Rudyard Kipling

The Jungle Book Rudyard Kipling

It was seven o'clock of a very warm evening in the Seeonee hills when Father Wolf wokeup from his day's rest, scratched himself, yawned, and spread out his paws one after theother to get rid of the sleepy feeling in their tips. Mother Wolf lay with her big gray nosedropped across her four tumbling, squealing cubs, and the moon shone into the mouth ofthe cave where they all lived. "Augrh!" said Father Wolf. "It is time to hunt again." He wasgoing to spring down hill when a little shadow with a bushy tail crossed the threshold andwhined: "Good luck go with you, O Chief of the Wolves. And good luck and strong whiteteeth go with noble children that they may never forget the hungry in this world."It was the jackal-Tabaqui, the Dish-licker-and the wolves of India despise Tabaquibecause he runs about making mischief, and telling tales, and eating rags and pieces ofleather from the village rubbish-heaps. But they are afraid of him too, because Tabaqui, more than anyone else in the jungle, is apt to go mad, and then he forgets that he was everafraid of anyone, and runs through the forest biting everything in his way. Even the tigerruns and hides when little Tabaqui goes mad, for madness is the most disgraceful thing thatcan overtake a wild creature. We call it hydrophobia, but they call it dewanee-themadness-and run."Enter, then, and look," said Father Wolf stiffly, "but there is no food here.""For a wolf, no," said Tabaqui, "but for so mean a person as myself a dry bone is a goodfeast. Who are we, the Gidur-log [the jackal people], to pick and choose?" He scuttled to theback of the cave, where he found the bone of a buck with some meat on it, and sat crackingthe end merrily."All thanks for this good meal," he said, licking his lips. "How beautiful are the noblechildren! How large are their eyes! And so young too! Indeed, indeed, I might haveremembered that the children of kings are men from the beginning."Now, Tabaqui knew as well as anyone else that there is nothing so unlucky as tocompliment children to their faces. It pleased him to see Mother and Father Wolf lookuncomfortable