Mooswa sniffed solemnly and continued: "You said you were hungry, Yellow Leopard. Was it not a land of much good feeding?"
"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."