Part 7 (1/2)

KAA

Anger is the egg of Fear-- Only lidless eyes are clear.

Cobra-poison none may leech, Even so with Cobra-speech.

Open talk shall call to thee Strength, whose mate is Courtesy.

Send no lunge beyond thy length; Lend no rotten bough thy strength.

Gauge thy gape with buck or goat, Lest thine eye should choke thy throat After gorging, wouldst thou sleep?

Look thy den be hid and deep, Lest a wrong, by thee forgot, Draw thy killer to the spot.

East and West and North and South, Wash thy hide and close thy mouth.

(Pit and rift and blue pool-brim, Middle-Jungle follow him!) _Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, Jungle-Favour go with thee!_

BAGHEERA

In the cage my life began; Well I know the worth of Man.

By the Broken Lock that freed-- Man-cub, 'ware the Man-cub's breed!

Scenting-dew or starlight pale, Choose no tangled tree-cat trail.

Pack or council, hunt or den, Cry no truce with Jackal-Men.

Feed them silence when they say: 'Come with us an easy way.'

Feed them silence when they seek Help of thine to hurt the weak.

Make no _bandar's_ boast of skill; Hold thy peace above the kill.

Let nor call nor song nor sign Turn thee from thy hunting-line.

(Morning mist or twilight clear, Serve him, Wardens of the Deer!) _Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, Jungle-Favour go with thee!_

THE THREE

_On the trail that thou must tread To the thresholds of our dread, Where the Flower blossoms red; Through the nights when thou shalt lie Prisoned from our Mother-sky, Hearing us, thy loves, go by; In the dawns when thou shalt wake To the toil thou canst not break, Heartsick for the Jungle's sake: Wood and Water, Wind and Tree, Wisdom, Strength, and Courtesy, Jungle-Favour go with thee!_

HARP SONG OF THE DANE WOMEN

What is a woman that you forsake her, And the hearth-fire and the home-acre, To go with the old grey Widow-maker?

She has no house to lay a guest in-- But one chill bed for all to rest in, That the pale suns and the stray bergs nest in.

She has no strong white arms to fold you, But the ten-times-fingering weed to hold you-- Out on the rocks where the tide has rolled you.

Yet, when the signs of summer thicken, And the ice breaks, and the birch-buds quicken, Yearly you turn from our side, and sicken--

Sicken again for the shouts and the slaughters.

You steal away to the lapping waters, And look at your s.h.i.+p in her winter quarters.