter, he is Fear! + +Ere the moon has climbed the mountain, ere the rocks + are ribbed with light, + When the downward-dipping trails are dank and drear, +Comes a breathing hard behind thee--snuffle-snuffle + through the night-- + It is Fear, O Little Hunter, it is Fear! + +On thy knees and draw the bow; bid the shrilling arrow go; + In the empty, mocking thicket plunge the spear; +But thy hands are loosed and weak, and the blood has left + thy cheek-- + It is Fear, O Little Hunter, it is Fear! + +When the heat-cloud sucks the tempest, when the slivered + pine-trees fall, + When the blinding, blaring rain-squalls lash and veer; +Through the war-gongs of the thunder rings a voice more + loud than all-- + It is Fear, O Little Hunter, it is Fear! + +Now the spates are banked and deep; now the footless + boulders leap-- + Now the lightning shows each littlest leaf-rib clear-- +But thy throat is shut and dried, and thy heart against + thy side + Hammers: Fear, O Little Hunter--this is Fear! + + + + QUIQUERN + +The People of the Eastern Ice, they are melting like the snow-- +They beg for coffee and sugar; they go where the white men go. +The People of the Western Ice, they learn to steal and fight; +"They sell their furs to the trading-post: they sell their souls + to the white. +The People of the Southern Ice, they trade with the whaler's +crew; +Their women have many ribbons, but their tents are torn and few. +But the People of the Elder Ice, beyond the white man's ken-- +Their spears are made of the narwhal-horn, and they are the + last of the Men! + Translation. + +"He has opened his eyes. Look!" + +"Put him in the skin again. He will be a strong dog. On the +fourth month we will name him." + +"For whom?" said Amoraq. + +Kadlu's eye rolled round the skin-lined snow-house till it +fell on fourteen-year-old Kotuko sitting on the sleeping-bench, +making a button out of walrus ivory. "Name him for me," +said Kotuko, with a grin. "I shall need him one day." + +Kadlu grinned back till his eyes were almost buried in the fat +of his flat cheeks, and nodded to Amoraq, while the puppy's +fierce mother whined to see her baby wriggling far out of reach +in the little sealskin pouch hung above the warmth of the +blubber-lamp. Kotuko went on with his carving, and Kadlu threw +a rolled bundle of leather dog-harnesses into a tiny little +room that opened from one side of the house, slipped off his +heavy deerskin hunting-suit, put it into a whalebone-net that +hung above another lamp, and dropped down on the sleeping-bench +to whittle at a piece of frozen seal-meat till Amoraq, his wife, +should bring the regular dinner of boiled meat and blood-soup. +He had been out since early dawn at the seal-holes, eight miles +away, and had come home with three big seal. Half-way down the +long, low snow passage or tunnel that led to the inner door +of the house you could hear snappings and yelpings, as the +dogs of his sleigh-team, released from the day's work, scuffled +for warm places. + +When the yelpings grew too loud Kotuko lazily rolled off the +sleeping-bench, and picked up a whip with an eighteen-inch +handle of springy whalebone, and twenty-five feet of heavy, +plaited thong. He dived into the passage, where it sounded as +though all the dogs were eating him alive; but that was no more +than their regular grace before meals. When he crawled out at +the far end, half a dozen furry heads followed him with their +eyes as he went to a sort of gallows of whale-jawbones, from +which the dog's meat was hung; split off the frozen stuff in big +lumps with a broad-headed spear; and stood, his whip in one hand +and the meat in the other. Each beast was called by name, +the weakest first, and woe betide any dog that moved out of his +turn; for the tapering lash would shoot out like thonged +lightning, and flick away an inch or so of hair and hide. +Each beast growled, snapped, choked once over his portion, +and hurried back to the protection of the passage, while the boy +stood upon the snow under the blazing Northern Lights and dealt +out justice. The last to be served was the big black leader of +the team, who kept order when the dogs were harnessed; and to +him Kotuko gave a double allowance of meat as well as an extra +crack of the whip. + +"Ah!" said Kotuko, coiling up the lash," I have a little +one over the lamp that will make a great many howlings. SARPOK! +Get in!" + +He crawled back over the huddled dogs, dusted the dry snow from +his furs with the whalebone beater that Amoraq kept by the door, +tapped the skin-lined roof of the house to shake off any icicles +that might have fallen from the dome of snow above, and curled +up on the bench. The dogs in the passage snored and whined in +their sleep, the boy-baby in Amoraq's deep fur hood kicked and +choked and gurgled, and the mother of the newly-named puppy lay +at Kotuko's side, her eyes fixed on the bundle of sealskin, warm +and safe above the broad yellow flame of the lamp. + +And all this happened far away to the north, beyond Labrador, +beyond Hudson's Strait, where the great tides heave the ice +about, north of Melville Peninsula--north even of the narrow +Fury and Hecla Straits--on the north shore of Baffin Land, +where Bylot's Island stands above the ice of Lancaster Sound +like a pudding-bowl wrong side up. North of Lancaster Sound +there is little we know anything about, except North Devon and +Ellesmere Land; but even there live a few scattered people, +next door, as it were, to the very Pole. + +Kadlu was an Inuit,--what you call an Esquimau,--and his tribe, +some thirty persons all told, belonged to the Tununirmiut--"the +country lying at the back of something." In the maps that +desolate coast is written Navy Board Inlet, but the Inuit name +is best, because the country lies at the very back of everything +in the world. For nine months of the year there is only ice and +snow, and gale after gale, with a cold that no one can realise +who has never seen the thermometer even at zero. For six months +of those nine it is dark; and that is what makes it so horrible. +In the three months of the summer it only freezes every other +day and every night, and then the snow begins to weep off on the +southerly slopes, and a few ground-willows put out their woolly +buds, a tiny stonecrop or so makes believe to blossom, beaches +of fine gravel and rounded stones run down to the open sea, +and polished boulders and streaked rocks lift up above the +granulated snow. But all that is gone in a few weeks, and the +wild winter locks down again on the land; while at sea the ice +tears up and down the offing, jamming and ramming, and splitting +and hitting, and pounding and grounding, till it all freezes +together, ten feet thick, from the land outward to deep water. + +In the winter Kadlu would follow the seal to the edge of this +land-ice, and spear them as they came up to breathe at their +blow-holes. The seal must have open water to live and catch fish +in, and in the deep of winter the ice would sometimes run eighty +miles without a break from the nearest shore. In the spring he +and his people retreated from the floes to the rocky mainland, +where they put up tents of skins, and snared the sea-birds, or +speared the young seal basking on the beaches. Later, they would +go south into Baffin Land after the reindeer, and to get their +year's store of salmon from the hundreds of streams and lakes of +the interior; coming back north in September or October for the +musk-ox hunting and the regular winter sealery. This travelling +was done with dog-sleighs, twenty and thirty miles a day, or +sometimes down the coast in big skin "woman-boats," when the +dogs and the babies lay among the feet of the rowers, and the +women sang songs as they glided from cape to cape over the +glassy, cold waters. All the luxuries that the Tununirmiut knew +came from the south--driftwood for sleigh-runners, rod-iron for +harpoon-tips, steel knives, tin kettles that cooked food much +better than the old soap-stone affairs, flint and steel, and +even matches, as well as coloured ribbons for the women's hair, +little cheap mirrors, and red cloth for the edging of deerskin +dress-jackets. Kadlu traded the rich, creamy, twisted narwhal +horn and musk-ox teeth (these are just as valuable as pearls) to +the Southern Inuit, and they, in turn, traded with the whalers +and the missionary-posts of Exeter and Cumberland Sounds; and so +the chain went on, till a kettle picked up by a ship's cook in +the Bhendy Bazaar might end its days over a blubber-lamp +somewhere on the cool side of the Arctic Circle. + +Kadlu, being a good hunter, was rich in iron harpoons, snow- +knives, bird-darts, and all the other things that make life easy +up there in the great cold; and he was the head of his tribe, +or, as they say, "the man who knows all about it by practice." +This did not give him any authority, except now and then he +could advise his friends to change their hunting-grounds; +but Kotuko used it to domineer a little, in the lazy, fat Inuit +fashion, over the other boys, when they came out at night to +play ball in the moonlight, or to sing the Child's Song to the +Aurora Borealis. + +But at fourteen an Inuit feels himself a man, and Kotuko was +tired of making snares for wild-fowl and kit-foxes, and most +tired of all of helping the women to chew seal- and deer-skins +(that supples them as nothing else can) the long day through, +while the men were out hunting. He wanted to go into the quaggi, +the Singing-House, when the hunters gathered there for their +mysteries, and the angekok, the sorcerer, frightened them into +the most delightful fits after the lamps were put out, and you +could hear the Spirit of the Reindeer stamping on the roof; +and when a spear was thrust out into the open black night it +came back covered with hot blood. He wanted to throw his big +boots into the net with the tired air of the head of a family, +and to gamble with the hunters when they dropped in of an +evening and played a sort of home-made roulette with a tin pot +and a nail. There were hundreds of things that he wanted to do, +but the grown men laughed at him and said, "Wait till you have +been in the buckle, Kotuko. Hunting is not ALL catching." + +Now that his father had named a puppy for him, things looked +brighter. An Inuit does not waste a good dog on his son till the +boy knows something of dog-driving; and Kotuko was more than +sure that he knew more than everything. + +If the puppy had not had an iron constitution he would have died +from over-stuffing and over-handling. Kotuko made him a tiny +harness with a trace to it, and hauled him all over the house- +floor, shouting: "Aua! Ja aua!" (Go to the right). Choiachoi! Ja +choiachoi!" (Go to the left). "Ohaha!" (Stop). The puppy did not +like it at all, but being fished for in this way was pure +happiness beside being put to the sleigh for the first time. +He just sat down on the snow, and played with the seal-hide +trace that ran from his harness to the pitu, the big thong in +the bows of the sleigh. Then the team started, and the puppy +found the heavy ten-foot sleigh running up his back, and +dragging him along the snow, while Kotuko laughed till the tears +ran down his face. There followed days and days of the cruel +whip that hisses like the wind over ice, and his companions all +bit him because he did not know his work, and the harness chafed +him, and he was dot allowed to sleep with Kotuko any more, +but had to take the coldest place in the passage. It was a sad +time for the puppy. + +The boy learned, too, as fast as the dog; though a dog-sleigh is +a heart-breaking thing to manage. Each beast is harnessed, +the weakest nearest to the driver, by his own separate trace, +which runs under his left fore-leg to the main thong, where it +is fastened by a sort of button and loop which can be slipped by +a turn of the wrist, thus freeing one dog at a time. This is +very necessary, because young dogs often get the trace between +their hind legs, where it cuts to the bone. And they one and all +WILL go visiting their friends as they run, jumping in and out +among the traces. Then they fight, and the result is more mixed +than a wet fishing-line next morning. A great deal of trouble +can be avoided by scientific use of the whip. Every Inuit boy +prides himself as being a master of the long lash; but it is +easy to flick at a mark on the ground, and difficult to lean +forward and catch a shirking dog just behind the shoulders when +the sleigh is going at full speed. If you call one dog's name +for "visiting," and accidentally lash another, the two will +fight it out at once, and stop all the others. Again, if you +travel with a companion and begin to talk, or by yourself and +sing, the dogs will halt, turn round, and sit down to hear what +you have to say. Kotuko was run away from once or twice through +forgetting to block the sleigh when he stopped; and he broke +many lashings, and ruined a few thongs before he could be +trusted with a full team of eight and the light sleigh. Then he +felt himself a person of consequence, and on smooth, black ice, +with a bold heart and a quick elbow, he smoked along over the +levels as fast as a pack in full cry. He would go ten miles to +the seal-holes, and when he was on the hunting~grounds he would +twitch a trace loose from the pitu, and free the big black +leader, who was the cleverest dog in the team. As soon as the +dog had scented a breathing-hole, Kotuko would reverse the +sleigh, driving a couple of sawed-off antlers, that stuck up +like perambulator-handles from the back-rest, deep into the +snow, so that the team could not get away. Then he would crawl +forward inch by inch, and wait till the seal came up to breathe. +Then he would stab down swiftly with his spear and running-line, +and presently would haul his seal up to the lip of the ice, +while the black leader came up and helped to pull the carcass +across the ice to the sleigh. That was the time when the +harnessed dogs yelled and foamed with excitement, and Kotuko +laid the long lash like a red-hot bar across all their faces, +till the carcass froze stiff. Going home was the heavy work. +The loaded sleigh had to be humoured among the rough ice, +and the dogs sat down and looked hungrily at the seal instead +of pulling. At last they would strike the well-worn sleigh-road +to the village, and toodle-kiyi along the ringing ice, heads +down and tails up, while Kotuko struck up the "An-gutivaun +tai-na tau-na-ne taina" (The Song of the Returning Hunter), +and voices hailed him from house to house under all that dim, +star-littern sky. + +When Kotuko the dog came to his full growth he enjoyed himself +too. He fought his way up the team steadily, fight after fight, +till one fine evening, over their food, he tackled the big, +black leader (Kotuko the boy saw fair play), and made second dog +of him, as they say. So he was promoted to the long thong of the +leading dog, running five feet in advance of all the others: +it was his bounden duty to stop all fighting, in harness or out +of it, and he wore a collar of copper wire, very thick and +heavy. On special occasions he was fed with cooked food inside +the house, and sometimes was allowed to sleep on the bench with +Kotuko. He was a good seal-dog, and would keep a musk-ox at bay +by running round him and snapping at his heels. He would even-- +and this for a sleigh-dog is the last proof of bravery--he would +even stand up to the gaunt Arctic wolf, whom all dogs of the +North, as a rule, fear beyond anything that walks the snow. +He and his master--they did not count the team of ordinary dogs +as company--hunted together, day after day and night after +night, fur-wrapped boy and savage, long-haired, narrow-eyed, +white-fanged, yellow brute. All an Inuit has to do is to get +food and skins for himself and his family. The women-folk make +the skins into clothing, and occasionally help in trapping small +game; but the bulk of the food--and they eat enormously--must be +found by the men. If the supply fails there is no one up there +to buy or beg or borrow from. The people must die. + +An Inuit does not think of these chances till he is forced to. +Kadlu, Kotuko, Amoraq, and the boy-baby who kicked about in +Amoraq's fur hood and chewed pieces of blubber all day, were as +happy together as any family in the world. They came of a very +gentle race--an Inuit seldom loses his temper, and almost never +strikes a child--who did not know exactly what telling a real +lie meant, still less how to steal. They were content to spear +their living out of the heart of the bitter, hopeless cold; +to smile oily smiles, and tell queer ghost and fairy tales +of evenings, and eat till they could eat no more, and sing +the endless woman's song: "Amna aya, aya amna, ah! ah!" through +the long lamp-lighted days as they mended their clothes and +their hunting-gear. + +But one terrible winter everything betrayed them. +The Tununirmiut returned from the yearly salmon-fishing, +and made their houses on the early ice to the north of Bylot's +Island, ready to go after the seal as soon as the sea froze. +But it was an early and savage autumn. All through September +there were continuous gales that broke up the smooth seal-ice +when it was only four or five feet thick, and forced it inland, +and piled a great barrier, some twenty miles broad, of lumped +and ragged and needly ice, over which it was impossible to draw +the dog-sleighs. The edge of the floe off which the seal were +used to fish in winter lay perhaps twenty miles beyond this +barrier, and out of reach of the Tununirmiut. Even so, they +might have managed to scrape through the winter on their stock +of frozen salmon and stored blubber, and what the traps gave +them, but in December one of their hunters came across a tupik +(a skin-tent) of three women and a girl nearly dead, whose men +had come down from the far North and been crushed in their +little skin hunting-boats while they were out after the long- +horned narwhal. Kadlu, of course, could only distribute the +women among the huts of the winter village, for no Inuit