fight for, said Bagheera in his gentlest voice.
A bull paid ten years ago! the Pack snarled. What do we care for
bones ten years old?
Or for a pledge? said Bagheera, his white teeth bared under his lip.
Well are ye called the Free People!
No man s cub can run with the people of the jungle, howled Shere Khan.
Give him to me!
He is our brother in all but blood, Akela went on, and ye would kill
him here! In truth, I have lived too long. Some of ye are eaters of
cattle, and of others I have heard that, under Shere Khan s teaching,
ye go by dark night and snatch children from the villager s doorstep.
Therefore I know ye to be cowards, and it is to cowards I speak. It is
certain that I must die, and my life is of no worth, or I would offer
that in the man-cub s place. But for the sake of the Honor of
the Pack,--a little matter that by being without a leader ye have
forgotten,--I promise that if ye let the man-cub go to his own place, I
will not, when my time comes to die, bare one tooth against ye. I will
die without fighting. That will at least save the Pack three lives.
More I cannot do; but if ye will, I can save ye the shame that comes of
killing a brother against whom there is no fault--a brother spoken for
and bought into the Pack according to the Law of the Jungle.
He is a man--a man--a man! snarled the Pack. And most of the wolves
began to gather round Shere Khan, whose tail was beginning to switch.
Now the business is in thy hands, said Bagheera to Mowgli. We can do
no more except fight.
Mowgli stood upright--the fire pot in his hands. Then he stretched out
his arms, and yawned in the face of the Council; but he was furious with
rage and sorrow, for, wolflike, the wolves had never told him how they
hated him. Listen you! he cried. There is no need for this dog s
jabber. Ye have told me so often tonight that I am a man (and indeed I
would have been a wolf with you to my life s end) that I feel your words
are true. So I do not call ye my brothers any more, but sag [dogs], as
a man should. What ye will do, and what ye will not do, is not yours
18