"It was a bad year – a year of starvation," answered Chita. "Up to that time the way of my life had been smooth, for I had found the manner of an easy kill. To be sure, Soor is not the pick of all good food – "
"'Soor,' indeed!" grunted Wild Boar. "Ugh, ugh, ugh! by the length of my tusks you would have found me tough eating."
"You see," continued Chita, paying no attention to this interruption, "the wild Pigs were horrid thieves – "
"You were well mated," mumbled Magh, stuffing a handful of peanut shells in Hathi's ear.
"They used to go at night to the rice fields of the poor natives, and chew and chew, and grunt, and row amongst themselves, until the Men-kind were nearly ruined because of their greediness."
"But they did not eat the natives," objected Boar.
"Neither did I," protested Chita – "while the Pigs lasted," he muttered to himself. "Knowing of all this, I made out a new kill-plan. At the first beginning of dark time I would go quietly down to the rice fields, hide myself in the straw that was near to the place where the Men-kind tramped the grain from its stalk with Buffalo, and wait for the coming of the rice thieves. Soon one dark shadow would slip from the jungle, then another, and another, until they were many.
"'Chop, chop, chop!' I'd hear their wet mouths going in the rice; and all the time growling and whining amongst themselves because of the labor it was, and for fear that one had better chance than another; not in peace, but with many rows, striking sideways at each other with their coarse, ugly heads."
"You're a beauty!" commented Wild Boar. "When you shove your ugly face up to the bars the women-kind scream, and jump back – I've noticed that."
"Presently," continued Chita, "one would come my way, seeing the great pile of straw, and I'd have him. Jungle Dwellers! how he'd squeal; and his mates would scurry away jinking and bounding like Kakur Deer. Cowardly swine they were. Now, Buffalo, when one of my kind charged them, would throw themselves together like men of the war-kind, and stand shoulder to shoulder."
"Yes; but, great Cat," objected Boar, "you took care to seize upon a young one, I warrant. Suppose you come out here and try a charge with me. Ugh, ugh! I'll soon slit up your lean sides with my sharp tusks."
"Be still!" commanded Sa'-zada; "here we are all friends, and this is but a tale of what has been."
Chita had turned in a rage at Boar's taunt, and glared through the bars, his great fangs bared, and tail lashing his sides. When the Keeper spoke he snarled in disdain at the bristling Pig, and continued the story.
"Then came the hungry year. At the turning of the monsoons there should have been rain, but no rain came. All through the cold weather the jungle had gone on drying up, and the grass turned brown, even to the color of my coat. The Tree-Crickets and Toads whistled shrill and loud, until the jungle was like a great nest of the sweet-feeders – the Bees. Then when it was time for rain there was only more dryness.
"The yellow-clothed Phoongyis (Priests) prayed; and the Men-kind brought sweetmeats and sheet-gold to their God Buddha; but still there was no rain. Miles and miles I traveled for a drink; and if I made a kill at the pool it was nothing but skin and bones. The small Deer that bark, what were they? Not a mouthful. And the Pigs shriveled up until one might as well have eaten straw. The Nilgai and the Sambhur-deer, as big as you, Mooswa, went away from that land of desolation, and soon nothing seemed to stir in all the jungle but the Koel Bird; and his cry of 'fee-e-ever!' forever ringing in my ears drove me full mad.
"Then it was that I stalked close to the place of the Men-kind – though I had never killed a Bullock before – and I made a kill. But after that they took the Bullocks under their houses at night, thinking I would not venture so close.
"But hunger is the death of all fear, and even there I made a kill. Then again the Men-kind, in their selfishness, thought to outwit me, for about the small village they built a stockade."
"Were there no guns?" queried Hathi. "I, who have been in a big hunt with the Men-kind, have had them on my back with the fierce-striking guns, and all that was in the jungle presently fell dead."
Chita laughed disagreeably.
"I almost forgot about that. One day, when they were still at the stockade making, I saw one of these Yellow-faced Men tying two sticks together and sticking them in the ground, somewhat after the fashion of Mooswa's hind legs. Then surely it was a gun he put in the crotch of the sticks, pointing at the little runway I had made for myself.
"I went into the elephant-grass that grew thereabout, and watching him took thought of this thing. 'It is to do me harm,' I said, 'for is not that my road? Always now I will come a little to one side, because of this new thing.'
"And in the evening, as I came to the village, walking through the same coarse grass, but to one side, mind you, there saw I two of these Men sitting behind this thing that was surely a gun.
"Only, because of thee, Sa'-zada, perhaps this part were better not in the story."
"If it is a true tale it is a true tale," quoth Hathi, sententiously; "and, as the good Sa'-zada has said, of things that have happened."
"Oh, tell it all," commented the Keeper.
"Only say first you were hungry," sneered Magh; "hunger covers many sins."
"Yes; I was hungry," moaned Chita; "chee-wough! so hungry. The Bullock I had killed was but a collection of bones tied up in a thick skin; I broke a good tooth trying to get a supper off him. And were not the Men-kind trying to do evil for me also, little nut-eater, Magh? They would take my skin to the Sahib and get much profit in bounty. I heard them say that as I lay in the thick grass. I crept close, close – "
"Behind them," volunteered Wolf, "I know. You didn't look in their eyes, Brother, did you?"
"They were busy talking," declared Chita, "and did not look my way. Suddenly I sprang out just to frighten them, for they were close to the stockade, and one ran away."
"Only one?" demanded Mooswa, simply.
But Chita had gone over to the corner of his cage, and sitting down, was swinging his big head back and forth, back and forth, with his face turned to the wall, like a Dog that has been whipped.
"He has caught Sa'-zada's eye," whispered Magh in Hathi's ear.
"It's a nasty tale," said the Keeper, "but I think it is true."
"Yes; it is true," declared Wild Boar; "that is the way of his kind."
"Then," said Sa'-zada, "they got this Sahib who has written in The Book, and set the snare for Chita and caught him."
"At any rate, you were caught," muttered Hathi; "and from what you say, it seems to me a change for the better."
"Now, Pardus," cried the Keeper, gently tapping Panther's tail, which hung through between the bars, "tell us of the manner of your taking."
"I was caught twice," replied Pardus, blinking his eyes lazily, and yawning until the great teeth shone white against his black coat; "but you are right to call me Panther, for I am no Leopard. And it is so hot here and dry; quite like the place they took me to – they of the black faces – when I was first caught, being not more than a full-grown Cub, as was White Leopard. That was at Vizianagram, up in the hills; but the hills were not like White Leopard's, all hot and dry. The jungle was cool and fresh, and full of dark places to hide in, with deep pools of sweet water that one might drink after a kill. Here the Birds do nothing but scream and scold; Hornbill, and Cockatoo, and Eagle make my head ache with their harsh voices; there, if a Bird had occasion to speak, it was a song about the sweet land he lived in. It is well enough for Hathi to say that being trapped and brought here is a piece of great luck; for my part, all day long I do nothing but think, think of the Madras Hills. There were mango and tamarind, and peepul, and huge banyan trees, with strong limbs stretching so far that one could walk out full over the Deer paths, and wait in sweet content for a kill. Perhaps even a big family of bamboos growing up about one's resting-place, and whispering when the wind