"The Jungle will swallow these shells," said a quiet voice in the wreckage. "It is the outer wall that must lie down," and Mowgli, with the rain sluicing over his bare shoulders and arms, leaped back from a wall that was settling like a tired buffalo.
"All in good time," panted Hathi. "Oh, but my tusks were red at Bhurtpore! To the outer wall, children! With the head! Together! Now!"
The four pushed side by side; the outer wall bulged, split, and fell, and the villagers, dumb with horror, saw the savage, clay-streaked heads of the wreckers in the ragged gap. Then they fled, houseless and foodless, down the valley, as their village, shredded and tossed and trampled, melted behind them.
A month later the place was a dimpled mound, covered with soft, green young stuff; and by the end of the Rains there was the roaring Jungle in full blast on the spot that had been under plow not six months before.
MOWGLI'S SONG AGAINST PEOPLE
will let loose against you the fleet-footed vines—
I will call in the Jungle to stamp out your lines! The roofs shall fade before it, The house-beams shall fall, And the Karela, the bitter Karela, Shall cover it all!
In the gates of these your councils my people shall sing, In the doors of these your garners the Bat-folk shall cling; And the snake shall be your watchman, By a hearthstone unswept; For the Karela, the bitter Karela, Shall fruit where ye slept!