dare +refuse a meal to a stranger. He never knows when his own turn +may come to beg. Amoraq took the girl, who was about fourteen, +into her own house as a sort of servant. From the cut of her +sharp-pointed hood, and the long diamond pattern of her white +deer-skin leggings, they supposed she came from Ellesmere Land. +She had never seen tin cooking-pots or wooden-shod sleighs +before; but Kotuko the boy and Kotuko the dog were rather +fond of her. + +Then all the foxes went south, and even the wolverine, that +growling, blunt-headed little thief of the snow, did not take +the trouble to follow the line of empty traps that Kotuko set. +The tribe lost a couple of their best hunters, who were badly +crippled in a fight with a musk-ox, and this threw more work on +the others. Kotuko went out, day after day, with a light +hunting-sleigh and six or seven of the strongest dogs, looking +till his eyes ached for some patch of clear ice where a seal +might perhaps have scratched a breathing-hole. Kotuko the dog +ranged far and wide, and in the dead stillness of the ice-fields +Kotuko the boy could hear his half-choked whine of excitement, +above a seal-hole three miles away, as plainly as though he were +at his elbow. When the dog found a hole the boy would build +himself a little, low snow wall to keep off the worst of the +bitter wind, and there he would wait ten, twelve, twenty hours +for the seal to come up to breathe, his eyes glued to the tiny +mark he had made above the hole to guide the downward thrust of +his harpoon, a little seal-skin mat under his feet, and his legs +tied together in the tutareang (the buckle that the old hunters +had talked about). This helps to keep a man's legs from +twitching as he waits and waits and waits for the quick-eared +seal to rise. Though there is no excitement in it, you can +easily believe that the sitting still in the buckle with the +thermometer perhaps forty degrees below zero is the hardest work +an Inuit knows. When a seal was caught, Kotuko the dog would +bound forward, his trace trailing behind him, and help to pull +the body to the sleigh, where the tired and hungry dogs lay +sullenly under the lee of the broken ice. + +A seal did not go very far, for each mouth in the little village +had a right to be filled, and neither bone, hide, nor sinew was +wasted. The dogs' meat was taken for human use, and Amoraq fed +the team with pieces of old summer skin-tents raked out from +under the sleeping-bench, and they howled and howled again, and +waked to howl hungrily. One could tell by the soap-stone lamps +in the huts that famine was near. In good seasons, when blubber +was plentiful, the light in the boat-shaped lamps would be two +feet high--cheerful, oily, and yellow. Now it was a bare six +inches: Amoraq carefully pricked down the moss wick, when an +unwatched flame brightened for a moment, and the eyes of all the +family followed her hand. The horror of famine up there in the +great cold is not so much dying, as dying in the dark. All the +Inuit dread the dark that presses on them without a break for +six months in each year; and when the lamps are low in the +houses the minds of people begin to be shaken and confused. + +But worse was to come. + +The underfed dogs snapped and growled in the passages, +glaring at the cold stars, and snuffing into the bitter wind, +night after night. When they stopped howling the silence fell +down again as solid and heavy as a snowdrift against a door, +and men could hear the beating of their blood in the thin +passages of the ear, and the thumping of their own hearts, +that sounded as loud as the noise of sorcerers' drums beaten +across the snow. One night Kotuko the dog, who had been +unusually sullen in harness, leaped up and pushed his head +against Kotuko's knee. Kotuko patted him, but the dog still +pushed blindly forward, fawning. Then Kadlu waked, and gripped +the heavy wolf-like head, and stared into the glassy eyes. +The dog whimpered and shivered between Kadlu's knees. The hair +rose about his neck, and he growled as though a stranger were at +the door; then he barked joyously, and rolled on the ground, and +bit at Kotuko's boot like a puppy. + +"What is it?" said Kotuko; for he was beginning to be afraid. + +"The sickness," Kadlu answered. "It is the dog sickness." Kotuko +the dog lifted his nose and howled and howled again. + +"I have not seen this before. What will he do?" said Kotuko. + +Kadlu shrugged one shoulder a little, and crossed the hut for +his short stabbing-harpoon. The big dog looked at him, howled +again, and slunk away down the passage, while the other dogs +drew aside right and left to give him ample room. When he was +out on the snow he barked furiously, as though on the trail of +a musk-ox, and, barking and leaping and frisking, passed out of +sight. His trouble was not hydrophobia, but simple, plain +madness. The cold and the hunger, and, above all, the dark, +had turned his head; and when the terrible dog-sickness once +shows itself in a team, it spreads like wild-fire. Next hunting- +day another dog sickened, and was killed then and there by +Kotuko as he bit and struggled among the traces. Then the black +second dog, who had been the leader in the old days, suddenly +gave tongue on an imaginary reindeer-track, and when they +slipped him from the pitu he flew at the throat of an ice-cliff, +and ran away as his leader had done, his harness on his back. +After that no one would take the dogs out again. They needed +them for something else, and the dogs knew it; and though they +were tied down and fed by hand, their eyes were full of despair +and fear. To make things worse, the old women began to tell +ghost-tales, and to say that they had met the spirits of the +dead hunters lost that autumn, who prophesied all sorts of +horrible things. + +Kotuko grieved more for the loss of his dog than anything else; +for though an Inuit eats enormously he also knows how to starve. +But the hunger, the darkness, the cold, and the exposure told on +his strength, and he began to hear voices inside his head, and +to see people who were not there, out of the tail of his eye. +One night--he had unbuckled himself after ten hours' waiting +above a "blind" seal-hole, and was staggering back to the +village faint and dizzy--he halted to lean his back against +a boulder which happened to be supported like a rocking-stone +on a single jutting point of ice. His weight disturbed the +balance of the thing, it rolled over ponderously, and as Kotuko +sprang aside to avoid it, slid after him, squeaking and hissing +on the ice-slope. + +That was enough for Kotuko. He had been brought up to believe +that every rock and boulder had its owner (its inua), who was +generally a one-eyed kind of a Woman-Thing called a tornaq, +and that when a tornaq meant to help a man she rolled after him +inside her stone house, and asked him whether he would take her +for a guardian spirit. (In summer thaws the ice-propped rocks +and boulders roll and slip all over the face of the land, so you +can easily see how the idea of live stones arose.) Kotuko heard +the blood beating in his ears as he had heard it all day, and he +thought that was the tornaq of the stone speaking to him. +Before he reached home he was quite certain that he had held a +long conversation with her, and as all his people believed that +this was quite possible, no one contradicted him. + +"She said to me, 'I jump down, I jump down from my place on the +snow,'" cried Kotuko, with hollow eyes, leaning forward in the +half-lighted hut. "She said, 'I will be a guide.' She said, +'I will guide you to the good seal-holes.' To-morrow I go out, +and the tornaq will guide me." + +Then the angekok, the village sorcerer, came in, and Kotuko told +him the tale a second time. It lost nothing in the telling. + +"Follow the tornait [the spirits of the stones], and they will +bring us food again," said the angekok. + +Now the girl from the North had been lying near the lamp, +eating very little and saying less for days past; but when +Amoraq and Kadlu next morning packed and lashed a little hand- +sleigh for Kotuko, and loaded it with his hunting-gear and as +much blubber and frozen seal-meat as they could spare, she took +the pulling-rope, and stepped out boldly at the boy's side. + +"Your house is my house," she said, as the little +bone-shod sleigh squeaked and bumped behind them in +the awful Arctic night. + +"My house is your house," said Kotuko; "but I think that we +shall both go to Sedna together." + +Now Sedna is the Mistress of the Underworld, and the Inuit +believe that every one who dies must spend a year in her +horrible country before going to Quadliparmiut, the Happy +Place, where it never freezes and the fat reindeer trot up +when you call. + +Through the village people were shouting: "The tornait have +spoken to Kotuko. They will show him open ice. He will bring +us the seal again!" Their voices were soon swallowed up by the +cold, empty dark, and Kotuko and the girl shouldered close +together as they strained on the pulling-rope or humoured the +sleigh through the ice in the direction of the Polar Sea. +Kotuko insisted that the tornaq of the stone had told him to go +north, and north they went under Tuktuqdjung the Reindeer--those +stars that we call the Great Bear. + +No European could have made five miles a day over the ice- +rubbish and the sharp-edged drifts; but those two knew exactly +the turn of the wrist that coaxes a sleigh round a hummock, +the jerk that nearly lifts it out of an ice-crack, and the exact +strength that goes to the few quiet strokes of the spear-head +that make a path possible when everything looks hopeless. + +The girl said nothing, but bowed her head, and the long +wolverine-fur fringe of her ermine hood blew across her broad, +dark face. The sky above them was an intense velvety black, +changing to bands of Indian red on the horizon, where the great +stars burned like street-lamps. From time to time a greenish +wave of the Northern Lights would roll across the hollow of the +high heavens, flick like a flag, and disappear; or a meteor +would crackle from darkness to darkness, trailing a shower of +sparks behind. Then they could see the ridged and furrowed +surface of the floe tipped and laced with strange colours--red, +copper, and bluish; but in the ordinary starlight everything +turned to one frost-bitten gray. The floe, as you will remember, +had been battered and tormented by the autumn gales till it was +one frozen earthquake. There were gullies and ravines, and holes +like gravel-pits, cut in ice; lumps and scattered pieces frozen +down to the original floor of the floe; blotches of old black +ice that had been thrust under the floe in some gale and heaved +up again; roundish boulders of ice; saw-like edges of ice carved +by the snow that flies before the wind; and sunken pits where +thirty or forty acres lay below the level of the rest of the +field. From a little distance you might have taken the lumps +for seal or walrus, overturned sleighs or men on a hunting +expedition, or even the great Ten-legged White Spirit-Bear +himself; but in spite of these fantastic shapes, all on the +very edge of starting into life, there was neither sound nor +the least faint echo of sound. And through this silence and +through this waste, where the sudden lights flapped and went +out again, the sleigh and the two that pulled it crawled like +things in a nightmare--a nightmare of the end of the world at +the end of the world. + +When they were tired Kotuko would make what the hunters call a +"half-house," a very small snow hut, into which they would +huddle with the travelling-lamp, and try to thaw out the frozen +seal-meat. When they had slept, the march began again--thirty +miles a day to get ten miles northward. The girl was always very +silent, but Kotuko muttered to himself and broke out into songs +he had learned in the Singing-House--summer songs, and reindeer +and salmon songs--all horribly out of place at that season. +He would declare that he heard the tornaq growling to him, and +would run wildly up a hummock, tossing his arms and speaking in +loud, threatening tones. To tell the truth, Kotuko was very +nearly crazy for the time being; but the girl was sure that he +was being guided by his guardian spirit, and that everything +would come right. She was not surprised, therefore, when at the +end of the fourth march Kotuko, whose eyes were burning like +fire-balls in his head, told her that his tornaq was following +them across the snow in the shape of a two-headed dog. The girl +looked where Kotuko pointed, and something seemed to slip into +a ravine. It was certainly not human, but everybody knew that +the tornait preferred to appear in the shape of bear and seal, +and such like. + +It might have been the Ten-legged White Spirit-Bear himself, +or it might have been anything, for Kotuko and the girl were +so starved that their eyes were untrustworthy. They had trapped +nothing, and seen no trace of game since they had left the +village; their food would not hold out for another week, +and there was a gale coming. A Polar storm can blow for ten days +without a break, and all that while it is certain death to be +abroad. Kotuko laid up a snow-house large enough to take in the +hand-sleigh (never be separated from your meat), and while he +was shaping the last irregular block of ice that makes the +key-stone of the roof, he saw a Thing looking at him from a +little cliff of ice half a mile away. The air was hazy, and the +Thing seemed to be forty feet long and ten feet high, with +twenty feet of tail and a shape that quivered all along the +outlines. The girl saw it too, but instead of crying aloud with +terror, said quietly, "That is Quiquern. What comes after?" + +"He will speak to me," said Kotuko; but the snow-knife trembled +in his hand as he spoke, because however much a man may believe +that he is a friend of strange and ugly spirits, he seldom likes +to be taken quite at his word. Quiquern, too, is the phantom of +a gigantic toothless dog without any hair, who is supposed to +live in the far North, and to wander about the country just +before things are going to happen. They may be pleasant or +unpleasant things, but not even the sorcerers care to speak +about Quiquern. He makes the dogs go mad. Like the Spirit-Bear, +he has several extra pairs of legs,--six or eight,--and this +Thing jumping up and down in the haze had more legs than any +real dog needed. Kotuko and the girl huddled into their hut +quickly. Of course if Quiquern had wanted them, he could have +torn it to pieces above their heads, but the sense of a foot- +thick snow-wall between themselves and the wicked dark was great +comfort. The gale broke with a shriek of wind like the shriek of +a train, and for three days and three nights it held, never +varying one point, and never lulling even for a minute. They fed +the stone lamp between their knees, and nibbled at the half-warm +seal-meat, and watched the black soot gather on the roof for +seventy-two long hours. The girl counted up the food in the +sleigh; there was not more than two days' supply, and Kotuko +looked over the iron heads and the deer-sinew fastenings of +his harpoon and his seal-lance and his bird-dart. There was +nothing else to do. + +"We shall go to Sedna soon--very soon," the girl whispered. +"In three days we shall lie down and go. Will your tornaq do +nothing? Sing her an angekok's song to make her come here." + +He began to sing in the high-pitched howl of the magic songs, +and the gale went down slowly. In the middle of his song the +girl started, laid her mittened hand and then her head to the +ice floor of the hut. Kotuko followed her example, and the two +kneeled, staring into each other's eyes, and listening with +every nerve. He ripped a thin sliver of whalebone from the +rim of a bird-snare that lay on the sleigh, and, after +straightening, set it upright in a little hole in the ice, +firming it down with his mitten. It was almost as delicately +adjusted as a compass-needle, and now instead of listening they +watched. The thin rod quivered a little--the least little jar +in the world; then it vibrated steadily for a few seconds, +came to rest, and vibrated again, this time nodding to another +point of the compass. + +"Too soon!" said Kotuko. "Some big floe has broken far away +outside." + +The girl pointed at the rod, and shook her head. "It is the big +breaking," she said. "Listen to the ground-ice. It knocks." + +When they kneeled this time they heard the most curious muffled +grunts and knockings, apparently under their feet. Sometimes it +sounded as though a blind puppy were squeaking above the lamp; +then as if a stone were being ground on hard ice; and again, +like muffled blows on a drum; but all dragged out and made +small, as though they travelled through a little horn a weary +distance away. + +"We shall not go to Sedna lying down," said Kotuko. "It is the +breaking. The tornaq has cheated us. We shall die." + +All this may sound absurd enough, but the two were face to face +with a very real danger. The three days' gale had driven the +deep water of Baffin's Bay southerly, and piled it on to the +edge of the far-reaching land-ice that stretches from Bylot's +Island to the west. Also, the strong current which sets east out +of Lancaster Sound carried with it mile upon mile of what they +call pack-ice--rough ice that has not frozen into fields; +and this pack was bombarding the floe at the same time that +the swell and heave of the storm-worked sea was weakening and +undermining it. What Kotuko and the girl had been listening to +were the faint echoes of that fight thirty or forty miles away, +and the little tell-tale rod quivered to the shock of it. + +Now, as the Inuit say, when the ice once wakes after its +long winter sleep, there is no knowing what may happen, +for solid floe-ice changes shape almost as quickly as a cloud. +The gale was evidently a spring gale sent out of time, and +anything was possible. + +Yet the two were happier in their minds than before. If the floe +broke up there would be no more