Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) (340 page)
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Authors: Rudyard Kipling
‘I die,’ he said quietly. ‘It is well for me, Leo, that you sang for forty years.’
‘Are you afraid?’ said Leo, bending over him.
‘I am a man, not a God,’ said the man. ‘I should have run away but for your songs. My work is done, and I die without making a show of my fear.’
‘I am very well paid,’ said Leo to himself. ‘Now that I see what my songs are doing, I will sing better ones.’
He went down the road, collected his little knot of listeners, and began the Song of the Girl. In the middle of his singing he felt the cold touch of the Crab’s claw on the apple of his throat. He lifted his hand, choked, and stopped for an instant.
‘Sing on, Leo,’ said the crowd. ‘The old song runs as well as ever it did.’
Leo went on steadily till the end with the cold fear at his heart. When his song was ended, he felt the grip on his throat tighten. He was old, he had lost the Girl, he knew that he was losing more than half his power to sing, he could scarcely walk to the diminishing crowds that waited for him, and could not see their faces when they stood about him. None the less, he cried angrily to the Crab:
‘Why have you come for me now?’
‘You were born under my care. How can I help coming for you?’ said the Crab wearily. Every human being whom the Crab killed had asked that same question.
‘But I was just beginning to know what my songs were doing,’ said Leo.
‘Perhaps that is why,’ said the Crab, and the grip tightened.
‘You said you would not come till I had taken the world by the shoulders,’ gasped Leo, falling back.
‘I always keep my word. You have done that three times with three songs. What more do you desire?’
‘Let me live to see the world know it,’ pleaded Leo. ‘Let me be sure that my songs — ’
‘Make men brave?’ said the Crab. ‘Even then there would be one man who was afraid. The Girl was braver than you are. Come.’
Leo was standing close to the restless, insatiable mouth.
‘I forgot,’ said he simply. ‘The Girl was braver. But I am a God too, and I am not afraid.’
‘What is that to me?’ said the Crab.
Then Leo’s speech was taken from him and he lay still and dumb, watching Death till he died.
Leo was the last of the Children of the Zodiac. After his death there sprang up a breed of little mean men, whimpering and flinching and howling because the Houses killed them and theirs, who wished to live for ever without any pain. They did not increase their lives, but they increased their own torments miserably, and there were no Children of the Zodiac to guide them; and the greater part of Leo’s songs were lost.
Only he had carved on the Girl’s tombstone the last verse of the Song of the Girl, which stands at the head of this story.
One of the children of men, coming thousands of years later, rubbed away the lichen, read the lines, and applied them to a trouble other than the one Leo meant. Being a man, men believed that he had made the verses himself; but they belong to Leo, the Child of the Zodiac, and teach, as he taught, that whatever comes or does not come we men must not be afraid.
ANCHOR SONG
HEH! Walk her round. Heave, ah heave her short again!
Over, snatch her over, there, and hold her on the pawl.
Loose all sail, and brace your yards back and full —
Ready jib to pay her off and heave short all!
Well, ah fare you well; we can stay no more with you, my love —
Down, set down your liquor and your girl from off your knee;
For the wind has come to say:
“You must take me while you may,
If you’d go to Mother Carey
(Walk her down to Mother Carey!),
Oh, we’re bound to Mother Carey where she feeds her chicks at sea!”
Heh! Walk her round. Break, ah break it out o’ that!
Break our starboard-bower out, apeak, awash, and clear.
Port — port she casts, with the harbour-mud beneath her foot,
And that’s the last o’ bottom we shall see this year!
Well, ah fare you well, for we’ve got to take her out again —
Take her out in ballast, riding light and cargo-free.
And it’s time to clear and quit
When the hawser grips the bitt,
So we’ll pay you with the foresheet and a promise from the sea!
Heh! Tally on. Aft and walk away with her!
Handsome to the cathead, now; O tally on the fall!
Stop, seize and fish, and easy on the davit-guy.
Up, well up the fluke of her, and inboard haul!
Well, ah fare you well, for the Channel wind’s took hold of us,
Choking down our voices as we snatch the gaskets free.
And it’s blowing up for night,
And she’s dropping Light on Light,
And she’s snorting under bonnets for a breath of open sea,
Wheel, full and by; but she’ll smell her road alone to-night.
Sick she is and harbour-sick — O sick to clear the land!
Roll down to Brest with the old Red Ensign over us —
Carry on and thrash her out with all she’ll stand!
Well, ah fare you well, and it’s Ushant slams the door on us,
Whirling like a windmill through the dirty scud to lee:
Till the last, last flicker goes
From the tumbling water-rows,
And we’re off to Mother Carey
(Walk her down to Mother Carey!),
Oh, we’re bound for Mother Carey where she feeds her chicks at sea!
THE END
THE JUNGLE BOOK
Published in 1894, this collection of stories is Kipling’s most famous work. The stories were first published in magazines in 1893–4. The tales in the book are fables, using animals to portray moral lessons. The verses of
The Law of the Jungle
, for example, lay down rules for the safety of individuals, families and communities. Due to its moral tone,
The Jungle Book
was later used as a motivational book by the Cub Scouts, a junior element of the Scouting movement. The collection has inspired many film adaptations, which have ensured that its popularity has never waned.
The first edition
CONTENTS
HUNTING-SONG OF THE SEEONEE PACK
PARADE-SONG OF THE CAMP ANIMALS
The 1942 film adaptation
The 1967 Disney animation film
The 1994 film adaptation
THE JUNGLE BOOK
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.
MOWGLI’S BROTHERS
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 the 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”; and he was going to spring downhill 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 the noble children, that they may never forget the hungry in this world.”