“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 be 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!
THE DAY’S WORK
This collection of short stories was first published in 1898.
The first edition
CONTENTS
Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) Page 301