 Section 8 of Actions and Reactions. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Cornel Nemes in Reno, Nevada. Actions and Reactions by Rudyard Kipling. The Four Angels. As Adam lay a dreaming beneath the apple tree, the angel of the earth came down and offered earth in fee. But Adam did not need it. Nor the plow he would not spit it. Singing earth and water, air and fire. What more can mortal men desire? The apple trees in bud. As Adam lay a dreaming beneath the apple tree, the angel of the waters offered all the seas in fee. But Adam would not take him. Nor the ships he would not make him. Singing water, earth and air and fire. What more can mortal men desire? The apple trees in leaf. As Adam lay a dreaming beneath the apple tree, the angel of the air he offered all the air in fee. But Adam did not crave it. Nor the flight he wouldn't brave it. Singing air and water, earth and fire. What more can mortal men desire? The apple trees in bloom. As Adam lay a dreaming beneath the apple tree, the angel of the fire rose up and not a word said he. But he wished a fire and made it. And in Adam's heart he laid it. Singing fire, fire, burning fire. Stand up and reach your heart's desire. The apple blossom set. As Adam was a working outside of Eden Wall, he used the earth, he used the seas, he used the air and all. And out of black disaster he arose to be the master of earth and water, air and fire. But never reached his heart's desire. The apple trees cut down. End of Section 8. Recording by Cornel Nemes in Reno, Nevada. Section 9 of Actions and Reactions. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Nuggin. Actions and Reactions by Rudyard Kipling. A Deal in Cotton. Long and long ago, when David et al was king of Benares, I wrote some tales concerning Strickland of the Punjab police who married Miss Yugo and Adam his son. Strickland has finished his Indian service and lives now at a place in England called Western Supermere where his wife plays the organ in one of the churches. Some he occasionally comes up to London and occasionally his wife makes him visit his friends. Otherwise he plays golf and follows the Harriers for his figure's sake. If you remember that infant who told the tale to Eustace Cleaver the novelist, you will remember that he became a baronet with a vast estate. He has, owing to cookery, a little lost his figure, but he never loses his friends. I have found a wing of his house turned into a hospital for sick men and there I once spent a week in the company of two dismal nurses and a specialist in sprue. Another time the place was full of schoolboys, sons of Anglo-Indians whom the infant had collected for the holidays and they nearly broke his keeper's heart. But my last visit was better. The infant called me up by wire and I fell into the arms of a friend of mine, Colonel Al Corcoran, so that the years departed from us and we praised Allah who had not yet terminated the delights nor separated the companions. Said Corcoran when he had explained how it felt to command a native infantry regiment on the border. The Stricks are coming for tonight with their boy. I remember him, the little fellow I wrote a story about. I said, is he in the service? No. Strick got him into the Central Euro-Africa Protectorate. He's assistant commissioner at Duke, wherever that is. So Molliland ate the stocky. That's the infant. Stocky puffed out his nostrils scornfully. You're only 3,000 miles out. Look at the Atlas. Anyhow, he's as rotten full of fever as the rest of you, said the infant, at length on the big devan, and he's bringing a native servant with him. Stocky be an athlete and tell Ips to put him in the stable room. Why? Is he a yow like the fellow Wade brought here when your housekeeper had fits? Stocky often visits the infant and has seen some odd things. No, he's one of old Strickland's Punjabi policemen and quite European, I believe. Hooray! Haven't talked Punjabi for 3 months and a Punjabi from Central Africa ought to be amusing. We heard the chuff of the motor and the porch, and the first to enter was Agnes Strickland, whom the infant makes no secret of adoring. He is devoted, in a fat man's placid way, to at least 8 designing women. But she nursed him once through a bad bout of Peshawar fever and when she is in the house, it is more than all hers. You didn't send rugs enough, she began. Adam might have taken a chill. It's quite warm in the tunnel. Why did you let him ride in front? Because he wanted to, she replied, with a mother's smile, and we were introduced to the shadow of a young man leaning heavily on the shoulder of a bearded Punjabi Muhammadan. That is all that came home of him, said his father to me. There was nothing in it of the child with whom I had journeyed to Dahauzi centuries since. And what is this uniform? Stokhi asked of Imam Din, the servant, who came to attention on the marble floor. The uniform of the protectorate troop Sahib, though I am a little Sahib's body servant, is not seenly for us white men to be attended by folk dressed all together as servants. And you white men wait at table on horseback? Stokhi pointed to the man's spurs. These I added for the sake of honor when I came to England, said Imam Din. Adam smiled a ghost of a little smile that I began to remember, and we put him on the big couch for refreshments. Stokhi asked him how much leave he had, and he said six months. But he'll take another six on medical certificate, said Agnes anxiously. Adam knit his brows. You don't want to, eh? I know. Wonder what my second in command is doing. Stokhi tugged his moustache and felt the thinking of his Sikhs. Ah! said the infant. I have only a few thousand peasants to look after. Come along and just for dinner. We're just ourselves. What flower is your honor's ladieship commanding for the table? Just ourselves, she said, looking at the crotons in the Great Hall. Then let's have marigolds, the little cemetery ones. So it was ordered. Now, marigolds to us mean hot weather, discomfort, parting, and death. That smell in our nostrils and Adam's servant and waiting, we naturally fell back more and more on the old slang, recalling at each glass those who had gone before. We did not sit at the big table, but in the bay window overlooking the park, where they were carting the last of the hay. When twilight fell, we would not have candles, but waited for the moon, and continued our talk and the dusk that makes one remember. Young Adam was not interested in our past except where he had touched his future. I think his mother held his hand beneath the table. Imam Din, shoeless, out of respect to the floors, brought him his medicine, put it drop by drop, and asked for orders. Wait to take him to his cot when he grows weary, said his mother, and Imam Din retired into the shadow by the ancestral portraits. Now, what do you expect to get out of your country? Din fin asked, when our India laid aside, we talked Adam's Africa. It roused him at once. Rubber, nuts, gums, and so on, he said, but our real future is cotton. I grew 50 acres of it last year in my district. My district, said his father, hear him, mummy. I did, though. I wish I could show you the sample. Some Manchester sap said it was good as any sea island cotton on the market. But what made you a cotton planter, my son? She asked. My chief said every man ought to have a chook, a hobby of