"If you insist upon it, Muskwa," answered the Keeper, "I might tell a little tale of your people."
"I should like that—do," pleaded Black Bear; "in all the stories there has been nothing of our doing."
"But they were also only relatives of yours, though they were black, for the happening was in India, and there they are called Bhalu the Bear. And the happening was not of my doing, either, for I was hunting Bagh, the Tiger."
"Every hunter takes me for a choice," growled Raj Bagh.
"But this was a bad Tiger," declared Sa'-zada; "he had killed many people."
"And what of that—Waugh-houk! what of that, Little Master?" demanded Raj Bagh. "Have not many people killed many of my kind—are they not always killing us?"
"Still the Little Master is right," objected Hathi. "If a Bull Elephant becomes Rogue, and, neglecting his proper eating which is in the Jungle, goes seeking to kill the Men-kind, does he not surely come into trouble?"
"But we be flesh eaters and slayers of life," answered Raj Bagh.
"Even so, though that were better otherwise, but do you not know of your own people that the Men-kind are not for Kill? Before all other Dwellers of the Jungle you stand forth and are ready to battle, but just the scent of Man causes you to slink away like Jaruk the Hyena."
"I think that is true," commented Mooswa. "Wie-sah-ke-chack has arranged all that."