waiting and suffering. Spirits, +goblins, and witch-people were moving about on the racking ice, +and they might find themselves stepping into Sedna's country +side by side with all sorts of wild Things, the flush of +excitement still on them. When they left the hut after the gale, +the noise on the horizon was steadily growing, and the tough ice +moaned and buzzed all round them. + +"It is still waiting," said Kotuko. + +On the top of a hummock sat or crouched the eight-legged Thing +that they had seen three days before--and it howled horribly. + +"Let us follow," said the girl. "It may know some way that does +not lead to Sedna"; but she reeled from weakness as she took the +pulling-rope. The Thing moved off slowly and clumsily across the +ridges, heading always toward the westward and the land, and +they followed, while the growling thunder at the edge of the +floe rolled nearer and nearer. The floe's lip was split and +cracked in every direction for three or four miles inland, +and great pans of ten-foot-thick ice, from a few yards to twenty +acres square, were jolting and ducking and surging into one +another, and into the yet unbroken floe, as the heavy swell took +and shook and spouted between them. This battering-ram ice was, +so to speak, the first army that the sea was flinging against +the floe. The incessant crash and jar of these cakes almost +drowned the ripping sound of sheets of pack-ice driven bodily +under the floe as cards are hastily pushed under a tablecloth. +Where the water was shallow these sheets would be piled one atop +of the other till the bottommost touched mud fifty feet down, +and the discoloured sea banked behind the muddy ice till the +increasing pressure drove all forward again. In addition to the +floe and the pack-ice, the gale and the currents were bringing +down true bergs, sailing mountains of ice, snapped off from the +Greenland side of the water or the north shore of Melville Bay. +They pounded in solemnly, the waves breaking white round them, +and advanced on the floe like an old-time fleet under full sail. +A berg that seemed ready to carry the world before it would +ground helplessly in deep water, reel over, and wallow in a +lather of foam and mud and flying frozen spray, while a much +smaller and lower one would rip and ride into the flat floe, +flinging tons of ice on either side, and cutting a track half a +mile long before it was stopped. Some fell like swords, shearing +a raw-edged canal; and others splintered into a shower of +blocks, weighing scores of tons apiece, that whirled and skirted +among the hummocks. Others, again, rose up bodily out of the +water when they shoaled, twisted as though in pain, and fell +solidly on their sides, while the sea threshed over their +shoulders. This trampling and crowding and bending and buckling +and arching of the ice into every possible shape was going on as +far as the eye could reach all along the north line of the floe. +>From where Kotuko and the girl were, the confusion looked no +more than an uneasy, rippling, crawling movement under the +horizon; but it came toward them each moment, and they could +hear, far away to landward a heavy booming, as it might have +been the boom of artillery through a fog. That showed that the +floe was being jammed home against the iron cliffs of Bylot's +Island, the land to the southward behind them. + +"This has never been before," said Kotuko, staring stupidly. +"This is not the time. How can the floe break NOW?" + +"Follow THAT! the girl cried, pointing to the Thing half +limping, half running distractedly before them. They followed, +tugging at the hand- sleigh, while nearer and nearer came the +roaring march of the ice. At last the fields round them cracked +and starred in every direction, and the cracks opened and +snapped like the teeth of wolves. But where the Thing rested, +on a mound of old and scattered ice-blocks some fifty feet high, +there was no motion. Kotuko leaped forward wildly, dragging the +girl after him, and crawled to the bottom of the mound. +The talking of the ice grew louder and louder round them, +but the mound stayed fast, and, as the girl looked at him, +he threw his right elbow upward and outward, making the Inuit +sign for land in the shape of an island. And land it was that +the eight-legged, limping Thing had led them to--some granite- +tipped, sand-beached islet off the coast, shod and sheathed +and masked with ice so that no man could have told it from the +floe, but at the bottom solid earth, and not shifting ice! +The smashing and rebound of the floes as they grounded and +splintered marked the borders of it, and a friendly shoal ran +out to the northward, and turned aside the rush of the heaviest +ice, exactly as a ploughshare turns over loam. There was danger, +of course, that some heavily squeezed ice-field might shoot up +the beach, and plane off the top of the islet bodily; but that +did not trouble Kotuko and the girl when they made their snow- +house and began to eat, and heard the ice hammer and skid along +the beach. The Thing had disappeared, and Kotuko was talking +excitedly about his power over spirits as he crouched round the +lamp. In the middle of his wild sayings the girl began to laugh, +and rock herself backward and forward. + +Behind her shoulder, crawling into the hut crawl by crawl, +there were two heads, one yellow and one black, that belonged to +two of the most sorrowful and ashamed dogs that ever you saw. +Kotuko the dog was one, and the black leader was the other. +Both were now fat, well-looking, and quite restored to their +proper minds, but coupled to each other in an extraordinary +fashion. When the black leader ran off, you remember, +his harness was still on him. He must have met Kotuko the dog, +and played or fought with him, for his shoulder-loop had caught +in the plaited copper wire of Kotuko's collar, and had drawn +tight, so that neither could get at the trace to gnaw it apart, +but each was fastened sidelong to his neighbour's neck. +That, with the freedom of hunting on their own account, +must have helped to cure their madness. They were very sober. + +The girl pushed the two shamefaced creatures towards Kotuko, +and, sobbing with laughter, cried, "That is Quiquern, who led +us to safe ground. Look at his eight legs and double head!" + +Kotuko cut them free, and they fell into his arms, yellow and +black together, trying to explain how they had got their senses +back again. Kotuko ran a hand down their ribs, which were round +and well clothed. "They have found food," he said, with a grin. +"I do not think we shall go to Sedna so soon. My tornaq sent +these. The sickness has left them." + +As soon as they had greeted Kotuko, these two, who had +been forced to sleep and eat and hunt together for the past +few weeks, flew at each other's throat, and there was a +beautiful battle in the snow-house. "Empty dogs do not fight," +Kotuko said. "They have found the seal. Let us sleep. We shall +find food." + +When they waked there was open water on the north beach of the +island, and all the loosened ice had been driven landward. +The first sound of the surf is one of the most delightful that +the Inuit can hear, for it means that spring is on the road. +Kotuko and the girl took hold of hands and smiled, for the +clear, full roar of the surge among the ice reminded them of +salmon and reindeer time and the smell of blossoming ground- +willows. Even as they looked, the sea began to skim over between +the floating cakes of ice, so intense was the cold; but on the +horizon there was a vast red glare, and that was the light of +the sunken sun. It was more like hearing him yawn in his sleep +than seeing him rise, and the glare lasted for only a few +minutes, but it marked the turn of the year. Nothing, they felt, +could alter that. + +Kotuko found the dogs fighting over a fresh-killed seal who was +following the fish that a gale always disturbs. He was the first +of some twenty or thirty seal that landed on the island in the +course of the day, and till the sea froze hard there were +hundreds of keen black heads rejoicing in the shallow free water +and floating about with the floating ice. + +It was good to eat seal-liver again; to fill the lamps +recklessly with blubber, and watch the flame blaze three feet in +the air; but as soon as the new sea-ice bore, Kotuko and the +girl loaded the hand-sleigh, and made the two dogs pull as they +had never pulled in their lives, for they feared what might have +happened in their village. The weather was as pitiless as usual; +but it is easier to draw a sleigh loaded with good food than to +hunt starving. They left five-and-twenty seal carcasses buried +in the ice of the beach, all ready for use, and hurried back to +their people. The dogs showed them the way as soon as Kotuko +told them what was expected, and though there was no sign of a +landmark, in two days they were giving tongue outside Kadlu's +house. Only three dogs answered them; the others had been eaten, +and the houses were all dark. But when Kotuko shouted, "Ojo!" +(boiled meat), weak voices replied, and when he called the +muster of the village name by name, very distinctly, there were +no gaps in it. + +An hour later the lamps blazed in Kadlu's house; snow-water was +heating; the pots were beginning to simmer, and the snow was +dripping from the roof, as Amoraq made ready a meal for all the +village, and the boy-baby in the hood chewed at a strip of rich +nutty blubber, and the hunters slowly and methodically filled +themselves to the very brim with seal-meat. Kotuko and the +girl told their tale. The two dogs sat between them, and +whenever their names came in, they cocked an ear apiece and +looked most thoroughly ashamed of themselves. A dog who has +once gone mad and recovered, the Inuit say, is safe against +all further attacks. + +"So the tornaq did not forget us," said Kotuko. The storm blew, +the ice broke, and the seal swam in behind the fish that were +frightened by the storm. Now the new seal-holes are not two days +distant. Let the good hunters go to-morrow and bring back the +seal I have speared--twenty-five seal buried in the ice. When we +have eaten those we will all follow the seal on the floe." + +"What do YOU do?" said the sorcerer in the same sort of voice as +he used to Kadlu, richest of the Tununirmiut. + +Kadlu looked at the girl from the North, and said quietly, +"WE build a house." He pointed to the north-west side of Kadlu's +house, for that is the side on which the married son or daughter +always lives. + +The girl turned her hands palm upward, with a little despairing +shake of her head. She was a foreigner, picked up starving, +and could bring nothing to the housekeeping. + +Amoraq jumped from the bench where she sat, and began to sweep +things into the girl's lap--stone lamps, iron skin-scrapers, +tin kettles, deer- skins embroidered with musk-ox teeth, and +real canvas-needles such as sailors use--the finest dowry that +has ever been given on the far edge of the Arctic Circle, and +the girl from the North bowed her head down to the very floor. + +"Also these!" said Kotuko, laughing and signing to the dogs, +who thrust their cold muzzles into the girl's face. + +"Ah," said the angekok, with an important cough, as though he +had been thinking it all over. "As soon as Kotuko left the +village I went to the Singing-House and sang magic. I sang all +the long nights, and called upon the Spirit of the Reindeer. +MY singing made the gale blow that broke the ice and drew the +two dogs toward Kotuko when the ice would have crushed his +bones. MY song drew the seal in behind the broken ice. +My body lay still in the quaggi, but my spirit ran about on the +ice, and guided Kotuko and the dogs in all the things they did. +I did it." + +Everybody was full and sleepy, so no one contradicted; and the +angekok, by virtue of his office, helped himself to yet another +lump of boiled meat, and lay down to sleep with the others in +the warm, well-lighted, oil-smelling home. + +..... + +Now Kotuko, who drew very well in the Inuit fashion, scratched +pictures of all these adventures on a long, flat piece of ivory +with a hole at one end. When he and the girl went north to +Ellesmere Land in the year of the Wonderful Open Winter, he left +the picture-story with Kadlu, who lost it in the shingle when +his dog-sleigh broke down one summer on the beach of Lake +Netilling at Nikosiring, and there a Lake Inuit found it next +spring and sold it to a man at Imigen who was interpreter on a +Cumberland Sound whaler, and he sold it to Hans Olsen, who was +afterward a quartermaster on board a big steamer that took +tourists to the North Cape in Norway. When the tourist season +was over, the steamer ran between London and Australia, stopping +at Ceylon, and there Olsen sold the ivory to a Cingalese +jeweller for two imitation sapphires. I found it under some +rubbish in a house at Colombo, and have translated it from one +end to the other. + + + + 'ANGUTIVAUN TAINA' + +[This is a very free translation of the Song of the Returning +Hunter, as the men used to sing it after seal-spearing. +The Inuit always repeat things over and over again.] + + Our gloves are stiff with the frozen blood, + Our furs with the drifted snow, + As we come in with the seal--the seal! + In from the edge of the floe. + + Au jana! Aua! Oha! Haq! + And the yelping dog-teams go, + And the long whips crack, and the men come back, + Back from the edge of the floe ! + + We tracked our seal to his secret place, + We heard him scratch below, + We made our mark, and we watched beside, + Out on the edge of the floe. + + We raised our lance when he rose to breathe, + We drove it downward--so! + And we played him thus, and we killed him thus, + Out on the edge of the floe. + + Our gloves are glued with the frozen blood, + Our eyes with the drifting snow; + But we come back to our wives again, + Back from the edge of the floe! + + Au jana! Aua! Oha! Haq! + And the loaded dog-teams go, + And the wives can hear their men come back. + Back from the edge of the floe! + + + + RED DOG + +For our white and our excellent nights---for the nights of + swift running. + Fair ranging, far seeing, good hunting, sure cunning! +For the smells of the dawning, untainted, ere dew has departed! +For the rush through the mist, and the quarry blind-started! +For the cry of our mates when the sambhur has wheeled and is + standing at bay, + For the risk and the riot of night! + For the sleep at the lair-mouth by day, + It is met, and we go to the fight. + Bay! O Bay! + +It was after the letting in of the Jungle that the pleasantest +part of Mowgli's life began. He had the good conscience that +comes from paying debts; all the Jungle was his friend, and just +a little afraid of him. The things that he did and saw and heard +when he was wandering from one people to another, with or +without his four companions, would make many many stories, +each as long as this one. So you will never be told how he met +the Mad Elephant of Mandla, who killed two-and-twenty bullocks +drawing eleven carts of coined silver to the Government +Treasury, and scattered the shiny rupees in the dust; how he +fought Jacala, the Crocodile, all one long night in the Marshes +of the North, and broke his skinning-knife on the brute's back- +plates; how he found a new and longer knife round the neck of a +man who had been killed by a wild boar, and how he tracked that +boar and killed him as a fair price for the knife; how he was +caught up once in the Great Famine, by the moving of the deer, +and nearly crushed to death in the swaying hot herds; how he +saved Hathi the Silent from being once more trapped in a pit +with a stake at the bottom, and how, next day, he himself fell +into a very cunning leopard-trap, and how Hathi broke the thick +wooden bars to pieces above him; how he milked the wild +buffaloes in the swamp, and how---- + +But we must tell one tale at a time. Father and Mother Wolf +died, and Mowgli rolled a big boulder against the mouth of their +cave, and cried the Death Song over them; Baloo grew very old +and stiff, and even Bagheera, whose nerves were steel and whose +muscles were iron, was a shade slower on the kill than he had +been. Akela turned from gray to milky white with pure age; +his ribs stuck out, and he walked as though he had been made +of wood, and Mowgli killed for him. But the young wolves, +the children of the disbanded Seeonee Pack, throve and +increased, and when there were about forty of them, masterless, +full-voiced, clean-footed five-year-olds, Akela told them that +they ought to gather themselves together ahd follow the Law, +and run under one head, as befitted the Free People. + +This was not a question in which Mowgli concerned himself, for, +as he said, he had eaten sour fruit, and he knew the tree it +hung from; but when Phao, son of Phaona (his father was the Gray +Tracker in the days of Akela's headship), fought his way to the +leadership of the Pack, according to the Jungle Law, and the old +calls and songs began to ring under the stars once more, Mowgli +came to the Council Rock for memory's sake. When he chose to +speak the Pack waited till he had finished, and he sat at +Akela's side on the rock above Phao. Those were days of good +hunting and good sleeping. No stranger cared to break into the +jungles that belonged to Mowgli's people, as they called the +Pack, and the young wolves grew fat and strong, and there were +many cubs to bring to the Looking-over. Mowgli always attended +a Looking-over, remembering the night when a black panther +bought a naked brown baby into the pack, and the long call, +"Look, look well, O Wolves," made his heart flutter. Otherwise, +he would be far away in the Jungle with his four brothers, +tasting, touching, seeing, and feeling new things. + +One twilight when he was trotting leisurely across the ranges +to give Akela the half of a buck that he had killed, while the +Four jogged behind him, sparring a little, and tumbling one +another over for joy of being alive, he heard a cry that had +never been heard since the bad days of Shere Khan. It was