sorts, and he took the trouble to ride a day out of his way to show me a built of black soil that was just a thing for cotton. Ah, what was your chief like? Stocky asked in his silkiest tones. The best man alive, absolutely. He lets you blow your own nose yourself. The people called him. Adam jerked out some heathen phrase. That means the man with the stone eyes, you know. I'm glad of that, because I've heard from other quarters. Stocky's sentence burned like a slow match, but the explosion was not long delayed. Other quarters. Adam threw out a thin hand. Every dog has his fleas. If you listen to them, of course. The shake of his head was, as I remember it, among his father's policemen twenty years before, and his mother's eyes shining through the dusk called on me to adore it. I kicked Stocky on the shin. One must not mock a young man's first love or loyalty. A lump of raw cotton appeared on the table. I thought there might be a need, therefore I packed it between our shirts, said the voice of Imam Din. Does he know as much English as that, because of the infant who had forgotten his east? I admire the cotton for Adam's sake, and indeed it was very long and glossy. It's only an experiment, he said. We're such awful paupers we can't even pay for a mail cart in my district. We use a biscuit box on two bicycle wheels. I only got the money for that, he patted the stuff, by a pure fluke. How much did it cost, Astrickland, with seed and machinery? About two hundred pounds. I had the labor done by cannibals. That sounds promising, Stocky reached for a first cigarette. No thank you, said Agnes. I've been a western super mayor a little too long for cannibals. I'll go to the music room and try over next Sunday's hymns. She looked at the boy's hand lightly to her lips and chipped across the acres of glimmering floor to the music room that had been the infant's ancestors' banquet hall. Her grand silver dress disappeared under the musician's gallery. Two electrics broke out and she stood back against the lines of gilded pipes. There's a moment of a self-playing attachment here, she called. Me, the infant answered, the napkin on his shoulder. That's how I play Parsifal. I preferred the direct expression. Take it away, Ips. We heard old Ips skating obediently all over the floor. Now for the direct expression, said Stocky, and moved on the burgundy recommended by the faculty to enrich fewer thin blood. It's nothing much. Only the belt of cotton soil, my chief showed me, ran right into the Shaysahale country. We haven't been able to prove cannibalism against that tribe in their courts. But when a Shaysahale offers you four pounds of women's breast, tattoos, marks and all, skewered up in a plantain leaf before breakfast, you naturally burn the villages before lunch, said Stocky. Adam shook his head. No troops, he sighed. I told my chief about it, and he said we must wait till they chopped a white man. He advised me if I ever felt like it, not to commit a barren fellow disay, but to let the Shaysahale do it. Then he could report, and then we could mop him up. Most immoral. That's how we got Stocky quoted the name of a province won by just such a sacrifice. Yes, but the beast dominated one end of my cotton belt like anything. They chivied me out of it when I went to take soil for analysis, me and Imam Din. Sahib, is there a need? The voice came out of the darkness, and the eyes shown over Adam's shoulder ere it ceased. None, the name was taken in talk. Adam abolished him with a turn of the finger. I couldn't make a case this belly out of it just then, because my chief had taken all the troops to hammer a gang of slave kings up north. Did you ever hear of our war against Ibn Makara? He precious nearly lost to the protector at one time, though he's an ally of ours now. Wasn't he a rather pernicious brute, even as they go, said Stocky? Wade told me about him last year. Well, his nickname all through the country was The Merciful, and he didn't get that for nothing. None of our people ever breathed his proper name. They said he, or that one, and they didn't say it aloud either. He fought us for eight months. I remember there was a paragraph about it in one of the papers, I said. We broke him, though. No, the slavers don't come our way, because our men have the reputation of dying too much the first month after they're captured. That knocks down profits, you see. What about your charming friends? The Shaysha Haley said the infant. There's no market for Shaysha Haley. People would ask soon by crocodiles. I believe before we axe the country, Ibn Makara had dropped down on him once to train his young men and simply hewed him in pieces. The bulk of my people are agriculturists just the right stamp for cotton growers. What's mother playing, once in royal? The organ that had been crooning as happily as a woman over her babe restored, studied to a tune. Magnificent, oh magnificent, said the infant loyally. I had never heard him sing but once, and then, though it was early in the tolerant morning, his mess had rolled him into a loaves pond. How did you get your cannibals to work for you? Asked Strickland. They got converted to civilization after my chief smashed Ibn Makara, just at the time I wanted them. You see, my chief had promised me in writing that if I could scrape up a surplus, he would not bag it for his rose this time, but I might have it for my cotton game. I only needed two hundred pounds. Our revenues didn't run to it. What is your revenue? Stocky asked in the vernacular. With hot tax, traders game, and mining licenses, not more than fourteen thousand rupees, every penny of it earmarked months ahead, Adam's side. Also, there's a fine for dog straying in the Sahib's camp. Last year exceeded three rupees, Imam Din said quietly. Well, I thought that was fair. They howled so. We were rather strict on fines. I worked up my native clerk, Bulaki Ram, to a ferocious pitch of enthusiasm. He used to calculate the profits of our cotton scheme to three points of decimals after office. I tell you, I envied your magistrates here, hauling money out of motorists every week. I had managed to make our ordinary revenue and expenditure just about me, and I was crazy to get the odd two hundred pounds for my cotton. That sort of thing grows on a chat when he's alone and talks aloud. Hello. Have you been there already? The father said, and Adam nodded. Yes, used to spout what I could remember of Marmian to a tree, sir. Well, then my luck turned. One evening an English-speaking nigger came in towing a corpse by the feet. You get used to little things like that. He said he'd found it, and please would I identify, because if it was one of Ibn Makarah's men, there might be a reward. It was an old Mohammedan with a strong dash of Arab, a small-boned bald-headed chap, and I was just wondering how it had kept so on our climate when it sneezed. You ought to have seen nigger. He fetched a howl and bolted like the dog in Tom Sawyer when he sat on the what's-his-name beetle. He yelled as he ran, and the corpse went on sneezing. I could see it had been sarkied. That's a sort of gum poison, patter, which attacks the nerve centers. Our chief medical officer is writing a monograph about it. So Imam Din and I emptied out the corpse one time with my shaving, soap, and trade gunpowder and hot water. I'd seen a case of sarkie before, so