Rudyard Kipling

The Second Jungle Book Rudyard Kipling

The stream is shrunk-the pool is dry, And we be comrades, thou and I; With fevered jowl and sunken flankEach jostling each along the bank; And, by one drouthy fear made still, Foregoing thought of quest or kill. Now 'neath his dam the fawn may seeThe lean Pack-wolf as cowed as he, And the tall buck, unflinching, noteThe fangs that tore his father's throat. The pools are shrunk-the streams are dry, And we be playmates, thou and I, Till yonder cloud-Good Hunting!-looseThe rain that breaks the Water Truce. The Law of the Jungle-which is by far the oldest law in the world-has arranged for almost every kind of accident that may befall the Jungle People, till now its code is as perfect as time and custom can make it. If you have read the other book about Mowgli, you will remember that he spent a great part of his life in the Seeonee Wolf-Pack, learning the Law from Baloo, the Brown Bear; and it was Baloo who told him, when the boy grew impatient at the constant orders, that the Law was like the Giant Creeper, because it dropped across every one's back and no one could escape. "When thou hast lived as long as I have, Little Brother, thou wilt see how all the Jungle obeys at least one Law. And that will be no pleasant sight," said B