what +they call in the Jungle the pheeal, a hideous kind of shriek +that the jackal gives when he is hunting behind a tiger, or when +there is a big killing afoot. If you can imagine a mixture of +hate, triumph, fear, and despair, with a kind of leer running +through it, you will get some notion of the pheeal that rose and +sank and wavered and quavered far away across the Waingunga. +The Four stopped at once, bristling and growling. Mowgli's hand +went to his knife, and he checked, the blood in his face, +his eyebrows knotted. + +"There is no Striped One dare kill here," he said. + +"That is not the cry of the Forerunner," answered Gray Brother. +"It is some great killing. Listen!" + +It broke out again, half sobbing and half chuckling, just as +though the jackal had soft human lips. Then Mowgli drew deep +breath, and ran to the Council Rock, overtaking on his way +hurrying wolves of the Pack. Phao and Akela were on the Rock +together, and below them, every nerve strained, sat the others. +The mothers and the cubs were cantering off to their lairs; +for when the pheeal cries it is no time for weak things to +be abroad. + +They could hear nothing except the Waingunga rushing and +gurgling in the dark, and the light evening winds among the +tree-tops, till suddenly across the river a wolf called. It was +no wolf of the Pack, for they were all at the Rock. The note +changed to a long, despairing bay; and "Dhole!" it said, "Dhole! +dhole! dhole!" They heard tired feet on the rocks, and a gaunt +wolf, streaked with red on his flanks, his right fore-paw +useless, and his jaws white with foam, flung himself into the +circle and lay gasping at Mowgli's feet. + +"Good hunting! Under whose Headship?" said Phao gravely. + +"Good hunting! Won-tolla am I," was the answer. He meant that +he was a solitary wolf, fending for himself, his mate, and his +cubs in some lonely lair, as do many wolves in the south. +Won-tolla means an Outlier--one who lies out from any Pack. +Then he panted, and they could see his heart-beats shake him +backward and forward. + +"What moves?" said Phao, for that is the question all the Jungle +asks after the pheeal cries. + +"The dhole, the dhole of the Dekkan--Red Dog, the Killer! +They came north from the south saying the Dekkan was empty and +killing out by the way. When this moon was new there were four +to me--my mate and three cubs. She would teach them to kill on +the grass plains, hiding to drive the buck, as we do who are of +the open. At midnight I heard them together, full tongue on the +trail. At the dawn-wind I found them stiff in the grass--four, +Free People, four when this moon was new. Then sought I my +Blood-Right and found the dhole." + +"How many?" said Mowgli quickly; the Pack growled deep in +their throats. + +"I do not know. Three of them will kill no more, but at the last +they drove me like the buck; on my three legs they drove me. +Look, Free People!" + +He thrust out his mangled fore-foot, all dark with dried blood. +There were cruel bites low down on his side, and his throat was +torn and worried. + +"Eat," said Akela, rising up from the meat Mowgli had brought +him, and the Outlier flung himself on it. + +"This shall be no loss," he said humbly, when he had taken off +the first edge of his hunger. "Give me a little strength, Free +People, and I also will kill. My lair is empty that was full +when this moon was new, and the Blood Debt is not all paid." + +Phao heard his teeth crack on a haunch-bone and grunted +approvingly. + +"We shall need those jaws," said he. "Were there cubs with +the dhole?" + +"Nay, nay. Red Hunters all: grown dogs of their Pack, heavy and +strong for all that they eat lizards in the Dekkan." + +What Won-tolla had said meant that the dhole, the red hunting- +dog of the Dekkan, was moving to kill, and the Pack knew well +that even the tiger will surrender a new kill to the dhole. +They drive straight through the Jungle, and what they meet they +pull down and tear to pieces. Though they are not as big nor +half as cunning as the wolf, they are very strong and very +numerous. The dhole, for instance, do not begin to call +themselves a pack till they are a hundred strong; whereas forty +wolves make a very fair pack indeed. Mowgli's wanderings had +taken him to the edge of the high grassy downs of the Dekkan, +and he had seen the fearless dholes sleeping and playing and +scratching themselves in the little hollows and tussocks that +they use for lairs. He despised and hated them because they did +not smell like the Free People, because they did not live in +caves, and, above all, because they had hair between their toes +while he and his friends were clean-footed. But he knew, for +Hathi had told him, what a terrible thing a dhole hunting-pack +was. Even Hathi moves aside from their line, and until they are +killed, or till game is scarce, they will go forward. + +Akela knew something of the dholes, too, for he said to Mowgli +quietly, "It is better to die in a Full Pack than leaderless and +alone. This is good hunting, and--my last. But, as men live, +thou hast very many more nights and days, Little Brother. +Go north and lie down, and if any live after the dhole has gone +by he shall bring thee word of the fight." + + +"Ah," said Mowgli, quite gravely, "must I go to the marshes and +catch little fish and sleep in a tree, or must I ask help of the +Bandar-log and crack nuts, while the Pack fight below?" + +"It is to the death," said Akela. "Thou hast never met the +dhole--the Red Killer. Even the Striped One----" + +"Aowa! Aowa!" said Mowgli pettingly. "I have killed one striped +ape, and sure am I in my stomach that Shere Khan would have left +his own mate for meat to the dhole if he had winded a pack +across three ranges. Listen now: There was a wolf, my father, +and there was a wolf, my mother, and there was an old gray wolf +(not too wise: he is white now) was my father and my mother. +Therefore I--" he raised his voice, "I say that when the dhole +come, and if the dhole come, Mowgli and the Free People are of +one skin for that hunting ; and I say, by the Bull that bought +me--by the Bull Bagheera paid for me in the old days which ye of +the Pack do not remember--_I_ say, that the Trees and the River +may hear and hold fast if I forget; _I_ say that this my knife +shall be as a tooth to the Pack--and I do not think it is so +blunt. This is my Word which has gone from me." + +"Thou dost not know the dhole, man with a wolf's tongue," said +Won-tolla. "I look only to clear the Blood Debt against them ere +they have me in many pieces. They move slowly, killing out as +they go, but in two days a little strength will come back to me +and I turn again for the Blood Debt. But for YE, Free People, +my word is that ye go north and eat but little for a while till +the dhole are gone. There is no meat in this hunting." + +"Hear the Outlier!" said Mowgli with a laugh. Free People, +we must go north and dig lizards and rats from the bank, lest by +any chance we meet the dhole. He must kill out our hunting- +grounds, while we lie hid in the north till it please him to +give us our own again. He is a dog--and the pup of a dog--red, +yellow-bellied, lairless, and haired between every toe! +He counts his cubs six and eight at the litter, as though he +were Chikai, the little leaping rat. Surely we must run away, +Free People, and beg leave of the peoples of the north for the +offal of dead cattle! Ye know the saying: 'North are the vermin; +south are the lice. WE are the Jungle.' Choose ye, O choose. +It is good hunting! For the Pack--for the Full Pack--for the +lair and the litter; for the in-kill and the out-kill; for the +mate that drives the doe and the little, little cub within the +cave; it is met!--it is met!--it is met!" + +The Pack answered with one deep, crashing bark that sounded in +the night like a big tree falling. "It is met!" they cried. +"Stay with these," said Mowgli to the Four. We shall need every +tooth. Phao and Akela must make ready the battle. I go to count +the dogs." + +"It is death!" Won-tolla cried, half rising. What can such a +hairless one do against the Red Dog? Even the Striped One, +remember----" + +"Thou art indeed an Outlier," Mowgli called back; "but we will +speak when the dholes are dead. Good hunting all!" + +He hurried off into the darkness, wild with excitement, hardly +looking where he set foot, and the natural consequence was that +he tripped full length over Kaa's great coils where the python +lay watching a deer-path near the river. + +"Kssha!" said Kaa angrily. "Is this jungle-work, to stamp and +tramp and undo a night's hunting--when the game are moving so +well, too?" + +"The fault was mine," said Mowgli, picking himself up. "Indeed +I was seeking thee, Flathead, but each time we meet thou art +longer and broader by the length of my arm. There is none like +thee in the Jungle, wise, old, strong, and most beautiful Kaa." + +"Now whither does THIS trail lead?" Kaa's voice was gentler. +"Not a moon since there was a Manling with a knife threw stones +at my head and called me bad little tree-cat names, because I +lay asleep in the open." + +"Ay, and turned every driven deer to all the winds, and Mowgli +was hunting, and this same Flathead was too deaf to hear his +whistle, and leave the deer-roads free," Mowgli answered +composedly, sitting down among the painted coils. + +"Now this same Manling comes with soft, tickling words to this +same Flathead, telling him that he is wise and strong and +beautiful, and this same old Flathead believes and makes a +place, thus, for this same stone-throwing Manling, and--Art thou +at ease now? Could Bagheera give thee so good a resting-place?" + +Kaa had, as usual, made a sort of soft half-hammock of himself +under Mowgli's weight. The boy reached out in the darkness, +and gathered in the supple cable-like neck till Kaa's head +rested on his shoulder, and then he told him all that had +happened in the Jungle that night. + +"Wise I may be," said Kaa at the end; "but deaf I surely am. +Else I should have heard the pheeal. Small wonder the Eaters of +Grass are uneasy. How many be the dhole?" + +"I have not yet seen. I came hot-foot to thee. Thou art older +than Hathi. But oh, Kaa,"--here Mowgli wriggled with sheerjoy,-- +"it will be good hunting. Few of us will see another moon." + +"Dost THOU strike in this? Remember thou art a Man; and remember +what Pack cast thee out. Let the Wolf look to the Dog. THOU art +a Man." + +"Last year's nuts are this year's black earth," said Mowgli. +"It is true that I am a Man, but it is in my stomach that this +night I have said that I am a Wolf. I called the River and the +Trees to remember. I am of the Free People, Kaa, till the dhole +has gone by." + +"Free People," Kaa grunted. "Free thieves! And thou hast tied +thyself into the death-knot for the sake of the memory of the +dead wolves? This is no good hunting." + +"It is my Word which I have spoken. The Trees know, the +River knows. Till the dhole have gone by my Word comes not +back to me." + +"Ngssh! This changes all trails. I had thought to take thee +away with me to the northern marshes, but the Word--even the +Word of a little, naked, hairless Manling--is the Word. +Now I, Kaa, say----" + +"Think well, Flathead, lest thou tie thyself into the death-knot +also. I need no Word from thee, for well I know----" + +"Be it so, then," said Kaa. "I will give no Word; but what is in +thy stomach to do when the dhole come?" + +"They must swim the Waingunga. I thought to meet them with my +knife in the shallows, the Pack behind me; and so stabbing and +thrusting, we a little might turn them down-stream, or cool +their throats." + +"The dhole do not turn and their throats are hot," said Kaa. +"There will be neither Manling nor Wolf-cub when that hunting is +done, but only dry bones." + +"Alala! If we die, we die. It will be most good hunting. But my +stomach is young, and I have not seen many Rains. I am not wise +nor strong. Hast thou a better plan, Kaa?" + +"I have seen a hundred and a hundred Rains. Ere Hathi cast +his milk-tushes my trail was big in the dust. By the First Egg, +I am older than many trees, and I have seen all that the Jungle +has done." + +"But THIS is new hunting," said Mowgli. "Never before have the +dhole crossed our trail." + +"What is has been. What will be is no more than a forgotten year +striking backward. Be still while I count those my years." + +For a long hour Mowgli lay back among the coils, while Kaa, +his head motionless on the ground, thought of all that he had +seen and known since the day he came from the egg. The light +seemed to go out of his eyes and leave them like stale opals, +and now and again he made little stiff passes with his head, +right and left, as though he were hunting in his sleep. +Mowgli dozed quietly, for he knew that there is nothing like +sleep before hunting, and he was trained to take it at any hour +of the day or night. + +Then he felt Kaa's back grow bigger and broader below him as the +huge python puffed himself out, hissing with the noise of a +sword drawn from a steel scabbard. + +"I have seen all the dead seasons," Kaa said at last, "and the +great trees and the old elephants, and the rocks that were +bare and sharp-pointed ere the moss grew. Art THOU still +alive, Manling?" + +"It is only a little after moonset," said Mowgli. I do not +understand----" + +"Hssh! I am again Kaa. I knew it was but a little time. Now we +will go to the river, and I will show thee what is to be done +against the dhole." + +He turned, straight as an arrow, for the main stream of the +Waingunga, plunging in a little above the pool that hid the +Peace Rock, Mowgli at his side. + +"Nay, do not swim. I go swiftly. My back, Little Brother." + +Mowgli tucked his left arm round Kaa's neck, dropped his right +close to his body, and straightened his feet. Then Kaa breasted +the current as he alone could, and the ripple of the checked +water stood up in a frill round Mowgli's neck, and his feet were +waved to and fro in the eddy under the python's lashing sides. +A mile or two above the Peace Rock the Waingunga narrows between +a gorge of marble rocks from eighty to a hundred feet high, and +the current runs like a mill-race between and over all manner of +ugly stones. But Mowgli did not trouble his head about the +water; little water in the world could have given him a moment's +fear. He was looking at the gorge on either side and sniffing +uneasily, for there was a sweetish-sourish smell in the air, +very like the smell of a big ant-hill on a hot day. +Instinctively he lowered himself in the water, only raising his +head to breathe from time to time, and Kaa came to anchor with a +double twist of his tail round a sunken rock, holding Mowgli in +the hollow of a coil, while the water raced on. + +"This is the Place of Death," said the boy. "Why do we +come here?" + +"They sleep," said Kaa. "Hathi will not turn aside for the +Striped One. Yet Hathi and the Striped One together turn aside +for the dhole, and the dhole they say turn aside for nothing. +And yet for whom do the Little People of the Rocks turn aside? +Tell me, Master of the Jungle, who is the Master of the Jungle?" + +"These," Mowgli whispered. "It is the Place of Death. +Let us go." + +"Nay, look well, for they are asleep. It is as it was when I was +not the length of thy arm." + +The split and weatherworn rocks of the gorge of the Waingunga +had been used since the beginning of the Jungle by the Little +People of the Rocks--the busy, furious, black wild bees of +India; and, as Mowgli knew well, all trails turned off half a +mile before they reached the gorge. For centuries the Little +People had hived and swarmed from cleft to cleft, and swarmed +again, staining the white marble with stale honey, and made +their combs tall and deep in the dark of the inner caves, where +neither man nor beast nor fire nor water had ever touched them. +The length of the gorge on both siaes was hung as it were with +black shimmery velvet curtains, and Mowgli sank as he looked, +for those were the clotted millions of the sleeping bees. +There were other lumps and festoons and things like decayed +tree-trunks studded on the face of the rock, the old combs of +past years, or new cities built in the shadow of the windless +gorge, and huge masses of spongy, rotten trash had rolled down +and stuck among the trees and creepers that clung to the rock- +face. As he listened he heard more than once the rustle and +slide of a honey-loaded comb turning over or failing away +somewhere in the dark galleries; then a booming of angry wings, +and the sullen drip, drip, drip, of the wasted honey, guttering +along till it lipped over some ledge in the open air and +sluggishly trickled down on the twigs. There was a tiny little +beach, not five feet broad, on one side of the river, and that +was piled high with the rubbish of uncounted years. There were +dead bees, drones, sweepings, and stale combs, and wings of +marauding moths that had strayed in after honey, all tumbled in +smooth piles of the finest black dust. The mere sharp smell of +it was enough to frighten anything that had no wings, and knew +what the Little People were. + +Kaa moved up-stream again till he came to a sandy bar at the +head of the gorge. + +"Here is this season's kill," said he. "Look!" On the bank lay +the skeletons of a couple of young deer and a buffalo. +Mowgli could see that neither wolf nor jackal had touched the +hones, which were laid out naturally. + +"They came beyond the line;, they did not know the Law," +murmured Mowgli, "and the Little People killed them. Let us +go ere they wake." + +"They do not wake till the dawn," said Kaa. "Now I will tell +thee. A hunted buck from the south, many, many Rains ago, +came hither from the south, not knowing the Jungle, a Pack on +his trail. Being made blind by fear, he leaped from above, +the Pack running by sight, for they were hot and blind on the +trail. The sun was high, and the Little People were many and +very angry. Many, too, were those of the Pack who leaped into +the Waingunga, but they were dead ere they took water. Those