when the skin peeled off his feet and he stopped sneezing, I knew he'd live. He was bad, though, lay like a log for a week while Imam Din and I massaged the paralysis out of him. Then he told us he was a haji, had been three times to Mecca, come in from French Africa, and that he'd met the nigger by the wayside, just like a case of thuggy in India, and the nigger had poisoned him. That seemed reasonable, not by what I knew of coast niggers. You believed him, said his father keenly. There was no reason I shouldn't. The nigger never came back, and the old man stayed with me for two months, Adam returned. You know what the best type of a Mohammedan gentleman can be, Petter? He was that. None finer, none finer was the answer, except a Sikh, stocky-granted. He'd been to Bombay. He knew French Africa inside out. He'd coat poetry and the Quran all day long. He played chess. You don't know what that meant to me, like a master. We used to talk about the regeneration of Turkey and the shriek-ul Islam between moves. Oh, everything under the sun we talked about. He was awfully open-minded. He believed in slavery, of course, but he quite saw that it would have to die out. That's why he agreed with me about developing the resources of the district by cotton-growing, you know? You talked of that, too, Astrakhan. Rather, we discussed it for hours. You don't know what it meant to me. A wonderful man. Imam Din was not our haji marvelous. Most marvelous. It was all through the haji that we found the money for our cotton play. Imam Din had moved, I fancy, behind Strickland's chair. Yes, it must have been dead against his convictions, too. He brought me news when I was down with fever at Doop that one of Ibn Makkah's men was parading through my district with a bunch of slaves in the fork. What's the matter with the fork that you can't abide it, said stocky? Adam's voice had risen at the last word. Local etiquette, sir, he replied, too earnest to notice stocky's atrocious pun. If a slave runs slaves through British territory, he ought to pretend that they're his servants, hawking them about in the fork, the fork-stick that you put round their necks, you know, is insolence, same as not backing your top sales in the old days. Besides, it unsettles the district. I thought you said slavers didn't come your way, I put in. They don't, but my chief was smoking them out of the north all that season, and they were bolting into French territory any road they could find. My orders were to take no notice so long as they circulated, but open slave-during in the fork was too much. I couldn't go myself, so I told a couple of our Makkah lali police and Imam Din to make talk with the gentlemen one time. It was rather risky, and it might have been expensive, but turned up trumps. They were back in a few days with the slaver. He didn't show fight, and a whole crowd of witnesses, and we tried him in my bedroom and find him properly. Just to show you how demoralized the brute must have been, Arabs often go doddy after a defeat. He snapped up four or five utterly useless Seisha Haley and was offering them to all in sundry along the road. Why, he offered them to you, didn't he, Momdin? I was witness that he offered man-eaters for sale, said Imam Din. Luckily for my cotton scheme, that landed him both ways. You see, he had slaved and exposed slaves for sale in British territory. That meant the double fine if I could get it out of him. What was his defense, said Strickland, late of the Punjab police? As far as I remember, but I had a temperature of 104 degrees at the time. He'd mistaken the meridians of long tube. He thought he was in French territory. Said he'd never do it again if he let him off with the fine. I got a shaken hands with a brute for that. He paid up cash like a motorist and went off one time. Did you see him? Yes, didn't I, Momdin? Assuredly the Sahib both saw and spoke to his labor, and the Sahib also made a speech to the man-eaters when he freed them, and they swore to supply him with labor for all his cotton play. The Sahib leaned on his own servant's shoulder in the wild. I remember something of that. I remember Bulaki Rahm giving me the papers to sign, and I distinctly remember him locking up the money in the safe. 210 beautiful English sovereigns. You don't know what that meant to me. I believe it cured my fever, and as soon as I could, I staggered off with the haji to interview the Shaysha Haley about labor. Then I found out why they had been so keen to work. It wasn't gratitude. Their big village had been hit by lightning and burned out a week or two before, and they lay flat and rose around me, asking me for a job. I gave it to them, and so you were very happy his mother had stolen up behind us. He liked your cotton, dear. She tidied the lump away. Bye, Joe, wireless happy, Adam yawned. Now, if anyone, he looked at the infant, cares to put a little money in the scheme. It will be the making of my district. I can't give you figures, sir, but I assure you will take your arsenic and Imandin will take you up to bed, and I'll come and tuck you in. Agnes leaned forward, her rounded elbows on his shoulders, hands joined across his dark hair, and, isn't he a darling, she said to us, with just the same heart-rending lift to the left eyebrow and the same break of her voice, as since trickling mad among the horses in the year 84. We were quiet when they were gone. We waited till Imandin returned to us from above and would cough at the door, as only dark-hearted Asia can. Now, said trickling, tell us what truly befell, son of my servant. As befell, as our sahib has said, only only does an arrangement, a little arrangement on account of his cotton play. Tell, sit, I beg your pardon, infant, says trickling, but the infant had already made the sign, and we heard Imandin hunker down on the floor. One gets little out of the east attention. A fever came on our sahib in our roofed house at Doop, he began. The haji listened intently to his talk. He expected the names of women, though I had already told him that our virtue was beyond belief or compare, and that our sole desire was this cotton play. Being alas convinced, the haji breathed on our sahib's forehead to sink into his brain, news concerning a slave dealer in his district who had made a mock of the law. Sahib, Imandin turned to trickling. Our sahib answered to those false words as a horse of blood answers to the spur. He sat up, he issued orders for the apprehension of the slave dealer. Then he fell back, then we left him. Alone, servant of my son and son of my servant, said his father. There was an old woman which belonged to the haji. She had come in with the haji's money belt. The haji told her that if our sahib died she would die with him, and surely our sahib had given me orders to depart. Being mad with fever, eh? What could we do sahib? This cotton play was his harsh desire. He talked of it in his fever, therefore it was his harsh desire that the haji went to fetch. Doubtless the haji could have given him money enough out of hand for ten cotton plays, but in this respect also our sahib's virtue was beyond belief or compare. Great ones do not exchange monies. Therefore the haji said, and I helped with my counsel, that we must make arrangements for the money in all respects conformable with the English law. There was great trouble to us, but the law is