Said the Keeper: "Comrades, you must all be very careful, for this is Snake"s night."
"Oo-o-oh!" whimpered Jackal, "is Nag the Cobra to come here among us?"
Even Hathi trembled, and blowing softly through his trumpet, said: "Oh, Sa"-zada, I who am a Lord of the Jungle, fearing not any Dweller therein, feel great pains this evening. I am sure that hay is musty and has disagreed with me. If you do not mind, Little Brother, I will go back to my stall and lie down."
"Will Deboia the Climber come also, Little Master?" asked Magh. "If so, I think my Terrier Pup is feeling unwell; I will take him to my cage and wrap him in his blanket. I hate snake stories, anyway."
"Hiz-z-z!" laughed Python, who was already there. "Lords of the Jungle indeed! When I strike or throw a loop, or go swift as the wind through the Jungle--Thches-s-s! but I am no boaster. See our friends. When the smallest of my kind are to be here each one makes his excuses."
"Never fear, Comrades," Sa"-zada a.s.sured the frightened animals, "Nag the Cobra, and Karait, and all the others will behave themselves if they are left alone. Only don"t move about, that"s all. The first law when Snakes are about is--keep still."
"Yes, we like quietness," a.s.sented Python. "Once there was a fussy old Buffalo Bull who used to come to my pool and stir up the mud until it was scarce fit to live in. In the end I threw a loop around his neck, and he became one of the quietest Bulls you ever saw in your life."
"Now, Comrades," said Sa"-zada, as he returned accompanied by the Dwellers of the Snake House, "Hamadryad, the King Cobra, has promised us a story."
"Look at my length," cried Hamadryad, drawing his yellow and black mottled body through many intricate knots like a skein of colored silk; "think you I was born this way just as I am? At first--that was up in the Yoma Hills in Burma--I was not much larger than a good-sized hair from Tiger"s mustache, and since then it has been nothing but adventure. Even my Mother, where she had us hid in a pile of rocks covered with ferns, had to fight for our lives."
"Phuff!" retorted Boar, disdainfully, "many a nest of Cobra eggs have I rid the world of."
"Not of my kind, I"ll warrant," snorted Python, blowing his foul breath like a small sirocco almost in Pig"s face. "Of Nag, or Hamadryad"s family, perhaps, yes, for, know you, Comrades, what Nagina does with her eggs? Lays them in the sun to hatch _apsi_ (of themselves). But my Mother--ah, you should have seen her, Comrades; all the eggs gathered in a heap, and her great, beautiful body--much like my own in color--wound tenderly about them until the young came forth. Perhaps a matter of two moons and never a bite for her to eat all the time.
That"s what I call being a genuine Mother."
"Very wise, indeed, and thoughtful," cried the Salt Water Snake. "My Mother--well I remember it--carried her eggs about in her body till they were hatched, which seems to me quite as good a plan. Also, n.o.body molests us--if they do, they die quickly. We all can kill quite as readily as Nag the Cobra, though there is less talk about us."
"Even so," a.s.sented Hamadryad, "the proof of the matter is in being here; and, as I was going to say, it is this way with my people; in the hot weather when there is no rain we burrow in the ground for months at a stretch. And then the rains come on and we are driven out of our holes by the water, and live abroad in the Jungles for a time. It was at this season of the year I speak of; I had just come up out of my burrow and was wondrous hungry, I can tell you; and, traveling, I came across the trail of a Karait. I followed Karait"s trail, and found him in a hole under a bungalow of the Men-kind. It was dry under the bungalow, so I rested after my meal in the hole that had been Karait"s.
It was a good place, so I lived there. Every day a young of the Men-kind----"
"I know," interrupted Mooswa; "a Boy, eh?"
"Perhaps; but the old ones called him "Baba." And Baba used to come every day under the bungalow to play. He threw little sticks and stones at me; but nothing to hurt, mind you, for he was small. The things he threw wouldn"t have injured a Fly-Lizard as he crawled on the bungalow posts. He laughed when he saw me, and called, as he clapped his little hands, and I wouldn"t have hurt him--why should I? I don"t eat Babas.
"When I heard the heavy feet of the Men I always slipped in the hole; but, one day, by an evil chance I was to one side looking for food, and Baba was following, when his Mother saw me. Such a row there was, the Men running, and Baba"s Mother calling, and only the little one with no fear. Surely it was the fear of which Chita and Hathi have spoken which came over the Men-kind.
[Ill.u.s.tration: "AND BABA USED TO COME EVERY DAY UNDER THE BUNGALOW TO PLAY...."]
"There was one of a great size, like Bear Muskwa, with a stomach such as Magh"s. He was a native baboo. He had a black face, and his voice was like the trumpet of Hathi; but when I went straight his way, and rose up to strike, his fat legs made great haste to carry him far away.