who +did not leap died also in the rocks above. But the buck lived." + +"How?" + +"Because he came first, running for his life, leaping ere the +Little People were aware, and was in the river when they +gathered to kill. The Pack, following, was altogether lost +under the weight of the Little People." + +"The buck lived?" Mowgli repeated slowly. + +"At least he did not die THEN, though none waited his coming +down with a strong body to hold him safe against the water, +as a certain old fat, deaf, yellow Flathead would wait for a +Manling--yea, though there were all the dholes of the Dekkan on +his trail. What is in thy stomach?" Kaa's head was close to +Mowgli's ear; and it was a little time before the boy answered. + +"It is to pull the very whiskers of Death, but--Kaa, thou art, +indeed, the wisest of all the Jungle." + +"So many have said. Look now, if the dhole follow thee----" + +"As surely they will follow. Ho! ho! I have many little thorns +under my tongue to prick into their hides." + +"If they follow thee hot and blind, looking only at thy +shoulders, those who do not die up above will take water either +here or lower down, for the Little People will rise up and cover +them. Now the Waingunga is hungry water, and they will have no +Kaa to hold them, but will go down, such as live, to the +shallows by the Seeonee Lairs, and there thy Pack may meet +them by the throat." + +"Ahai! Eowawa! Better could not be till the Rains fall in the +dry season. There is now only the little matter of the run and +the leap. I will make me known to the dholes, so that they shall +follow me very closely." + +"Hast thou seen the rocks above thee? From the landward side?" + +"Indeed, no. That I had forgotten." + +"Go look. It is all rotten ground, cut and full of holes. One of +thy clumsy feet set down without seeing would end the hunt. +See, I leave thee here, and for thy sake only I will carry word +to the Pack that they may know where to look for the dhole. +For myself, I am not of one skin with ANY wolf." + +When Kaa disliked an acquaintance he could be more unpleasant +than any of the Jungle People, except perhaps Bagheera. He swam +down-stream, and opposite the Rock he came on Phao and Akela +listening to the night noises. + +"Hssh! Dogs," he said cheerfully. "The dholes will come down- +stream. If ye be not afraid ye can kill them in the shallows." + +"When come they?" said Phao. "And where is my Man-cub?" +said Akela. + +"They come when they come," said Kaa. "Wait and see. As for THY +Man-cub, from whom thou hast taken a Word and so laid him open +to Death, THY Man-cub is with ME, and if he be not already dead +the fault is none of thine, bleached dog! Wait here for the +dhole, and he glad that the Man- cub and I strike on thy side." + +Kaa flashed up-stream again, and moored himself in the middle of +the gorge, looking upward at the line of the cliff. Presently he +saw Mowgli's head move against the stars, and then there was a +whizz in the air, the keen, clean schloop of a body falling feet +first, and next minute the boy was at rest again in the loop of +Kaa's body. + +"It is no leap by night," said Mowgli quietly. "I have jumped +twice as far for sport; but that is an evil place above--low +bushes and gullies that go down very deep, all full of the +Little People. I have put big stones one above the other by +the side of three gullies. These I shall throw down with my +feet in running, and the Little People will rise up behind me, +very angry." + +"That is Man's talk and Man's cunning," said Kaa. "Thou art +wise, but the Little People are always angry." + +"Nay, at twilight all wings near and far rest for a while. +I will play with the dhole at twilight, for the dhole hunts best +by day. He follows now Won-tolla's blood-trail." + +"Chil does not leave a dead ox, nor the dhole the blood-trail," +said Kaa. + +"Then I will make him a new blood-trail, of his own blood, if +I can, and give him dirt to eat. Thou wilt stay here, Kaa, +till I come again with my dholes?" + +"Ay, but what if they kill thee in the Jungle, or the Little +People kill thee before thou canst leap down to the river?" + +"When to-morrow comes we will kill for to-morrow," said Mowgli, +quoting a Jungle saying; and again, "When I am dead it is time +to sing the Death Song. Good hunting, Kaa!" + +He loosed his arm from the python's neck and went down the gorge +like a log in a freshet, paddling toward the far bank, where he +found slack-water, and laughing aloud from sheer happiness. +There was nothing Mowgli liked better than, as he himself said, +"to pull the whiskers of Death," and make the Jungle know that +he was their overlord. He had often, with Baloo's help, robbed +bees' nests in single trees, and he knew that the Little People +hated the smell of wild garlic. So he gathered a small bundle of +it, tied it up with a bark string, and then followed Won-tolla's +blood-trail, as it ran southerly from the Lairs, for some five +miles, looking at the trees with his head on one side, and +chuckling as he looked. + +"Mowgli the Frog have I been," said he to himself; "Mowgli the +Wolf have I said that I am. Now Mowgli the Ape must I be before +I am Mowgli the Buck. At the end I shall be Mowgli the Man. +Ho!" and he slid his thumb along the eighteen-inch blade of +his knife. + +Won-tolla's trail, all rank with dark blood-spots, ran under +a forest of thick trees that grew close together and stretched +away north-eastward, gradually growing thinner and thinner to +within two miles of the Bee Rocks. From the last tree to the low +scrub of the Bee Rocks was open country, where there was hardly +cover enough to hide a wolf. Mowgli trotted along under the +trees, judging distances between branch and branch, occasionally +climbing up a trunk and taking a trial leap from one tree to +another till he came to the open ground, which he studied very +carefully for an hour. Then he turned, picked up Won-tolla's +trail where he had left it, settled himself in a tree with an +outrunning branch some eight feet from the ground, and sat +still, sharpening his knife on the sole of his foot and singing +to himself. + +A little before mid-day, when the sun was very warm, he heard +the patter of feet and smelt the abominable smell of the dhole- +pack as they trotted pitilessly along Won-tolla's trail. +Seen from above, the red dhole does not look half the size of +a wolf, but Mowgli knew how strong his feet and jaws were. +He watched the sharp bay head of the leader snuffing along the +trail, and gave him "Good hunting!" + +The brute looked up, and his companions halted behind him, +scores and scores of red dogs with low-hung tails, heavy +shoulders, weak quarters, and bloody mouths. The dholes are +a very silent people as a rule, and they have no manners even +in their own Jungle. Fully two hundred must have gathered +below him, but he could see that the leaders sniffed hungrily +on Won-tolla's trail, and tried to drag the Pack forward. +That would never do, or they would be at the Lairs in +broad daylight, and Mowgli meant to hold them under his +tree till dusk. + +"By whose leave do ye come here?" said Mowgli. + +"All Jungles are our Jungle," was the reply, and the dhole that +gave it bared his white teeth. Mowgli looked down with a smile, +and imitated perfectly the sharp chitter-chatter of Chikai, +the leaping rat of the Dekkan, meaning the dholes to understand +that he considered them no better than Chikai. The Pack closed +up round the tree-trunk and the leader bayed savagely, calling +Mowgli a tree-ape. For an answer Mowgli stretched down one naked +leg and wriggled his bare toes just above the leader's head. +That was enough, and more than enough, to wake the Pack to +stupid rage. Those who have hair between their toes do not care +to be reminded of it. Mowgli caught his foot away as the leader +leaped up, and said sweetly: Dog, red dog! Go back to the Dekkan +and eat lizards. Go to Chikai thy brother--dog, dog--red, +red dog! There is hair between every toe!" He twiddled his toes +a second time. + +"Come down ere we starve thee out, hairless ape!" yelled the +Pack, and this was exactly what Mowgli wanted. He laid himself +down along the branch, his cheek to the bark, his right arm +free, and there he told the Pack what he thought and knew about +them, their manners, their customs, their mates, and their +puppies. There is no speech in the world so rancorous and so +stinging as the language the Jungle People use to show scorn and +contempt. When you come to think of it you will see how this +must be so. As Mowgli told Kaa, he had many little thorns under +his tongue, and slowly and deliberately he drove the dholes from +silence to growls, from growls to yells, and from yells to +hoarse slavery ravings. They tried to answer his taunts, but a +cub might as well have tried to answer Kaa in a rage; and all +the while Mowgli's right hand lay crooked at his side, ready for +action, his feet locked round the branch. The big bay leader had +leaped many times in the air, but Mowgli dared not risk a false +blow. At last, made furious beyond his natural strength, +he bounded up seven or eight feet clear of the ground. +Then Mowgli's hand shot out like the head of a tree-snake, +and gripped him by the scruff of his neck, and the branch shook +with the jar as his weight fell back, almost wrenching Mowgli to +the ground. But he never loosed his grip, and inch by inch he +hauled the beast, hanging like a drowned jackal, up on the +branch. With his left hand he reached for his knife and cut off +the red, bushy tail, flinging the dhole back to earth again. +That was all he needed. The Pack would not go forward on +Won-tolla's trail now till they had killed Mowgli or Mowgli had +killed them. He saw them settle down in circles with a quiver of +the haunches that meant they were going to stay, and so he +climbed to a higher crotch, settled his back comfortably, +and went to sleep. + +After three or four hours he waked and counted the Pack. +They were all there, silent, husky, and dry, with eyes of steel. +The sun was beginning to sink. In half an hour the Little People +of the Rocks would be ending their labours, and, as you know, +the dhole does not fight best in the twilight. + +"I did not need such faithful watchers," he said politely, +standing up on a branch, "but I will remember this. Ye be true +dholes, but to my thinking over much of one kind. For that +reason I do not give the big lizard-eater his tail again. +Art thou not pleased, Red Dog?" + +"I myself will tear out thy stomach!" yelled the leader, +scratching at the foot of the tree. + +"Nay, but consider, wise rat of the Dekkan. There will now be +many litters of little tailless red dogs, yea, with raw red +stumps that sting when the sand is hot. Go home, Red Dog, +and cry that an ape has done this. Ye will not go? Come, then, +with me, and I will make you very wise!" + +He moved, Bandar-log fashion, into the next tree, and so on into +the next and the next, the Pack following with lifted hungry +heads. Now and then he would pretend to fall, and the Pack would +tumble one over the other in their haste to be at the death. +It was a curious sight--the boy with the knife that shone in the +low sunlight as it sifted through the upper branches, and the +silent Pack with their red coats all aflame, huddling and +following below. When he came to the last tree he took the +garlic and rubbed himself all over carefully, and the dholes +yelled with scorn. "Ape with a wolf's tongue, dost thou think to +cover thy scent?" they said. "We follow to the death." + +"Take thy tail," said Mowgli, flinging it back along the course +he had taken. The Pack instinctively rushed after it. +"And follow now--to the death." + +He had slipped down the tree-trunk, and headed like the wind +in bare feet for the Bee Rocks, before the dholes saw what +he would do. + +They gave one deep howl, and settled down to the long, lobbing +canter that can at the last run down anything that runs. +Mowgli knew their pack-pace to be much slower than that of the +wolves, or he would never have risked a two-mile run in full +sight. They were sure that the boy was theirs at last, and he +was sure that he held them to play with as he pleased. All his +trouble was to keep them sufficiently hot behind him to prevent +their turning off too soon. He ran cleanly, evenly, and +springily; the tailless leader not five yards behind him; +and the Pack tailing out over perhaps a quarter of a mile of +ground, crazy and blind with the rage of slaughter. So he kept +his distance by ear, reserving his last effort for the rush +across the Bee Rocks. + +The Little People had gone to sleep in the early twilight, +for it was not the season of late blossoming flowers; but as +Mowgli's first foot- falls rang hollow on the hollow ground he +heard a sound as though all the earth were humming. Then he ran +as he had never run in his life before, spurned aside one--two-- +three of the piles of stones into the dark, sweet-smelling +gullies; heard a roar like the roar of the sea in a cave; +saw with the tail of his eye the air grow dark behind him; +saw the current of the Waingunga far below, and a flat, diamond- +shaped head in the water; leaped outward with all his strength, +the tailless dhole snapping at his shoulder in mid-air, and +dropped feet first to the safety of the river, breathless and +triumphant. There was not a sting upon him, for the smell of the +garlic had checked the Little People for just the few seconds +that he was among them. When he rose Kaa's coils were steadying +him and things were bounding over the edge of the cliff--great +lumps, it seemed, of clustered bees falling like plummets; +but before any lump touched water the bees flew upward and the +body of a dhole whirled down-stream. Overhead they could hear +furious short yells that were drowned in a roar like breakers-- +the roar of the wings of the Little People of the Rocks. Some of +the dholes, too, had fallen into the gullies that communicated +with the underground caves, and there choked and fought and +snapped among the tumbled honeycombs, and at last, borne up, +even when they were dead, on the heaving waves of bees beneath +them, shot out of some hole in the river-face, to roll over on +the black rubbish-heaps. There were dholes who had leaped short +into the trees on the cliffs, and the bees blotted out their +shapes; but the greater number of them, maddened by the stings, +had flung themselves into the river; and, as Kaa said, the +Waingunga was hungry water. + +Kaa held Mowgli fast till the boy had recovered his breath. + +"We may not stay here," he said. "The Little People are roused +indeed. Come!" + +Swimming low and diving as often as he could, Mowgli went down +the river, knife in hand. + +"Slowly, slowly," said Kaa. "One tooth does not kill a hundred +unless it be a cobra's, and many of the dholes took water +swiftly when they saw the Little People rise." + +"The more work for my knife, then. Phai! How the, Little People +follow!" Mowgli sank again. The face of the water was blanketed +with wild bees, buzzing sullenly and stinging all they found. + +"Nothing was ever yet lost by silence," said Kaa--no sting could +penetrate his scales--"and thou hast all the long night for the +hunting. Hear them howl!" + +Nearly half the pack had seen the trap their fellows rushed +into, and turning sharp aside had flung themselves into the +water where the gorge broke down in steep banks. Their cries of +rage and their threats against the "tree-ape" who had brought +them to their shame mixed with the yells and growls of those who +had been punished by the Little People. To remain ashore was +death, and every dhole knew it. Their pack was swept along the +current, down to the deep eddies of the Peace Pool, but even +there the angry Little People followed and forced them to the +water again. Mowgli could hear the voice of the tailless leader +bidding his people hold on and kill out every wolf in Seeonee. +But he did not waste his time in listening. + +"One kills in the dark behind us!" snapped a dhole. "Here is +tainted water!" + +Mowgli had dived forward like an otter, twitched a struggling +dhole under water before he could open his mouth, and dark rings +rose as the body plopped up, turning on its side. The dholes +tried to turn, but the current prevented them, and the Little +People darted at the heads and ears, and they could hear the +challenge of the Seeonee Pack growing louder and deeper in the +gathering darkness. Again Mowgli dived, and again a dhole went +under, and rose dead, and again the clamour broke out at the +rear of the pack; some howling that it was best to go ashore, +others calling on their leader to lead them back to the Dekkan, +and others bidding Mowgli show himself and he killed. + +"They come to the fight with two stomachs and several voices," +said Kaa. "The rest is with thy brethren below yonder, The +Little People go back to sleep. They have chased us far. Now I, +too, turn back, for I am not of one skin with any wolf. +Good hunting, Little Brother, and remember the dhole bites low." + +A wolf came running along the bank on three legs, leaping up and +down, laying his head sideways close to the ground, hunching his +back, and breaking high into the air, as though he were playing +with his cubs. It was Won-tolla, the Outlier, and he said never +a word, but continued his horrible sport beside the dholes. +They had been long in the water now, and were swimming wearily, +their coats drenched and heavy, their bushy tails dragging like +sponges, so tired and shaken that they, too, were silent, +watching the pair of blazing eyes that moved abreast. + +"This is no good hunting," said one, panting. + +"Good hunting!" said Mowgli, as he rose boldly at the brute's +side, and sent the long knife home behind the shoulder, pushing +hard to avoid his dying snap. + +"Art thou there, Man-cub?" said Won-tolla across the water. + +"Ask of the dead, Outlier," Mowgli replied. "Have none come +down-stream? I have filled these dogs' mouths with dirt; +I have tricked them in the broad daylight, and their leader +lacks