the law. And the haji showed the old woman the knife by which she would die if our sahib died. So I accompanied the haji. Knowing who he was, said Trickland. No, fearing the man. A virtue went out from him overbearing the virtue of lesser persons. The haji told Bulaki-Ram the clerk to occupy the seat of government adieu till our return. Bulaki-Ram feared the haji, because the haji had often gloatingly appraised his skill and figures at 5,000 rupees upon any slave block. The haji then said to me, come, and we will make the man-eaters play the cotton game for my delight's delight. The haji loved our sahib with the love of a father for his son. I was saved for a savior, of a great one for a great one. But I said, we cannot go to that Sheshahili place without a hundred rifles. We have here five. The haji said, I have untied as not in my head handkerchief which will be more to us than a thousand. I saw that he had so loosed it that it lay flag-wise on his shoulder. Then I knew that he was a great one with virtue in him. We came to the highlands of the Sheshahili on the dawn of the second day, about the time of the stirring of the cold wind. The haji walked delicately across the open place where their filth is, and scratched upon the gate where it was shut. When it opened, I saw the man-eaters lying on their cots under the eaves of the huts. They rolled off, they rose up, one behind the other the length of the street, and the fear on their faces was as leaves whitening to a breeze. The haji stood in the gate guarding his skirts from defilement. The haji said, I am here once again, giving me six and yolk up. They justly then pushed to us with poles six and yolked them with a heavy tree. The haji then said, fetch fire from the morning hearth and come to windward. The wind is strong on those headlands at sunrise, so when each had emptied his crock of fire in front of that which was before him, the broadside of the town rolled into flame, and all went. The haji then said, at the end of a time there will come here the white man you once chased for sport. He'll demand labor to plant such and such stuff. You are that labor and you're spawn after you. The haji said, what is also my name? They said, thy name is also the merciful. The haji said, praise then my mercy. And while they did this, the haji walked away, eye-following. The infant made some noise in his throat and reached for some more burgundy. About noon, one of our six fell dead. Fright only frights saw him. None had, none could. The haji said, none had, none could touch him. Since they were in pairs and the other of the fork was mad and sang foolishly, we waited for some heathen to do what was needful. There came at last angry men with goats. The haji said, what do you see? They said, oh our lord we neither see nor hear. The haji said, but I command ye to see and to hear and to say. They said, oh our lord I have offended eyes as those slaves stood in a fork. The haji said, so testify before the officer who waits you in the town of Doop. They said, what shall come to us after? The haji said, the just reward for the informer. But if ye do not testify, then a punishment which shall cause birds to fall from the trees in terror and monkeys to scream for pity. Hearing this, the angry men hastened to Doop. The haji then said to me, are those things sufficient to establish our case or must I drive in a village for? I said that three witnesses simply established any case. But as yet, the haji had not offered his slaves for sale. It is true as our sahib said just now there is one fine for catching slaves and yet another for making to sell them. And it was the double fine that we needed sahib for our sahib's cotton play. We had four arranged all this with a blocky rum who knows the English law. And I thought the haji remembered but he grew angry and cried out oh god refuge of the afflicted must I who am what I am peddle this dog's meat by the roadside to gain his delight from my heart's delight. Nonetheless, he admitted it was the English law and so he offered me the six five in a small voice with an averted head. The shisha hailey do not smell of sour milk as he then should. They smell like lepran sahib. This is because they eat men. Maybe, since trickled but where were thy wits? One witness is not sufficient to establish the fact of a sale. What could we do sahib? There was the haji's reputation to consider. We could not have called in a heathen witness for such a thing and moreover the sahib forgets that the defendant himself was making this case. He would not contest his own evidence. Otherwise I know the law of evidence well enough. But then we went to dup and while the laki-ram waited among the Angari men I ran to see our sahib in bed. His eyes were very bright and his mouth was full of upside down orders. But the old woman had not loosened her hair for death. The haji said, be quick with my child I am not job. The haji was a learned man. We made the child swiftly to a sound of soothing voices around the bed. Yet, yet, because no man can be sure whether a sahib of that blood sees or does not see we made it strictly in the manner of the forms of the English law. Only the witnesses and the slaves and the prisoner we kept without for his nose's sake. Then he did not see the prisoner, said the trickling. I stood by to shackle up an Angari in case he should demand it. But by God's favor he was too far fevered to ask for one. It is quite true he signed the papers. It is quite true he saw the money put away in the safe. 210 English pounds and it is quite true that the gold wrought on him as a strong cure. But as to his seeing the prisoner and having speech with the man-eaters, the haji breathed all that on his forehead to sink into a sick brain. A little, as he hath heard, has remained. Ah, but when the fear broke and our sahib called for the fine book and the thin little picture books in Europe with the pictures of plows and hoes and cotton mills, ah, then he laughed as he used to laugh sahib. It was his heart's desire this cotton play. The haji loved him as who does not. It was a little, little arrangement. Sahib of which is it necessary to tell all the world? And when didst thou know who the haji was? Said trickling. Not for a certainty till he and our sahib had returned from their visit to the Seshiheli country. It is quite true that our sahib says the man-eaters lay flat around his feet and asked for spades to cultivate cotton. That very night when I was cooking the dinner, the haji said to me I go to my own place, though God knows whether the man with the stone eyes have left me an ox, a slave, or a woman. I said, thou art then that one? The haji said I am ten thousand rupees rewarded into thy hand. Shall we make another law case and get more cotton machines for the boy? I said what dog am I to do this? May God prolong thy life a thousand years. The haji said who has seen tomorrow? God has given me as it were a son in my old age and I praise him. See that the breed is not lost. He walked then from the cooking place to our sahib's office table under the tree where our sahib held in his hand a blue envelope of service, newly come in by runner from the north. At this, during evil news for the haji I would have restrained him. But he said, we be both great ones. Neither of us will fail. Our sahib looked up to invite the haji to approach