【英文原著类】THE JUNGLE BOOK(丛林的故事).pdf

THE JUNGLE BOOK
THE JUNGLE BOOK
1
THE JUNGLE BOOK
Mowgli's Brothers
Now Rann the Kite brings home the night That Mang the Bat sets
free-- The herds are shut in byre and hut For loosed till dawn are we. This
is the hour of pride and power, Talon and tush and claw. Oh, hear the call!-
-Good hunting all That keep the Jungle Law! Night-Song in the Jungle
It was seven o'clock of a very warm evening in the Seeonee hills when
Father Wolf woke up from his day's rest, scratched himself, yawned, and
spread out his paws one after the other to get rid of the sleepy feeling in
their tips. Mother Wolf lay with her big gray nose dropped across her four
tumbling, squealing cubs, and the moon shone into the mouth of the cave
where they all lived. "Augrh!" said Father Wolf. "It is time to hunt again."
He was going to spring down hill when a little shadow with a bushy tail
crossed the threshold and whined: "Good luck go with you, O Chief of the
Wolves. And good luck and strong white teeth 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 Tabaqui because he runs about making mischief, and telling tales,
and eating rags and pieces of leather 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 ever afraid of
anyone, and runs through the forest biting everything in his way. Even the
tiger runs and hides when little Tabaqui goes mad, for madness is the most
disgraceful thing that can overtake a wild creature. We call it hydrophobia,
but they call it dewanee--the madness-- 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 good feast. Who are we, the Gidur-log [the jackal people], to
pick and choose?" He scuttled to