his tail, but here be some few for thee still. +Whither shall I drive them?" + +"I will wait," said Won-tolla. "The night is before me." + +Nearer and nearer came the bay of the Seeonee wolves. "For the +Pack, for the Full Pack it is met!" and a bend in the river +drove the dholes forward among the sands and shoals opposite +the Lairs. + +Then they saw their mistake. They should have landed half a mile +higher up, and rushed the wolves on dry ground. Now it was too +late. The bank was lined with burning eyes, and except for the +horrible pheeal that had never stopped since sundown, there was +no sound in the Jungle. It seemed as though Won-tolla were +fawning on them to come ashore; and "Turn and take hold!" said +the leader of the dholes. The entire Pack flung themselves at +the shore, threshing and squattering through the shoal water, +till the face of the Waingunga was all white and torn, and the +great ripples went from side to side, like bow-waves from a +boat. Mowgli followed the rush, stabbing and slicing as the +dholes, huddled together, rushed up the river-beach in one wave. + +Then the long fight began, heaving and straining and splitting +and scattering and narrowing and broadening along the red, +wet sands, and over and between the tangled tree-roots, +and through and among the bushes, and in and out of the grass +clumps; for even now the dholes were two to one. But they met +wolves fighting for all that made the Pack, and not only the +short, high, deep-chested, white-tusked hunters of the Pack, +but the anxious-eyed lahinis--the she-wolves of the lair, as the +saying is--fighting for their litters, with here and there a +yearling wolf, his first coat still half woolly, tugging and +grappling by their sides. A wolf, you must know, flies at the +throat or snaps at the flank, while a dhole, by preference, +bites at the belly; so when the dholes were struggling out of +the water and had to raise their heads, the odds were with the +wolves. On dry land the wolves suffered; but in the water or +ashore, Mowgli's knife came and went without ceasing. The Four +had worried their way to his side. Gray Brother, crouched +between the boy's knees, was protecting his stomach, while the +others guarded his back and either side, or stood over him when +the shock of a leaping, yelling dhole who had thrown himself +full on the steady blade bore him down. For the rest, it was one +tangled confusion--a locked and swaying mob that moved from +right to left and from left to right along the bank; and also +ground round and round slowly on its own centre. Here would be a +heaving mound, like a water-blister in a whirlpool, which would +break like a water-blister, and throw up four or five mangled +dogs, each striving to get back to the centre; here would be a +single wolf borne down by two or three dholes, laboriously +dragging them forward, and sinking the while; here a yearling +cub would he held up by the pressure round him, though he had +been killed early, while his mother, crazed with dumb rage, +rolled over and over, snapping, and passing on; and in the +middle of the thickest press, perhaps, one wolf and one dhole, +forgetting everything else, would be manoeuvring for first hold +till they were whirled away by a rush of furious fighters. +Once Mowgli passed Akela, a dhole on either flank, and his all +but toothless jaws closed over the loins of a third; and once he +saw Phao, his teeth set in the throat of a dhole, tugging the +unwilling beast forward till the yearlings could finish him. +But the bulk of the fight was blind flurry and smother in the +dark; hit, trip, and tumble, yelp, groan, and worry-worry-worry, +round him and behind him and above him. As the night wore on, +the quick, giddy-go-round motion increased. The dholes were +cowed and afraid to attack the stronger wolves, but did not yet +dare to run away. Mowgli felt that the end was coming soon, and +contented himself with striking merely to cripple. The yearlings +were growing bolder; there was time now and again to breathe, +and pass a word to a friend, and the mere flicker of the knife +would sometimes turn a dog aside. + +"The meat is very near the bone," Gray Brother yelled. He was +bleeding from a score of flesh-wounds. + +"But the bone is yet to he cracked," said Mowgli. "Eowawa! +THUS do we do in the Jungle!" The red blade ran like a flame +along the side of a dhole whose hind-quarters were hidden by +the weight of a clinging wolf. + +"My kill!" snorted the wolf through his wrinkled nostrils. +"Leave him to me." + +"Is thy stomach still empty, Outlier?" said Mowgli. Won-tolla +was fearfully punished, but his grip had paralysed the dhole, +who could not turn round and reach him. + +"By the Bull that bought me," said Mowgli, with a bitter laugh, +"it is the tailless one!" And indeed it was the big bay- +coloured leader. + +"It is not wise to kill cubs and lahinis," Mowgli went on +philosophically, wiping the blood out of his eyes, "unless one +has also killed the Outlier; and it is in my stomach that this +Won-tolla kills thee." + +A dhole leaped to his leader's aid; but before his teeth had +found Won-tolla's flank, Mowgli's knife was in his throat, +and Gray Brother took what was left. + +"And thus do we do in the Jungle," said Mowgli. + +Won-tolla said not a word, only his jaws were closing and +closing on the backbone as his life ebbed. The dhole shuddered, +his head dropped, and he lay still, and Won-tolla dropped +above him. + +"Huh! The Blood Debt is paid," said Mowgli. "Sing the song, +Won-tolla." + +"He hunts no more," said Gray Brother; "and Akela, too, is +silent this long time." + +"The bone is cracked!" thundered Phao, son of Phaona. "They go! +Kill, kill out, O hunters of the Free People!" + +Dhole after dhole was slinking away from those dark and bloody +sands to the river, to the thick Jungle, up-stream or down- +stream as he saw the road clear. + +"The debt! The debt!" shouted Mowgli. "Pay the debt! They have +slain the Lone Wolf! Let not a dog go!" + +He was flying to the river, knife in hand, to check any dhole +who dared to take water, when, from under a mound of nine dead, +rose Akela's head and fore-quarters, and Mowgli dropped on his +knees beside the Lone Wolf. + +"Said I not it would be my last fight?" Akela gasped. "It is +good hunting. And thou, Little Brother?" + +"I live, having killed many." + +"Even so. I die, and I would--I would die by thee, +Little Brother." + +Mowgli took the terrible scarred head on his knees, and put his +arms round the torn neck. + +"It is long since the old days of Shere Khan, and a Man-cub that +rolled naked in the dust." + +"Nay, nay, I am a wolf. I am of one skin with the Free People," +Mowgli cried. "It is no will of mine that I am a man." + +"Thou art a man, Little Brother, wolfling of my watching. +Thou art a man, or else the Pack had fled before the dhole. +My life I owe to thee, and to-day thou hast saved the Pack even +as once I saved thee. Hast thou forgotten? All debts are paid +now. Go to thine own people. I tell thee again, eye of my eye, +this hunting is ended. Go to thine own people." + +"I will never go. I will hunt alone in the Jungle. I have +said it." + +"After the summer come the Rains, and after the Rains comes the +spring. Go back before thou art driven." + +"Who will drive me?" + +"Mowgli will drive Mowgli. Go back to thy people. Go to Man." + +"When Mowgli drives Mowgli I will go," Mowgli answered. + +"There is no more to say," said Akela. "Little Brother, +canst thou raise me to my feet? I also was a leader of the +Free People." + +Very carefully and gently Mowgli lifted the bodies aside, +and raised Akela to his feet, both arms round him, and the Lone +Wolf drew a long breath, and began the Death Song that a leader +of the Pack should sing when he dies. It gathered strength as he +went on, lifting and lifting, and ringing far across the river, +till it came to the last "Good hunting!" and Akela shook himself +clear of Mowgli for an instant, and, leaping into the air, +fell backward dead upon his last and most terrible kill. + +Mowgli sat with his head on his knees, careless of anything +else, while the remnant of the flying dholes were being +overtaken and run down by the merciless lahinis. Little by +little the cries died away, and the wolves returned limping, +as their wounds stiffened, to take stock of the losses. +Fifteen of the Pack, as well as half a dozen lahinis, lay dead +by the river, and of the others not one was unmarked. And Mowgli +sat through it all till the cold daybreak, when Phao's wet, +red muzzle was dropped in his hand, and Mowgli drew back to show +the gaunt body of Akela. + +"Good hunting!" said Phao, as though Akela were still alive, +and then over his bitten shoulder to the others: "Howl, dogs! +A Wolf has died to-night!" + +But of all the Pack of two hundred fighting dholes, whose boast +was that all jungles were their Jungle, and that no living thing +could stand before them, not one returned to the Dekkan to carry +that word. + + + CHIL'S SONG + +[This is the song that Chil sang as the kites dropped down one +after another to the river-bed, when the great fight was +finished. Chil is good friends with everybody, but he is a +cold-blooded kind of creature at heart, because he knows that +almost everybody in the Jungle comes to him in the long-run.] + +These were my companions going forth by night-- + (For Chil! Look you, for Chil!) +Now come I to whistle them the ending of the fight. + (Chil! Vanguards of Chil!} +Word they gave me overhead of quarry newly slain, +Word I gave them underfoot of buck upon the plain. +Here's an end of every trail--they shall not speak again! + +They that called the hunting-cry--they that followed fast-- + (For Chil! Look you, for Chil!) +They that bade the sambhur wheel, or pinned him as he passed-- + (Chil! Vanguards of Chil!) +They that lagged behind the scent--they that ran before, +They that shunned the level horn--they that overbore. +Here's an end of every trail--they shall not follow more. +These were my companions. Pity 'twas they died! + (For Chil! Look you, for Chil!) +Now come I to comfort them that knew them in their pride. + (Chil! Vanguards of Chil!) +Tattered flank and sunken eye, open mouth and red, +Locked and lank and lone they lie, the dead upon their dead. +Here's an end of every trail--and here my hosts are fed. + + + + + THE SPRING RUNNING + +Man goes to Man! Cry the challenge through the Jungle! + He that was our Brother goes away. +Hear, now, and judge, O ye People of the Jungle,-- + Answer, who shall turn him--who shall stay? + +Man goes to Man! He is weeping in the Jungle: + He that was our Brother sorrows sore! +Man goes to Man! (Oh, we loved him in the Jungle!) + To the Man-Trail where we may not follow more. + +The second year after the great fight with Red Dog and the death +of Akela, Mowgli must have been nearly seventeen years old. +He looked older, for hard exercise, the best of good eating, +and baths whenever he felt in the least hot or dusty, had given +him strength and growth far beyond his age. He could swing by +one hand from a top branch for half an hour at a time, when he +had occasion to look along the tree-roads. He could stop a young +buck in mid-gallop and throw him sideways by the head. He could +even jerk over the big, blue wild boars that lived in the +Marshes of the North. The Jungle People who used to fear him +for his wits feared him now for his strength, and when he +moved quietly on his own affairs the mere whisper of his coming +cleared the wood-paths. And yet the look in his eyes was always +gentle. Even when he fought, his eyes never blazed as Bagheera's +did. They only grew more and more interested and excited; +and that was one of the things that Bagheera himself did +not understand. + +He asked Mowgli about it, and the boy laughed and said. +"When I miss the kill I am angry. When I must go empty for two +days I am very angry. Do not my eyes talk then?" + +"The mouth is hungry," said Bagheera, "but the eyes say nothing. +Hunting, eating, or swimming, it is all one--like a stone in wet +or dry weather." Mowgli looked at him lazily from under his long +eyelashes, and, as usual, the panther's head dropped. Bagheera +knew his master. + +They were lying out far up the side of a hill overlooking the +Waingunga, and the morning mists hung below them in bands of +white and green. As the sun rose it changed into bubbling seas +of red gold, churned off, and let the low rays stripe the dried +grass on which Mowgli and Bagheera were resting. It was the end +of the cold weather, the leaves and the trees looked worn and +faded, and there was a dry, ticking rustle everywhere when the +wind blew. A little leaf tap-tap-tapped furiously against a +twig, as a single leaf caught in a current will. It roused +Bagheera, for he snuffed the morning air with a deep, hollow +cough, threw himself on his back, and struck with his fore-paws +at the nodding leaf above. + +"The year turns," he said. "The Jungle goes forward. The Time of +New Talk is near. That leaf knows. It is very good." + +"The grass is dry," Mowgli answered, pulling up a tuft. +"Even Eye-of-the-Spring [that is a little trumpet-shaped, waxy +red flower that runs in and out among the grasses]--even Eye-of- +the Spring is shut, and . . . Bagheera, IS it well for the Black +Panther so to lie on his back and beat with his paws in the air, +as though he were the tree-cat?" + +"Aowh?" said Bagheera. He seemed to be thinking of other things. + +"I say, IS it well for the Black Panther so to mouth and cough, +and howl and roll? Remember, we be the Masters of the Jungle, +thou and I." + +"Indeed, yes; I hear, Man-cub." Bagheera rolled over hurriedly +and sat up, the dust on his ragged black flanks. (He was +just casting his winter coat.) "We be surely the Masters of +the Jungle! Who is so strong as Mowgli? Who so wise?" There was +a curious drawl in the voice that made Mowgli turn to see +whether by any chance the Black Panther were making fun of him, +for the Jungle is full of words that sound like one thing, +but mean another. "I said we be beyond question the Masters +of the Jungle," Bagheera repeated. "Have I done wrong? I did +not know that the Man-cub no longer lay upon the ground. +Does he fly, then?" + +Mowgli sat with his elbows on his knees, looking out across the +valley at the daylight. Somewhere down in the woods below a bird +was trying over in a husky, reedy voice the first few notes of +his spring song. It was no more than a shadow of the liquid, +tumbling call he would be pouring later, but Bagheera heard it. + +"I said the Time of New Talk is near," growled the panther, +switching his tail. + +"I hear," Mowgli answered. "Bagheera, why dost thou shake all +over? The sun is warm." + +"That is Ferao, the scarlet woodpecker," said Bagheera. "HE has +not forgotten. Now I, too, must remember my song," and he began +purring and crooning to himself, harking back dissatisfied +again and again. + +"There is no game afoot," said Mowgli. + +"Little Brother, are BOTH thine ears stopped? That is no +killing-word, but my song that I make ready against the need." + +"I had forgotten. I shall know when the Time of New Talk is +here, because then thou and the others all run away and leave +me alone." Mowgli spoke rather savagely. + +"But, indeed, Little Brother," Bagheera began, "we do not +always----" + +"I say ye do," said Mowgli, shooting out his forefinger angrily. +"Ye DO run away, and I, who am the Master of the Jungle, must +needs walk alone. How was it last season, when I would gather +sugar-cane from the fields of a Man-Pack? I sent a runner--I +sent thee!