before he opened the letter. But the haji stood off till our sahib had well opened and well read the letter. Then the haji said, is it permitted to say farewell? Our sahib stabbed the letter on the file with a deep and joyful breath and cried a welcome. The haji said, I go to my own place. And he loosed from his neck a chained heart of ambergris set in soft gold and held it forth. Our sahib snatched swiftly in the closed fist downturned and said if thy name be written hereon it is needless for a name is already engraved on my heart. The haji said, an on mine also is a name engraved. But there is no name on the amulet. The haji stooped to our sahib's feet but our sahib raised and embraced him. And the haji covered his mouth with his shoulder cloth because it worked. And so he went away. And what order was in the service letter? Stocky murmured. Only an order for our sahib to write a report on some new cattle sickness. But all orders come in the same make of an envelope. We could not tell what order it might have been. When he opened the letter, my son, may he not sign? A cough an oath? Strickland asked. None sahib. I washed his hands. They did not shake. Afterward he wiped his face but he was sweating before from the heat. Did he know? Did he know who the haji was? Said the infant in English. I am a poor man. Who can say what a sahib of that get knows or does not know? But the haji is right. The breed should not be lost. It is not very hot for little children and dupes. And as regards nurses, my sister's cousin and jewel that is the boy's own concern. I wonder if his chief ever knew, says Strickland. Assuredly said he mobbed him. On the night before our sahib went down to the sea, the great sahib, the man with the stone eyes, dined with him in his camp. I being charged at the table. They talked a long while and the great sahib said, what did Stow think of that one? We did not say Ibn Makkah Yander. Our sahib said which one? The great sahib said, that one which taught thy managers to grow cotton for thee. He was in thy district three months to my certain knowledge and I looked by every runner that thou would see in his head. Our sahib said if his head had been needed another man should have been appointed to govern my district for he was my friend. The great sahib laughed and said, if I had needed a lesser man in thy place, be sure I would have sent him as if I had needed the head of that one be sure I would have sent men to bring it to me. But tell me now by what means did thou twist him to thy use and our profit in this cotton play? Our sahib said, by God I did not use that man in any fashion whatever he was my friend. The great sahib said, toh va, posh tel. Our sahib shook his head as he does, as he did when a child. And they looked at each other like swordplay men at the ring at a fair. The great sahib dropped his eyes first and he said so be it, I should perhaps have answered dust in my youth. No matter I have made treaty with that one as an ally of the state. Someday he shall tell me the tale. Then I brought in fresh coffee and they ceased. But I do not think that one will tell the great sahib more than our sahib told him. Wherefore I asked. Because they are both great ones, and I have observed in my life that great ones employ words very little between each other in their dealings still less when they speak to a third concerning those dealings. Also they profit by silence. Now I think that the mother has come down from the room and I will go rub his feet till he sleeps. His ears had caught Agnes' step at the stair head and presently she passed us on her way to the music room humming the Magnificat. End of section 9 Recording by Naveen Section 10 of Actions and Reactions This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Josh Kibbe Actions and Reactions By Rudyard Kipling The New Nighthood Who gives him the bath? I said the wet rank a jungle sweat. I'll give him the bath. Who'll sing the Psalms? We, said the palms, and the hot wind becomes we'll sing the Psalms. Who lays on the sword? I, said the sun, before he is done I'll lay on the sword. Who fastens his belt? I, said short rations, I know all the fashions of tightening a belt. Who buckles the spur? I, said his chief, exacting in brief, I'll give him the spur. Who'll shake his hand? I, said the fever, and I'm no deceiver. I'll shake his hand. Who brings him the wine? I, said quinine, It's a habit of mine. I'll come with his wine. Who'll put him to proof? I, said all earth. Whatever he's worth, I'll put to the proof. Who'll choose him for night? I, said his mother, before any other, my very own night. And after this fashion adventure to seek was Sir Gala had made, as it might be last week. End of Section 10 Section 11 Actions and reactions. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Actions and reactions by Regird Kipling, The Puzzler. I had not seen Penfenten Yu since the middle nineties when he was Minister of Ways and Woodsides and Administration. Last summer, though he nominally held the same portfolio, he was his colony's premier in all but name, and the idol of his own province, which is two and a half times the size of England. Politically, his greed was his growing country and he came over to England to develop a great idea in her behalf. Believing that he had put it in train, I made haste to welcome him to my house for a week. That he was chased to my door by his own agent General in a motor that they turned my study into a cabinet meeting which I was not invited to attend. That the local telegraph all but broke down beneath the strain of hundred word coded cables and that I practically broke into the house of a stranger to get him telephonic facilities on a Sunday are things I overlooked. What I objected to was his ingratitude while I bus tore up England to help him. So I said, why on earth didn't you see your opposite number in town instead of bringing your office work here? A, who, said he looking up from his fourth cable since lunch, see the English minister for ways and witsides. I saw him said pen pen ten you without enthusiasm. It seemed that he had called twice on the gentleman but without an appointment. I thought if I wasn't big enough my business was and each time I found him engaged. A third party intervening suggested that a meeting might be arranged if due notice were given. Then said pen pen ten you I called at the office at ten o'clock but they'd be in bed. I cried. One of the babies was awake. He told me that that my sort of questions he slapped the pile of cables were only taken between eleven and two. So I waited. And when you got to business I asked. It was like talking to children they'd never heard of it. And your opposite number pen pen ten you described him how you mustn't talk like that. I shuddered. He's one of the best of good fellows you should meet him socially. I've done that too. He said have you heaven forbid I cried but that's the proper thing to say. Oh he said all the proper things only I thought as this was England that they'd more or less have the hang of all the general hang together of my idea but I had to explain it from the beginning. Ah they probably mislaid the papers I said and I told him the story of a three million pound insurrection caused by a deputy under secretary sitting upon a massive green labeled correspondence instead of reading it. I wonder