Rikki-Tikki-Tavi | Page 2

him. If a snake came into the nursery now--"
But Teddy's mother wouldn't think of anything so awful.
Early in the morning Rikki-tikki came to early breakfast in the veranda riding on Teddy's
shoulder, and they gave him banana and some boiled egg. He sat on all their laps one
after the other, because every well-brought-up mongoose always hopes to be a house
mongoose some day and have rooms to run about in; and Rikki-tikki's mother (she used
to live in the general's house at Segowlee) had carefully told Rikki what to do if ever he
came across white men.
Then Rikki-tikki went out into the garden to see what was to be seen. It was a large
garden, only half cultivated, with bushes, as big as summer-houses, of Marshal Niel roses,
lime and orange trees, clumps of bamboos, and thickets of high grass. Rikki-tikki licked
his lips. "This is a splendid hunting-ground," he said, and his tail grew bottle-brushy at
the thought of it, and he scuttled up and down the garden, snuffing here and there till he
heard very sorrowful voices in a thorn-bush.
It was Darzee, the Tailorbird, and his wife. They had made a beautiful nest by pulling
two big leaves together and stitching them up the edges with fibers, and had filled the
hollow with cotton and downy fluff. The nest swayed to and fro, as they sat on the rim
and cried.

"What is the matter?" asked Rikki-tikki.
"We are very miserable," said Darzee. "One of our babies fell out of the nest yesterday
and Nag ate him."
"H'm!" said Rikki-tikki, "that is very sad--but I am a stranger here. Who is Nag?"
Darzee and his wife only cowered down in the nest without answering, for from the thick
grass at the foot of the bush there came a low hiss--a horrid cold sound that made
Rikki-tikki jump back two clear feet. Then inch by inch out of the grass rose up the head
and spread hood of Nag, the big black cobra, and he was five feet long from tongue to tail.
When he had lifted one-third of himself clear of the ground, he stayed balancing to and
fro exactly as a dandelion tuft balances in the wind, and he looked at Rikki-tikki with the
wicked snake's eyes that never change their expression, whatever the snake may be
thinking of.
"Who is Nag?" said he. "I am Nag. The great God Brahm put his mark upon all our
people, when the first cobra spread his hood to keep the sun off Brahm as he slept. Look,
and be afraid!"
He spread out his hood more than ever, and Rikki-tikki saw the spectacle-mark on the
back of it that looks exactly like the eye part of a hook-and-eye fastening. He was afraid
for the minute, but it is impossible for a mongoose to stay frightened for any length of
time, and though Rikki-tikki had never met a live cobra before, his mother had fed him
on dead ones, and he knew that all a grown mongoose's business in life was to fight and
eat snakes. Nag knew that too and, at the bottom of his cold heart, he was afraid.
"Well," said Rikki-tikki, and his tail began to fluff up again, "marks or no marks, do you
think it is right for you to eat fledglings out of a nest?"
Nag was thinking to himself, and watching the least little movement in the grass behind
Rikki-tikki. He knew that mongooses in the garden meant death sooner or later for him
and his family, but he wanted to get Rikki-tikki off his guard. So he dropped his head a
little, and put it on one side.
"Let us talk," he said. "You eat eggs. Why should not I eat birds?"
"Behind you! Look behind you!" sang Darzee.
Rikki-tikki knew better than to waste time in staring. He jumped up in the air as high as
he could go, and just under him whizzed by the head of Nagaina, Nag's wicked wife. She
had crept up behind him as he was talking, to make an end of him. He heard her savage
hiss as the stroke missed. He came down almost across her back, and if he had been an
old mongoose he would have known that then was the time to break her back with one
bite; but he was afraid of the terrible lashing return stroke of the cobra. He bit, indeed, but
did not bite long enough, and he jumped clear of the whisking tail, leaving Nagaina torn
and angry.

"Wicked, wicked Darzee!" said Nag, lashing up as high as he could reach toward the nest
in the thorn-bush. But Darzee had built it out of reach of snakes, and it only swayed to
and