--to Hathi, bidding him to come upon such a night and +pluck the sweet grass for me with his trunk." + +"He came only two nights later," said Bagheera, cowering a +little; "and of that long, sweet grass that pleased thee so he +gathered more than any Man-cub could eat in all the nights of +the Rains. That was no fault of mine." + +"He did not come upon the night when I sent him the word. +No, he was trumpeting and running and roaring through the +valleys in the moonlight. His trail was like the trail of +three elephants, for he would not hide among the trees. +He danced in the moonlight before the houses of the Man-Pack. +I saw him, and yet he would not come to me; and _I_ am the +Master of the Jungle!" + +"It was the Time of New Talk," said the panther, always very +humble. "Perhaps, Little Brother, thou didst not that time call +him by a Master-word? Listen to Ferao, and be glad!" + +Mowgli's bad temper seemed to have boiled itself away. He lay +back with his head on his arms, his eyes shut. "I do not know-- +nor do I care," he said sleepily. "Let us sleep, Bagheera. +My stomach is heavy in me. Make me a rest for my head." + +The panther lay down again with a sigh, because he could hear +Ferao practising and repractising his song against the +Springtime of New Talk, as they say. + +In an Indian Jungle the seasons slide one into the other +almost without division. There seem to be only two--the wet +and the dry; but if you look closely below the torrents of +rain and the clouds of char and dust you will find all four +going round in their regular ring. Spring is the most wonderful, +because she has not to cover a clean, bare field with new leaves +and flowers, but to drive before her and to put away the +hanging-on, over-surviving raffle of half-green things which +the gentle winter has suffered to live, and to make the +partly-dressed stale earth feel new and young once more. +And this she does so well that there is no spring in the world +like the Jungle spring. + +There is one day when all things are tired, and the very smells, +as they drift on the heavy air, are old and used. One cannot +explain this, but it feels so. Then there is another day--to the +eye nothing whatever has changed--when all the smells are new +and delightful, and the whiskers of the Jungle People quiver to +their roots, and the winter hair comes away from their sides in +long, draggled locks. Then, perhaps, a little rain falls, +and all the trees and the bushes and the bamboos and the mosses +and the juicy-leaved plants wake with a noise of growing that +you can almost hear, and under this noise runs, day and night, +a deep hum. THAT is the noise of the spring--a vibrating boom +which is neither bees, nor falling water, nor the wind in tree- +tops, but the purring of the warm, happy world. + +Up to this year Mowgli had always delighted in the turn of the +seasons. It was he who generally saw the first Eye-of-the-Spring +deep down among the grasses, and the first bank of spring +clouds, which are like nothing else in the Jungle. His voice +could be heard in all sorts of wet, star-lighted, blossoming +places, helping the big frogs through their choruses, or mocking +the little upside-down owls that hoot through the white nights. +Like all his people, spring was the season he chose for his +flittings--moving, for the mere joy of rushing through the warm +air, thirty, forty, or fifty miles between twilight and the +morning star, and coming back panting and laughing and wreathed +with strange flowers. The Four did not follow him on these wild +ringings of the Jungle, but went off to sing songs with other +wolves. The Jungle People are very busy in the spring, and +Mowgli could hear them grunting and screaming and whistling +according to their kind. Their voices then are different from +their voices at other times of the year, and that is one of the +reasons why spring in the Jungle is called the Time of New Talk. + +But that spring, as he told Bagheera, his stomach was changed +in him. Ever since the bamboo shoots turned spotty-brown he +had been looking forward to the morning when the smells should +change. But when the morning came, and Mor the Peacock, blazing +in bronze and blue and gold, cried it aloud all along the misty +woods, and Mowgli opened his mouth to send on the cry, the words +choked between his teeth, and a feeling came over him that +began at his toes and ended in his hair--a feeling of pure +unhappiness, so that he looked himself over to be sure that he +had not trod on a thorn. Mor cried the new smells, the other +birds took it over, and from the rocks by the Waingunga he heard +Bagheera's hoarse scream--something between the scream of an +eagle and the neighing of a horse. There was a yelling and +scattering of Bandar-log in the new-budding branches above, +and there stood Mowgli, his chest, filled to answer Mor, +sinking in little gasps as the breath was driven out of it +by this unhappiness. + +He stared all round him, but he could see no more than the +mocking Bandar-log scudding through the trees, and Mor, his tail +spread in full splendour, dancing on the slopes below. + +"The smells have changed," screamed Mor. "Good hunting, +Little Brother! Where is thy answer?" + +"Little Brother, good hunting!" whistled Chil the Kite and his +mate, swooping down together. The two baffed under Mowgli's nose +so close that a pinch of downy white feathers brushed away. + +A light spring rain--elephant-rain they call it--drove across +the Jungle in a belt half a mile wide, left the new leaves wet +and nodding behind, and died out in a double rainbow and a light +roll of thunder. The spring hum broke out for a minute, and was +silent, but all the Jungle Folk seemed to be giving tongue at +once. All except Mowgli. + +"I have eaten good food," he said to himself. "I have drunk good +water. Nor does my throat burn and grow small, as it did when +I bit the blue-spotted root that Oo the Turtle said was clean +food. But my stomach is heavy, and I have given very bad talk +to Bagheera and others, people of the Jungle and my people. +Now, too, I am hot and now I am cold, and now I am neither hot +nor cold, but angry with that which I cannot see. Huhu! It is +time to make a running! To-night I will cross the ranges; yes, +I will make a spring running to the Marshes of the North, and +back again. I have hunted too easily too long. The Four shall +come with me, for they grow as fat as white grubs." + +He called, but never one of the Four answered. They were far +beyond earshot, singing over the spring songs--the Moon and +Sambhur Songs-- with the wolves of the pack; for in the spring- +time the Jungle People make very little difference between the +day and the night. He gave the sharp, barking note, but his only +answer was the mocking maiou of the little spotted tree-cat +winding in and out among the branches for early birds' nests. +At this he shook all over with rage, and half drew his knife. +Then he became very haughty, though there was no one to see him, +and stalked severely down the hillside, chin up and eyebrows +down. But never a single one of his people asked him a question, +for they were all too busy with their own affairs. + +"Yes," said Mowgli to himself, though in his heart he knew that +he had no reason. "Let the Red Dhole come from the Dekkan, +or the Red Flower dance among the bamboos, and all the Jungle +runs whining to Mowgli, calling him great elephant-names. +But now, because Eye-of-the-Spring is red, and Mor, forsooth, +must show his naked legs in some spring dance, the Jungle goes +mad as Tabaqui. . . . By the Bull that bought me! am I the +Master of the Jungle, or am I not? Be silent! What do ye here?" + +A couple of young wolves of the Pack were cantering down a path, +looking for open ground in which to fight. (You will remember +that the Law of the Jungle forbids fighting where the Pack can +see.) Their neck-bristles were as stiff as wire, and they bayed +furiously, crouching for the first grapple. Mowgli leaped +forward, caught one outstretched throat in either hand, +expecting to fling the creatures backward as he had often done +in games or Pack hunts. But he had never before interfered with +a spring fight. The two leaped forward and dashed him aside, +and without word to waste rolled over and over close locked. + +Mowgli was on his feet almost before he fell, his knife and his +white teeth were bared, and at that minute he would have killed +both for no reason but that they were fighting when he wished +them to be quiet, although every wolf has full right under the +Law to fight. He danced round them with lowered shoulders and +quivering hand, ready to send in a double blow when the first +flurry of the scuffle should be over; but while he waited the +strength seemed to ebb from his body, the knife-point lowered, +and he sheathed the knife and watched. + +"I have surely eaten poison," he sighed at last. Since I broke +up the Council with the Red Flower--since I killed Shere Khan-- +none of the Pack could fling me aside. And these be only tail- +wolves in the Pack, little hunters! My strength is gone from me, +and presently I shall die. Oh, Mowgli, why dost thou not kill +them both?" + +The fight went on till one wolf ran away, and Mowgli was left +alone on the torn and bloody ground, looking now at his knife, +and now at his legs and arms, while the feeling of unhappiness +he had never known before covered him as water covers a log. + +He killed early that evening and ate but little, so as to be +in good fettle for his spring running, and he ate alone because +all the Jungle People were away singing or fighting. It was a +perfect white night, as they call it. All green things seemed to +have made a month's growth since the morning. The branch that +was yellow-leaved the day before dripped sap when Mowgli broke +it. The mosses curled deep and warm over his feet, the young +grass had no cutting edges, and all the voices of the Jungle +boomed like one deep harp-string touched by the moon--the Moon +of New Talk, who splashed her light full on rock and pool, +slipped it between trunk and creeper, and sifted it through a +million leaves. Forgetting his unhappiness, Mowgli sang aloud +with pure delight as he settled into his stride. It was more +like flying than anything else, for he had chosen the long +downward slope that leads to the Northern Marshes through the +heart of the main Jungle, where the springy ground deadened the +fall of his feet. A man-taught man would have picked his way +with many stumbles through the cheating moonlight, but Mowgli's +muscles, trained by years of experience, bore him up as though +he were a feather. When a rotten log or a hidden stone turned +under his foot he saved himself, never checking his pace, +without effort and without thought. When he tired of ground- +going he threw up his hands monkey-fashion to the nearest +creeper, and seemed to float rather than to climb up into the +thin branches, whence he would follow a tree-road till his mood +changed, and he shot downward in a long, leafy curve to the +levels again. There were still, hot hollows surrounded by wet +rocks where he could hardly breathe for the heavy scents of the +night flowers and the bloom along the creeper buds; dark avenues +where the moonlight lay in belts as regular as checkered marbles +in a church aisle; thickets where the wet young growth stood +breast-high about him and threw its arms round his waist; +and hilltops crowned with broken rock, where he leaped from +stone to stone above the lairs of the frightened little foxes. +He would hear, very faint and far off, the chug-drug of a boar +sharpening his tusks on a bole; and would come across the great +gray brute all alone, scribing and rending the bark of a tall +tree, his mouth dripping with foam, and his eyes blazing like +fire. Or he would turn aside to the sound of clashing horns and +hissing grunts, and dash past a couple of furious sambhur, +staggering to and fro with lowered heads, striped with blood +that showed black in the moonlight. Or at some rushing ford he +would hear Jacala the Crocodile bellowing like a bull, +or disturb a twined knot of the Poison People, but before they +could strike he would be away and across the glistening shingle, +and deep in the Jungle again. + +So he ran, sometimes shouting, sometimes singing to himself, +the happiest thing in all the Jungle that night, till the smell +of the flowers warned him that he was near the marshes, +and those lay far beyond his farthest hunting-grounds. + +Here, again, a man-trained man would have sunk overhead in three +strides, but Mowgli's feet had eyes in them, and they passed him +from tussock to tussock and clump to quaking clump without +asking help from the eyes in his head. He ran out to the middle +of the swamp, disturbing the duck as he ran, and sat down on a +moss-coated tree-trunk lapped in the black water. The marsh was +awake all round him, for in the spring the Bird People sleep +very lightly, and companies of them were coming or going the +night through. But no one took any notice of Mowgli sitting +among the tall reeds humming songs without words, and looking at +the soles of his hard brown feet in case of neglected thorns. +All his unhappiness seemed to have been left behind in his own +Jungle, and he was just beginning a full-throat song when it came +back again--ten times worse than before. + +This time Mowgli was frightened. "It is here also!" he said half +aloud. "It has followed me," and he looked over his shoulder to +see whether the It were not standing behind him. "There is no +one here." The night noises of the marsh went on, but never a +bird or beast spoke to him, and the new feeling of misery grew. + +"I have surely eaten poison," he said in an awe-stricken voice. +"It must be that carelessly I have eaten poison, and my strength +is going from me. I was afraid--and yet it was not _I_ that was +afraid--Mowgli was afraid when the two wolves fought. Akela, or +even Phao, would have silenced them; yet Mowgli was afraid. +That is true sign I have eaten poison. . . . But what do they +care in the Jungle? They sing and howl and fight, and run in +companies under the moon, and I--Hai-mai!--I am dying in the +marshes, of that poison which I have eaten." He was so sorry for +himself that he nearly wept. "And after," he went on, "they will +find me lying in the black water. Nay, I will go back to my own +Jungle, and I will die upon the Council Rock, and Bagheera, +whom I love, if he is not screaming in the valley--Bagheera, +perhaps, may watch by what is left for a little, lest Chil use +me as he used Akela." + +A large, warm tear splashed down on his knee, and, miserable as +he was, Mowgli felt happy that he was so miserable, if you can +understand that upside-down sort of happiness. "As Chil the +Kite used Akela," he repeated, "on the night I saved the Pack +from Red Dog." He was quiet for a little, thinking of the +last words of the Lone Wolf, which you, of course, remember. +"Now Akela said to me many foolish things before he died, +for when we die our stomachs change. He said . . . None the +less, I AM of the Jungle!" + +In his excitement, as he remembered the fight on Waingunga bank, +he shouted the last words aloud, and a wild buffalo-cow among +the reeds sprang to her knees, snorting, "Man!" + +"Uhh!" said Mysa the Wild Buffalo (Mowgli could hear him turn +in his wallow), "THAT is no man. It is only the hairless wolf +of the Seeonee Pack. On such nights runs he to and fro." + +"Uhh!" said the cow, dropping her head again to graze, +"I thought it was Man." + +"I say no. Oh, Mowgli, is it danger?" lowed Mysa. + +"Oh, Mowgli, is it danger?" the boy called back mockingly. +"That is all Mysa thinks for: Is it danger? But for Mowgli, +who goes to and fro in the Jungle by night, watching, what +do ye care?" + +"How loud he cries!" said the cow. "Thus do they cry," Mysa +answered contemptuously, "who, having torn up the grass, +know not how to eat it." + +"For less than this," Mowgli groaned to himself, for less than +this even last Rains I had pricked Mysa out of his wallow, +and ridden him through the swamp on a rush halter." He stretched +a hand to break one of the feathery reeds, but drew it back with +a sigh. Mysa went on steadily chewing the cud, and the long +grass ripped where the cow grazed. "I will not die HERE," +he said angrily. "Mysa, who is of one blood with Jacala and +the pig, would see me. Let us go beyond the swamp and see what +comes. Never have I run such a spring running--hot and cold +together. Up, Mowgli!" + +He could not resist the temptation of stealing across the reeds +to Mysa and pricking him with the point of his knife. The great +dripping bull broke out of his wallow like a shell exploding, +while Mowgli laughed till he sat down. + +"Say now that the hairless wolf of the Seeonee Pack once herded +thee, Mysa," he called. + +"Wolf! THOU?" the bull snorted, stamping in the mud. "All the +jungle knows thou wast a herder of tame cattle--such a man's +brat as shouts in the dust by the crops yonder. THOU of the +Jungle! What hunter would have crawled like a snake among the +leeches, and for a muddy jest--a jackal's jest--have shamed me +before my cow? Come to firm ground, and I will--I will . . ." +Mysa frothed at the mouth, for Mysa has nearly the worst temper +of any one in the Jungle. + +Mowgli watched him puff and blow with eyes that never changed. +When he could make himself heard through the pattering mud, +he said: "What Man-Pack lair here by the marshes, Mysa? This is +new Jungle to me." + +"Go north, then," roared the angry bull, for Mowgli had pricked +him rather sharply. "It was a naked cow-herd's jest. Go and tell +them at the village at the foot of the marsh." + +"The Man-Pack do not love jungle-tales, nor do I think, Mysa, +that a scratch more or less on thy hide is any matter for a +council. But I will go and look at this village. Yes, I will go. +Softly now. It is not every night that the Master of the Jungle +comes to herd thee." + +He stepped out to the shivering ground on the edge of the marsh, +well knowing that Mysa would never charge over it and laughed, +as he ran, to think of the bull's anger. + +"My strength is not altogether gone," he said. It may be that +the poison is not to the bone. There is a star sitting low +yonder." He looked at it between his half-shut hands. "By the +Bull that bought me, it is the Red Flower--the Red Flower that +I lay beside before--before I came even to the first Seeonee +Pack! Now that I have seen, I will finish the running." + +The marsh ended in a broad plain where a light twinkled. +It was a long time since Mowgli had concerned himself with +the doings of men, but this night the glimmer of the Red Flower +drew him forward. + +"I will look," said he, "as I did in the old days, and I will +see how far the Man-Pack has changed." + +Forgetting that he was no longer in his own Jungle, where he +could do what he pleased, he trod carelessly through the dew- +loaded grasses till he came to the hut where the light stood. +Three or four yelping dogs gave tongue, for he was on the +outskirts of a village. + +"Ho!" said Mowgli, sitting down noiselessly, after sending back +a deep wolf-growl that silenced the curs. "What comes will come. +Mowgli, what hast thou to do any more with the lairs of the +Man-Pack?" He rubbed his mouth, remembering where a stone had +struck it years ago when the other Man-Pack had cast him out. + +The door of the hut opened, and a woman stood peering out +into the darkness. A child cried, and the woman said over her +shoulder, "Sleep. It was but a jackal that waked the dogs. +In a little time morning comes." + +Mowgli in the grass began to shake as though he had fever. +He knew that voice well, but to make sure he cried softly, +surprised to find how man's talk came back, "Messua! O Messua!" + +"Who calls?" said the woman, a quiver in her voice. + +"Hast thou forgotten?" said Mowgli. His throat was dry as +he spoke. + +"If it be THOU, what name did I give thee? Say!" She had half +shut the door, and her hand was clutching at her breast. + +"Nathoo! Ohe, Nathoo!" said Mowgli, for, as you remember, that +was the name Messua gave him when he first came to the Man-Pack. + +"Come, my son," she called, and Mowgli stepped into the light, +and looked full at Messua, the woman who had been good to him, +and whose life he had saved from the Man-Pack so long before. +She was older, and her hair was gray, but her eyes and her voice +had not changed. Woman-like, she expected to find Mowgli where +she had left him, and her eyes travelled upward in a puzzled