it doesn't happen every week. He answered do you mind my having the agent general to dinner again tonight? I'll wire and he can motor down. The agent general arrived two hours later a patient and expostulating person visibly torn between the pulling devil of a rampant colony and the placid baker of a largely uninterested England but with pen pen ten you behind him he had worked for he told us that Lord Lundy the law Lord was the final authority on the legal and constitutional aspects of the great idea and to him it must be referred. Good heavens alive thundered pen pen ten you I told you to get that settled last Christmas it was the middle of the house party season said the agent general mildly Lord Lundy's that credence green now he spends his holidays there it's only 40 miles off shan't I disturb his holiness said pen pen ten you heavily perhaps my sort of questions he snorted may it be discussed except at midnight. Oh don't be a child I said what this country needs said pen pen ten you is and for ten minutes he trumpeted rebellion what you need is to pay for your own protection I cut in when he drew breath and I showed him a yellowish paper supplied gratis by government which is called scheduled D to my merciless delight he had never seen the thing before and I completed my victory over him and all the colonies with brass these naval annual and a statesman year book the agent general interposed with agent generalities but they were merely provocateurs about ties of sentiment baby blowed said pen pen ten you what's the good of sentiment towards a kindergarten quite so ties of common funk are the things that bind us together and the sooner you new nations realize it the better what you need as an annual invasion then you'd grow up thank you thank you said the agent general that's what I am always trying to tell my people but my dear fool pen pen ten you almost wept do you pretend that these banana fingered amateurs at home are grown up you poor serious pagan man I retorted if you take him that way you wreck your great idea will you take him to lord londies tomorrow said the agent general promptly I suppose I must I said if you won't not me I'm going home said the agent general and departed I'm glad that I'm no colonies agent general pen ten you continue to argue about naval contributions till one fifteen a.m. though I was victor from the first at ten o'clock I got him and his correspondence into the motor and he had the decency to ask whether he had been unpolished overnight I replied I waited and apology this he made excuse for renewed arguments and used way side shows as illustrations of the decadence of England for example we burst a tire within a mile of credence green and to save time walked into the beautifully kept little village his eye was caught by a building of pale blue tin stenciled Calvinist chapel before whose shuttered windows an Italian organ grinder with a petticoated monkey was playing dolly gray yes that's it snap the egoist that's a parable of the general situation in England and look at those brutes a huge household removals van was halted out of public house the men in charge were drinking beer from blue and white mugs it seemed to me a pretty sight but pen fen ten you said it represented our national attitude lord London the summer resting place we learned was a farm a little out of the village up a hill round which curled a high hedged road only an initiated few spend their holidays at credence green and they have trained the householders to keep the place select pen fen ten you made a grievance of this as we walked up the lane followed at a distance by the organ grinder suppose he is having a house party he said anything's possible in this living land just at that minute we found ourselves opposite an empty villa its roof was a black slate with bright unweathered ridge tiling its walls were a blood colored brick cornered and banded with vermiculated stucco work and there was cobalt magenta and purist apple green window glass on either side of the front door the hole was fenced from the road by a low brick pillar flint wall topped cast iron gothic rail picked out in blue and gold tight beds of geranium cal seal laria and lobelia speckled the glass plate from whose center rose one of the finest a raw carious its other name by the way is monkey puzzler that it has ever been my lot to see it must have been full 30 feet high and its foliage exquisitely answered the iron railings such bijoux ne plus zultra replete with all the amenities do not as I pointed out to pen fentanyu transpire outside of england a hedge swinging sharp right flanked the garden and above it on a slope of daisy dotted meadows we could see lord londies tiled and half timbered summer farmhouse of a sudden we heard voices behind the tree the fine full tones of the unembarrassed English speaking to their equals that tore through the hedge like sleet through rafters that it is not called monkey puzzler for nothing I willingly concede this was a rich and rolling note but on the other hand I submit me lead that the name implies that it might could would or should be ascended by a monkey and not that the ascent is a physical impossibility I believe one of our South American spider monkeys wouldn't hesitate by jove it might be worth trying if this was a crisper voice than the first a third higher pitched and full of pleasant affectations broken oh practical men there is no ape here why do you waste one of God's own days on unprofitable discussion give me a match I have a good mind to make you demonstrate in your own person come on bubbles we'll make Jimmy climb there was a sound of scuffling broken by squeaks from Jimmy of the high voice I turned back and drew penfenten you into the side of the flanking hedge I remembered to have read in a society paper that Lord Lundy's lesser name was bubbles what are they doing penfenten you said sharply drunk just playing super abundant vitality of the race you know we'll watch him I answered the noise ceased my deliver Jimmy gas the Ram caught in the thicket and I'm the only one who can talk near let go my collar he quite allowed in a foreign tongue and was answered from the gate it's the Calvinistic organ grinder I whispered I'd already found a practical break at the bottom of the hedge they're going to try to make the monkey climb I believe here let me look penfenten you flung himself down and rooted till he too broke up peephole we lay side by side commanding the entire garden at ten yards range you know said penfenten you as I made some noise or other I sighed only the big fellow in flannels is Lord Lundy the light built one with the yellow beard painted his picture at the last academy he is Oswell R.A. James Lohman and the brown chap with the hands Tomling Sir Christopher Tomling the South American engineer who built the San Juan viaduct I know said penfenten you we ought to have had him with us do you think a monkey would climb the tree the organ with the gate fenced his beast with one arm as Jimmy talked don't show off your futile accomplishments said Lord Lundy tell him it's an experiment interest him shut up bubbles you aren't in court Jimmy replied this needs delicacy Giuseppe says interest the monkey the brown engineer interrupted he won't climb for love cut up to the house and get some biscuits bubbles sugar ones and an orange or two no