The Jungle Books by Rudyard Kipling, Alev Lytle Croutier Read Free Book Online

Laws: how to tell a rotten branch from a sound one; how to speak politely to the wild bees when he came upon a hive of them fifty feet above ground; what to say to Mang the Bat when he disturbed him in the branches at mid-day; and how to warn the water-snakes in the pools before he splashed down among them. None of the Jungle-People like being disturbed, and all are very ready to fly at an intruder. Then, too, Mowgli was taught the Strangers’ Hunting-Call, which must be repeated aloud till it is answered, whenever one of the Jungle-People hunts outside his own grounds. It means, translated: “Give me leave to hunt here because I am hungry”; and the answer is: “Hunt then for food, but not for pleasure.”
    All this will show you how much Mowgli had to learn by heart, and he grew very tired of saying the same thing over a hundred times. But, as Baloo said to Bagheera, one day when Mowgli had been cuffed and run off in a temper: “A man’s cub is a man’s cub, and he must learn
all
the Law of the Jungle.”
    “But think how small he is,” said the black panther, who would have spoiled Mowgli if he had had his own way. “How can his little head carry all thy long talk?”
    “Is there anything in the jungle too little to be killed? No. That is why I teach him these things, and that is why I hit him, very softly, when he forgets.”
    “Softly! What dost thou know of softness, old Iron-feet?” Bagheera grunted. “His face is all bruised to-day by thy—softness.
Ugh.
”
    “Better he should be bruised from head to foot by me who loves him than that he should come to harmthrough ignorance,” Baloo answered very earnestly. “I am now teaching him the Master Words of the jungle that shall protect him with the birds and the Snake-People, and all that hunt on four feet, except his own pack. He can now claim protection, if he will only remember the words, from all in the jungle. Is not that worth a little beating?”
    “Well, look to it then that thou dost not kill the man-cub. He is no tree-trunk to sharpen thy blunt claws upon. But what are those Master Words? I am more likely to give help than to ask it”—Bagheera stretched out one paw and admired the steel-blue, ripping-chisel talons at the end of it—“still I should like to know.”
    “I will call Mowgli and he shall say them—if he will. Come, Little Brother!”
    “My head is ringing like a bee-tree,” said a sullen little voice over their heads, and Mowgli slid down a tree-trunk very angry and indignant, adding as he reached the ground: “I come for Bagheera and not for
thee
, fat old Baloo!”
    “That is all one to me,” said Baloo, though he was hurt and grieved. “Tell Bagheera, then, the Master Words of the jungle that I have taught thee this day.”
    “Master Words for which people?” said Mowgli, delighted to show off. “The jungle has many tongues.
I
know them all.”
    “A little thou knowest, but not much. See, O Bagheera, they never thank their teacher. Not one small wolfling has ever come back to thank old Baloo for his teachings. Say the word for the Hunting-People then—great scholar.”
    “We be of one blood, ye and I,” said Mowgli, giving the words the bear accent which all the Hunting-People use.
    “Good. Now for the birds.”
    Mowgli repeated, with the kite’s whistle at the end of the sentence.
    “Now for the Snake-People,” said Bagheera.
    The answer was a perfectly indescribable hiss, andMowgli kicked up his feet behind, clapped his hands together to applaud himself, and jumped on to Bagheera’s back, where he sat sideways, drumming with his heels on the glossy skin and making the worst faces he could think of at Baloo.
    “There—there! That was worth a little bruise,” said the brown bear tenderly. “Some day thou wilt remember me.” Then he turned aside to tell Bagheera how he had begged the Master Words from Hathi the Wild Elephant, who knows all about these things, and how Hathi had taken Mowgli down to a