way +from his chest to his head, that touched the top of the door. + +"My son," she stammered; and then, sinking to his feet: "But it +is no longer my son. It is a Godling of the Woods! Ahai!" + +As he stood in the red light of the oil-lamp, strong, tall, +and beautiful, his long black hair sweeping over his shoulders, +the knife swinging at his neck, and his head crowned with a +wreath of white jasmine, he might easily have been mistaken for +some wild god of a jungle legend. The child half asleep on a cot +sprang up and shrieked aloud with terror. Messua turned to +soothe him, while Mowgli stood still, looking in at the water- +jars and the cooking-pots, the grain-bin, and all the other +human belongings that he found himself remembering so well. + +"What wilt thou eat or drink?" Messua murmured. "This is all +thine. We owe our lives to thee. But art thou him I called +Nathoo, or a Godling, indeed?" + +"I am Nathoo," said Mowgli, "I am very far from my own place. +I saw this light, and came hither. I did not know thou +wast here." + +"After we came to Khanhiwara," Messua said timidly, "the English +would have helped us against those villagers that sought to burn +us. Rememberest thou?" + +"Indeed, I have not forgotten." + +"But when the English Law was made ready, we went to the village +of those evil people, and it was no more to be found." + +"That also I remember," said Mowgli, with a quiver of +his nostril. + +"My man, therefore, took service in the fields, and at last-- +for, indeed, he was a strong man--we held a little land here. +It is not so rich as the old village, but we do not need much-- +we two." + +"Where is he the man that dug in the dirt when he was afraid on +that night?" + +"He is dead--a year." + +"And he?" Mowgli pointed to the child. + +"My son that was born two Rains ago. If thou art a Godling, +give him the Favour of the Jungle, that he may be safe among +thy--thy people, as we were safe on that night." + +She lifted up the child, who, forgetting his fright, reached out +to play with the knife that hung on Mowgli's chest, and Mowgli +put the little fingers aside very carefully. + +"And if thou art Nathoo whom the tiger carried away," Messua +went on, choking, "he is then thy younger brother. Give him an +elder brother's blessing." + +"Hai-mai! What do I know of the thing called a blessing? +I am neither a Godling nor his brother, and--O mother, mother, +my heart is heavy in me." He shivered as he set down the child. + +"Like enough," said Messua, bustling among the cooking-pots. +"This comes of running about the marshes by night. +Beyond question, the fever had soaked thee to the marrow." +Mowgli smiled a little at the idea of anything in the Jungle +hurting him. "I will make a fire, and thou shalt drink warm +milk. Put away the jasmine wreath: the smell is heavy in so +small a place." + +Mowgli sat down, muttering, with his face in his hands. +All manner of strange feelings that he had never felt before +were running over him, exactly as though he had been poisoned, +and he felt dizzy and a little sick. He drank the warm milk in +long gulps, Messua patting him on the shoulder from time to +time, not quite sure whether he were her son Nathoo of the long +ago days, or some wonderful Jungle being, but glad to feel that +he was at least flesh and blood. + +"Son," she said at last,--her eyes were full of pride,-- +"have any told thee that thou art beautiful beyond all men?" + +"Hah?" said Mowgli, for naturally he had never heard anything of +the kind. Messua laughed softly and happily. The look in his +face was enough for her. + +"I am the first, then? It is right, though it comes seldom, +that a mother should tell her son these good things. Thou art +very beautiful. Never have I looked upon such a man." + +Mowgli twisted his head and tried to see over his own hard +shoulder, and Messua laughed again so long that Mowgli, +not knowing why, was forced to laugh with her, and the child +ran from one to the other, laughing too. + +"Nay, thou must not mock thy brother," said Messua, catching +him to her breast. "When thou art one-half as fair we will marry +thee to the youngest daughter of a king, and thou shalt ride +great elephants." + +Mowgli could not understand one word in three of the talk here; +the warm milk was taking effect on him after his long run, so he +curled up and in a minute was deep asleep, and Messua put the +hair back from his eyes, threw a cloth over him, and was happy. +Jungle-fashion, he slept out the rest of that night and all the +next day; for his instincts, which never wholly slept, warned +him there was nothing to fear. He waked at last with a bound +that shook the hut, for the cloth over his face made him dream +of traps; and there he stood, his hand on his knife, the sleep +all heavy in his rolling eyes, ready for any fight. + +Messua laughed, and set the evening meal before him. There were +only a few coarse cakes baked over the smoky fire, some rice, +and a lump of sour preserved tamarinds--just enough to go on +with till he could get to his evening kill. The smell of the dew +in the marshes made him hungry and restless. He wanted to finish +his spring running, but the child insisted on sitting in his +arms, and Messua would have it that his long, blue-black hair +must he combed out. So she sang, as she combed, foolish little +baby-songs, now calling Mowgli her son, and now begging him to +give some of his jungle power to the child. The hut door was +closed, but Mowgli heard a sound he knew well, and saw Messua's +jaw drop with horror as a great gray paw came under the bottom +of the door, and Gray Brother outside whined a muffled and +penitent whine of anxiety and fear. + +"Out and wait! Ye would not come when I called," said Mowgli +in Jungle-talk, without turning his head, and the great gray +paw disappeared. + +"Do not--do not bring thy--thy servants with thee," said Messua. +"I--we have always lived at peace with the Jungle." + +"It is peace," said Mowgli, rising. "Think of that night on the +road to Khanhiwara. There were scores of such folk before thee +and behind thee. But I see that even in springtime the Jungle +People do not always forget. Mother, I go." + +Messua drew aside humbly--he was indeed a wood-god, she thought; +but as his hand was on the door the mother in her made her throw +her arms round Mowgli's neck again and again. + +"Come back!" she whispered. "Son or no son, come back, for I +love thee--Look, he too grieves." + +The child was crying because the man with the shiny knife was +going away. + +"Come back again," Messua repeated. "By night or by day this +door is never shut to thee." + +Mowgli's throat worked as though the cords in it were being +pulled, and his voice seemed to be dragged from it as he +answered, "I will surely come back." + +"And now," he said, as he put by the head of the fawning wolf on +the threshold, "I have a little cry against thee, Gray Brother. +Why came ye not all four when I called so long ago?" + +"So long ago? It was but last night. I--we--were singing in +the Jungle the new songs, for this is the Time of New Talk. +Rememberest thou?" + +"Truly, truly." + +"And as soon as the songs were sung," Gray Brother went on +earnestly, "I followed thy trail. I ran from all the others and +followed hot-foot. But, O Little Brother, what hast THOU done, +eating and sleeping with the Man-Pack?" + +"If ye had come when I called, this had never been," said +Mowgli, running much faster. + +"And now what is to be?" said Gray Brother. Mowgli was going to +answer when a girl in a white cloth came down some path that led +from the outskirts of the village. Gray Brother dropped out of +sight at once, and Mowgli backed noiselessly into a field of +high-springing crops. He could almost have touched her with +his hand when the warm, green stalks closed before his face +and he disappeared like a ghost. The girl screamed, for she +thought she had seen a spirit, and then she gave a deep sigh. +Mowgli parted the stalks with his hands and watched her till +she was out of sight. + +"And now I do not know," he said, sighing in his turn. "WHY did +ye not come when I called?" + +"We follow thee--we follow thee," Gray Brother mumbled, licking +at Mowgli's heel. "We follow thee always, except in the Time of +the New Talk." + +"And would ye follow me to the Man-Pack?" Mowgli whispered. + +"Did I not follow thee on the night our old Pack cast thee out? +Who waked thee lying among the crops?" + +"Ay, but again?" + +"Have I not followed thee to-night? " + +"Ay, but again and again, and it may be again, Gray Brother?" + +Gray Brother was silent. When he spoke he growled to himself, +"The Black One spoke truth." + +"And he said?" + +"Man goes to Man at the last. Raksha, our mother, said----" + +"So also said Akela on the night of Red Dog," Mowgli muttered. + +"So also says Kaa, who is wiser than us all." + +"What dost thou say, Gray Brother?" + +"They cast thee out once, with bad talk. They cut thy mouth +with stones. They sent Buldeo to slay thee. They would have +thrown thee into the Red Flower. Thou, and not I, hast said +that they are evil and senseless. Thou, and not I--I follow +my own people--didst let in the Jungle upon them. Thou, and +not I, didst make song against them more bitter even than our +song against Red Dog." + +"I ask thee what THOU sayest?" + +They were talking as they ran. Gray Brother cantered on a while +without replying, and then he said,--between bound and bound as +it were,--"Man-cub--Master of the Jungle--Son of Raksha, Lair- +brother to me--though I forget for a little while in the spring, +thy trail is my trail, thy lair is my lair, thy kill is my kill, +and thy death-fight is my death-fight. I speak for the Three. +But what wilt thou say to the Jungle?" + +"That is well thought. Between the sight and the kill it is not +good to wait. Go before and cry them all to the Council Rock, +and I will tell them what is in my stomach. But they may not +come--in the Time of New Talk they may forget me." + +"Hast thou, then, forgotten nothing?" snapped Gray Brother over +his shoulder, as he laid himself down to gallop, and Mowgli +followed, thinking. + +At any other season the news would have called all the Jungle +together with bristling necks, but now they were busy hunting +and fighting and killing and singing. From one to another Gray +Brother ran, crying, "The Master of the Jungle goes back to Man! +Come to the Council Rock." And the happy, eager People only +answered, "He will return in the summer heats. The Rains will +drive him to lair. Run and sing with us, Gray Brother." + +"But the Master of the Jungle goes back to Man," Gray Brother +would repeat. + +"Eee--Yoawa? Is the Time of New Talk any less sweet for that?" +they would reply. So when Mowgli, heavy-hearted, came up through +the well- remembered rocks to the place where he had been +brought into the Council, he found only the Four, Baloo, who was +nearly blind with age, and the heavy, cold-blooded Kaa coiled +around Akela's empty seat. + +"Thy trail ends here, then, Manling?" said Kaa, as Mowgli threw +himself down, his face in his hands. "Cry thy cry. We be of one +blood, thou and I--man and snake together." + +"Why did I not die under Red Dog?" the boy moaned. "My strength +is gone from me, and it is not any poison. By night and by day +I hear a double step upon my trail. When I turn my head it is as +though one had hidden himself from me that instant. I go to look +behind the trees and he is not there. I call and none cry again; +but it is as though one listened and kept back the answer. I lie +down, but I do not rest. I run the spring running, but I am not +made still. I bathe, but I am not made cool. The kill sickens +me, but I have no heart to fight except I kill. The Red Flower +is in my body, my bones are water--and--I know not what I know." + +"What need of talk?" said Baloo slowly, turning his head to +where Mowgli lay. "Akela by the river said it, that Mowgli +should drive Mowgli back to the Man-Pack. I said it. But who +listens now to Baloo? Bagheera--where is Bagheera this night?-- +he knows also. It is the Law." + +"When we met at Cold Lairs, Manling, I knew it," said Kaa, +turning a little in his mighty coils. "Man goes to Man at the +last, though the Jungle does not cast him out." + +The Four looked at one another and at Mowgli, puzzled +but obedient. + +"The Jungle does not cast me out, then?" Mowgli stammered. + +Gray Brother and the Three growled furiously, beginning, +"So long as we live none shall dare----" But Baloo checked them. + +"I taught thee the Law. It is for me to speak," he said; +"and, though I cannot now see the rocks before me, I see far. +Little Frog, take thine own trail; make thy lair with thine own +blood and pack and people; but when there is need of foot or +tooth or eye, or a word carried swiftly by night, remember, +Master of the Jungle, the Jungle is thine at call." + +"The Middle Jungle is thine also," said Kaa. I speak for no +small people." + +"Hai-mai, my brothers," cried Mowgli, throwing up his arms with +a sob. "I know not what I know! I would not go; but I am drawn +by both feet. How shall I leave these nights?" + +"Nay, look up, Little Brother," Baloo repeated. There is no +shame in this hunting. When the honey is eaten we leave the +empty hive." + +"Having cast the skin," said Kaa, "we may not creep into it +afresh. It is the Law." + +"Listen, dearest of all to me," said Baloo. There is neither +word nor will here to hold thee back. Look up! Who may question +the Master of the Jungle? I saw thee playing among the white +pebbles yonder when thou wast a little frog; and Bagheera, +that bought thee for the price of a young bull newly killed, +saw thee also. Of that Looking Over we two only remain; +for Raksha, thy lair-mother, is dead with thy lair-father; +the old Wolf-Pack is long since dead; thou knowest whither +Shere Khan went, and Akela died among the dholes, where, +but for thy wisdom and strength, the second Seeonee Pack would +also have died. There remains nothing but old bones. It is no +longer the Man-cub that asks leave of his Pack, but the Master +of the Jungle that changes his trail. Who shall question Man +in his ways?" + +"But Bagheera and the Bull that bought me," said Mowgli. +"I would not----" + +His words were cut short by a roar and a crash in the thicket +below, and Bagheera, light, strong, and terrible as always, +stood before him. + +"Therefore," he said, stretching out a dripping right paw, +"I did not come. It was a long hunt, but he lies dead in the +bushes now--a bull in his second year--the Bull that frees thee, +Little Brother. All debts are paid now. For the rest, my word is +Baloo's word." He licked Mowgli's foot. "Remember, Bagheera +loved thee," he cried, and bounded away. At the foot of the hill +he cried again long and loud, "Good hunting on a new trail, +Master of the Jungle! Remember, Bagheera loved thee." + +"Thou hast heard," said Baloo. "There is no more. Go now; +but first come to me. O wise Little Frog, come to me!" + +"It is hard to cast the skin," said Kaa as Mowgli sobbed and +sobbed, with his head on the blind bear's side and his arms +round his neck, while Baloo tried feebly to lick his feet. + +"The stars are thin," said Gray Brother, snuffing at the dawn +wind. "Where shall we lair to-day? for from now, we follow +new trails." + +...... + +And this is the last of the Mowgli stories. + + + +THE OUTSONG + +[This is the song that Mowgli heard behind him in the Jungle till +he came to Messua's door again.] + +Baloo + +For the sake of him who showed +One wise Frog the Jungle-Road, +Keep the Law the Man-Pack make-- +For thy blind old Baloo's sake! +Clean or tainted, hot or stale, +Hold it as it were the Trail, +Through the day and through the night, +Questing neither left nor right. +For the sake of him who loves +Thee beyond all else that moves, +When thy Pack would make thee pain, +Say: "Tabaqui sings again." +When thy Pack would work thee ill, +Say: "Shere Khan is yet to kill." +When the knife is drawn to slay, +Keep the Law and go thy way. +(Root and honey, palm and spathe, +Guard a cub from harm and scathe!) +Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, +Jungle-Favour go with thee! + + +Kaa + +Anger is the egg of Fear-- +Only lidless eyes are clear. +Cobra-poison none may leech. +Even so with Cobra-speech. +Open talk shall call to thee +Strength, whose mate is Courtesy. +Send no lunge beyond thy length; +Lend no rotten bough thy strength. +Gauge thy gape with buck or goat, +Lest thine eye should choke thy throat, +After gorging, wouldst thou sleep? +Look thy den is hid and deep, +Lest a wrong, by thee forgot, +Draw thy killer to the spot. +East and West and North and South, +Wash thy hide and close thy mouth. +(Pit and rift and blue pool-brim, +Middle-Jungle follow him!) +Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, +Jungle-Favour go with thee! + + +Bagheera + +In the cage my life began; +Well I know the worth of Man. +By the Broken Lock that freed-- +Man-cub, 'ware the Man-cub's breed! +Scenting-dew or starlight pale, +Choose no tangled tree-cat trail. +Pack or council, hunt or den, +Cry no truce with Jackal-Men. +Feed them silence when they say: +"Come with us an easy way." +Feed them silence when they seek +Help of thine to hurt the weak. +Make no banaar's boast of skill; +Hold thy peace above the kill. +Let nor call nor song nor sign +Turn thee from thy hunting-line. +(Morning mist or twilight clear, +Serve him, Wardens of the Deer!) +Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, +Jungle-Favour go with thee! + + +The Three + +On the trail that thou must tread +To the thresholds of our dread, +Where the Flower blossoms red; +Through the nights when thou shalt lie +Prisoned from our Mother-sky, +Hearing us, thy loves, go by; +In the dawns when thou shalt wake +To the toil thou canst not break, +Heartsick for the Jungle's sake: +Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, +Wisdom, Strength, and Courtesy, +Jungle-Favour go with thee! + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg Etext The Second Jungle Book, Rudyard Kipling + |