need to tell the man folk the huge white figure lobbed off at a trot which would not have disgraced a boy of 17 I gathered from something Jimmy let fall that the three had been a hero together that Tomling has a head on his shoulders but he we didn't get him for the colony but the question is will the monkey climb be quick Jimmy tell the man we'll give him five Bob for the loan of the beast now run the organ under the tree and we'll just have a look at the monkey and I'll just have to for cry I've often wondered said pen fentanyu whether it would puzzle a monkey he had forgotten the needs of his nation and was earnestly parting the white thorn stems with his fingers Giuseppe and Jimmy did as they were told the monkey following them with a wary and malignant eye here's a discovery said Jimmy the singing part of this organ comes off the wheels Giuseppe can take it to his room on nights and play it do you hear that the organ grinder after his days crime plays as a cursed machine for love for love Chris and Michael Angelo was one of them don't jaw tell him to take the beast petty coat off said Sir Christopher Tomling Lord Lundy returned very little winded threw a gap higher up the hedge they're all out thank goodness he cried but I've rated what I could marines, glazes, candied food oranges excellent said the world renowned contractor Jimmy you're the lightweight jump up on the organ and impale these things on the leaves as I hand them I see said Jimmy capering like a spring buck upward and onward a first he'll reach out for how infernal prickly these leaves are this biscuit next we'll lure him on that's about the reach of his arm with the marine glaze and then he'll open out this orange human how like your ignoble career bubbles with care and elaboration they ornamented that tree's lower branches with sugar top biscuits oranges bits of banana and marines glazes till it looked very apes path to paradise unchain the guy asked Goudis said Sir Christopher commandingly Giuseppe placed the monkey at top of the organ where the beast's misunderstanding stood on his head he's throwing himself on the mercy of the blood said Jimmy no now he's interested now he's reaching after hire things what wouldn't I give to have here he mentioned a name not unhonored in British art ambition plucking apples of Sodom the monkey had pricked himself and was swearing genius hampered by convention oh there's a whole bushel full of allegories in it give him time he's balancing the probabilities said Lord Lundy the three closed round the monkey hanging on the motion with an earnestness almost equal to ours the great judge's head seemed and vertical forehead iron mouth and pike like under jaw all set on that thick neck rising out of the white flannel collar was thrown against the puckery green silk of the organ front as it might have been a cameo of Titus Jimmy with raised eyes imparted lips fingered his grizzled chestnut beard and I was near enough to note the capable beauty of his hands Sir Christopher stood a little apart his arms folded behind his back when heavy brown boot thrust forward chin in as curved and black eyebrows lowered to shade the king eyes Giuseppe's dark face between flashing earrings a twisted rag of red and yellow silk round his throat turned from the reaching yearning monkey to the pink and white biscuits spiked on the bronze leafage and upon them all fell the serious and workman like son of an English summer or name field of San Luis Monte oh yeah said Lord London suddenly in a voice that made me think of black caps I do not know what the monkey thought because of that instant he leaped off the organ and disappeared there was a clash of broken glass behind the tree the monkeys face distorted with passion appeared at an upper window of the house and a starred hole in the stained glass window to the left of the front door showed the face of his upward path we've got to catch him cried Sir Christopher come along they pushed at the door which was unlocked yes but consider the ethics of the case said Jimmy isn't this burglary or something bubbles settle that when he's caught said Sir Christopher were responsible for the beast a furious clanging of bells broke out of the empty house followed by muffed gurglings and trumpet tings what the deuce is that I asked half allowed the plumbing of course said Fentanyu what a pity I believe he'd have climbed if Lord London hadn't put him off wait a moment Chris said Jimmy the interpreter Giuseppe says he may answer to the music of his infancy Giuseppe therefore will go in with the organ Orpheus with his loot you know Avante Orpheus there's no Neapolitan for bathroom but I fancy your friend is there I'm not going into another man's house with a hurdy-gurdy said Lord London recalling Giuseppe unshipped the working mechanism of the organ it developed a hang-down leg from its wheels slipped out strap around his shoulders and gave the handle a twist don't be a cad bubbles was Jimmy's answer you couldn't leave us now if you were on the wool sack clay Orpheus the Coddy accompanies with a whoop a buzz and a crash the organ sprang to life under the hand of Giuseppe and the procession passed through the grain to imitate walnut front door a moment later he saw the monkey ramping on the roof he'll be all over the township in a minute if we don't head him said Pen Pen Tenu leaping to his feet and crashing into the garden we headed him with pebbles till he retired through a window to the tuneful reminder that he had left a lot of little things behind him as we passed the front door it swung open and showed Jimmy the artist sitting at the bottom of a newly cleaned staircase he waggled his hands at us and when we entered the room was stricken speechless his eyes grew red red like a ferrets and what little breath he had whistled shrilly at first we thought it was a fit and then we saw that it was mirth the in opportune mirth of the artistic temperament the house palpitated to an infamous melody punctuated by the stump of the barrel organs one leg as Giuseppe above moved from room to room after his rebel slave now and again a floor shook a little under the combined londy and Sir Christopher Tomlin who gave many and contradictory orders but when they could they cursed Jimmy with splendid thoroughness have you anything to do with the house panted Jimmy at last because we're using it just now he gulped and I'm a keeping cave all right said pen fin ten you and shut the hall door Jimmy you unspeakable blaggard Jimmy you cur you coward lord Lundy's voice overboard the flood of melody come here Giuseppe's saying something we don't understand Jimmy listened and interpreted between hiccups he says you'd better play the organ bubbles and let him do the stalking the monkey knows him by Jove he's quite right said Sir Christopher from the landing take it bubbles at once my god said Lord Lundy in horror the chase reverberated over our heads from the addicts to the first form back again bodies and voices met in collision and argument and once or twice the organ hit walls then it broke forth in a new manner he's playing it said Jimmy I know his acute Justinian ear are you fond of music I think lord Lundy plays very well for a beginner I ventured ah that's the trained legal intellect like mastering a brief I haven't got it he wiped his eyes and shook I said pen fin ten you looking through