Then I glided in the hole."
"Ghur-ah! it seems a strange tale," snarled Wolf; "even I would not dare, being alone, to chase one of the Men-kind."
"It may be true," declared Sa"-zada, "for it is written in the Book that Hamadryad is the only Snake that will really chase a man, and show fight."
"I could hear the Men-kind talking and tramping about," continued King Cobra, "and meant to lie still till night, and then go away, for I usually traveled in the dark, you know. But presently there was a soft whistling music calling me to come out; and also at times a pleading voice, though of the Men-kind, I knew that, "Ho, Bhai (brother), ho, Raj Naga (King Cobra)! come here, quick, Little Brother." Then the soft whistle called me, sometimes loud, and sometimes low, and even the noise was twisting and swinging in the air just as I might myself.
"Hiz-z-z-za! but I commenced to tremble; and I was full of fear, and I was full of love for the soft sounds, and with my eyes I wished to see it. So I came out of the hole, and there was a Black Man making the soft call from a hollow stick."
"A Snake Charmer with his pipes," exclaimed Sa"-zada.
"I raised up in anger, thinking that he, too, would soon run away; but he pointed with his hand, now this way, from side to side, even as the sweet sound from the hollow stick seemed to twist and curl in the air; and following his hand with my eyes, I commenced to swing as the hand swung.
""Ho, Little Brother!" he called, "come here."
"It was to a basket at his side; for, though I meant not to do it, I glided into it."
"That was the manner of your taking?" asked Chita.
"Better than having one"s toes squeezed in an iron trap," declared Jackal.
"Or being beaten by chains," murmured Hathi.
"Yes, the taking was simple enough; but if Baba had not cried, the Men would have killed me, I think."
"And that was how you came to Lower Burma?" asked Sa"-zada.
"Yes," answered Hamadryad, "this man who made music with the hollow stick took me with him, and at every place where there were any of his fellows he brought me forth from the basket, and made me dance to his music. That was what he called it--dance."
"Why didn"t you bite him?" queried Rattler, making his tail rattles sing in anger.
"He pulled out my fangs," declared Hamadryad.
"He-he," sneered Magh; "now surely it is a great lie, this wondrous tale of Cobra"s, for in his mouth are the very fangs he says the black-faced player of music pulled."
"Most wise Ape," said Hamadryad, ironically, "what your big head, like unto a Jack fruit, does not understand, is a lie, forsooth. Even though my teeth were pulled three times, they would grow again; but you do not know that--therefore it is a lie. Even now, behind these that you see, and perhaps yet may feel if you keep on, are others waiting the time when these may be broken. Was it not Hathi said some wise animal arranged all these things for us?"
"Sa"-zada says it is G.o.d," interrupted Hathi.
"This man made me fight with a Mongoos, that those of his kind might laugh."
"What is a Mongoos?" queried Magh.
"Our natural enemy," answered King Cobra, "just as Fleas and other Vermin are yours. But I killed the squeaky little beast with one drive of my head--broke his back. At Ramree a Sahib bought me from the black man."
"That was the Sahib who sent you here, I fancy," suggested Sa"-zada.
"Perhaps. At any rate he seemed fond of Snakes of my kind, for he put me in a box wherein was one of my family. But he should have known more about our manner of life, for he nearly starved us through ignorance of our taste. He puts Rats and Frogs, and Birds and such Vermin as that in, with never so much as a Green-Tree-Snake. The yellow-faced Burmans used to come in front of our cage and touch us up with sticks until my nose was skinned with striking at them and hitting the bars.
"Our getting something to eat was a pure accident. One night this Sahib stepped on a Snake--a young Rock Snake, which had curled up in the path for the warmth of the hot earth. "Oh, ho!" said the Sahib, bringing this new Snake to our cage, "you are looking for trouble, little _Samp_ (snake). Let us see how you get on in there," and he threw him in our box, expecting to see a fight."
"And did he?" queried Magh.
"Hiz-z-z-za! I should say so. My mate and I fought half an hour before we settled who was to eat the visitor."
"You two Comrades fought over it?" asked Mooswa.
"Yes; that is our way. Two Snakes cannot eat one--how else should we settle the question? we were both hungry. Why, one day my mate flew at me, and I could see in his eye that he meant eating me, and in self-defence I was forced to put him out of the way of mischief, but the Sahib pulled us apart.
"But if I hated the Yellow Men who came to my cage, I liked the Mem-Sahib (white lady). I think it was her voice. Hiz-z, hiz-z, hiz-z!
It was as soft as the song the man had brought forth from the hollow stick. Sometimes I would hear her voice-song near my box, and it would put me to sleep; only, of course, I had to keep one eye open lest my mate would try to eat me----"