the stained glass window down the garden what's that a household removals van in charge of four men at halted at the gate a husband and his wife householders beyond question quavered irresolutely up the path he looked tired she was certainly cross in all this haphazard world the last couple to understand a scientific experiment I laid hands on Jimmy the climber above drowning speech and with pen fin ten you Zade propped him against the window that he should see he saw nodded fell as an umbrella can fall and kneeling beat his forehead on the shut door pen fin ten you slid the bolt the furniture men reinforced the two figures on the path and advanced spreading generously hadn't we better warn them upstairs I suggested no I'll die first said Jimmy I'm pretty near it now besides they call me names I turned from the artist to the administrator satirus paribas I think we'd better be going said pen fin ten you dealer in crises to take me with you said Jimmy I've no reputation to lose but I'd like to watch him from or outside the picture there's always a modus where Wendy pen fin ten you murmured and tiptoed along the hall to a back door which he opened quite silently we passed into a tangle of gooseberry bushes where at his statesman like example we crawled on all fours and regained the hedge you relay up secure in our alibi but your firm the woman was wailing to the furniture removals men your firm promise me everything should be in yesterday and it's today you should have been here yesterday the last tenants ain't out yet lady said one of them lord londi was rapidly improving in technique though organ grinding like the law is more of a calling than a trade and he hung occasionally on a dead center to seppy I think was singing but I could not understand the drift of Sir Christopher's remarks they were Spanish the woman said something we did not catch you might have sub let it the man insisted or your gentlemen air might but I didn't send for the police at once I wouldn't do that lady they're only fruit pickers on a beano they aren't particular where they sleep you mean they've been sleeping there I only had it cleaned last week get them out oh if you say so we'll have them out of it in two twos out that's me the spare swingle bar don't you'll knock the pain off the door get them what the hell else am I trying to do for you lady the man answered with pathos but the woman wheeled on her mate Edward they're all drunk here and they're all mad there do something she said Edward took one short step forward and said hello in the direction of the turbulent house the woman walked up and down the very figure of domestic tragedy the furniture men swayed a little on their heels and got him the shot rang through all the windows at once it was followed by a bloodhound like Bay from Sir Christopher a maniacal prestissimo on the organ and loud cries for Jimmy but Jimmy at my side rolled his congested eyeballs out wise I never knew them he said I'm an orphan the front door opened and the three came forth to short-lived triumph I'd never before seen a lawlord dressed as for tennis with a stump leg barrel organ strapped to his shoulder but it is a shy bird in this plumage Lord Lundy strove to disembarrass himself of his accoutrements much as an ill-trained punch and duty dog tries to escape backwards through his frill collar Sir Christopher covered with lime wash cherished a bleeding thumb and the almost crazy monkey tore at Giuseppe's hair the men on both sides reeled but the woman stood her ground idiots she said and once more idiots I could have glided a few convicts of my acquaintance with a photograph of Lord Lundy at that instant Madame he began wonderfully preserving the role in his voice it was a monkey Sir Christopher sucked his thumb and nodded take it away and go she replied go away I would have gone and gladly on this permission but these still strong men must ever be justifying themselves Lord Lundy turned to the husband who for the first time spoke I have rented this house I am moving in he said we ought to have been in yesterday the woman interrupted yes we ought to have been in yesterday have you slept there overnight he visually no I sure you we haven't said Lord Lundy then go away go quite away cried the woman they went in single file down the path they went silently restrapping the organ on its wheels and re-chaining the monkey to the organ damn it all Sir pen tenu they do face the music and they do stick by each other in private life ties of common funk I answered Giuseppe ran to the gate and fled back to the possible world Lord Lundy and Sir Christopher trained by tradition paced slowly then it came to pass that the woman who walked behind them lifted up her eyes and beheld the tree which they had dressed stopped she called and they stopped who did that there was no answer the eternal bad boy in every man hung its head before the eternal mother in every woman who put these disgusting things there she repeated suddenly pen pen tenu premier of his colony in all but name left Jimmy and me and appeared at the gate she is not turned out of office that is how he will appear on the day of Armageddon well done you he cried zealously and off his hat to the woman have you any children madam he demanded yes to they should have been here today the firm promised then we're not a minute too soon that monkey escaped it was a very dangerous beast might have frightened your children into fits all the organ grinders fought the most lucky thing these gentlemen caught it when they did I hope you aren't badly mauled Sir Christopher shaken as I was I wanted to get away and laugh I could not but admire the scoundrel's consummate tact in leading his second highest trump and asked would have introduced Lord Lundy and they would not have believed him it took the trick the couple smiled and gave respectful thanks for their deliverance by such hands from such perils not in the least said Lord Lundy anybody any father would have done as much and pray don't apologize your mistake was quite natural a furniture man sniggered here and Lord Lundy I of doom on their ranks by the way if you have trouble with these persons they seem to have taken as much as is good for them please let me know good morning they turned into the lane heaven said Jimmy brushing himself down who's that real man with the real head and we heard after them for they were running unsteadily squeaking like rabbits as they ran we overtook them in a little nut wood half a mile up the road where they had turned aside and weren't rolling so we rolled with them and ceased not yet arrived at the extremity of exhaustion you you saw it all then said Lord Lundy rebuttening his 19 inch collar I saw it was a vital question from the first respond to Pen Pen 10 you and blew his nose it was by the way do you mind telling me your name summa Pen Pen 10 use great idea has gone through a little chipped at the edges but in fine and far reaching shape is opposite number worked at it like a mule of a wilder mule beaten from behind coaxed from in front and propped on either soft side by Lord Lundy of the compressed mouth and the searing tongue Sir Christopher Tomlin has been ravaged by the Argentine where after all he was but preparing trade routes for hostile peoples and now adorns the forefront of Pen Pen 10 use advisory board this was an unforeseen extra as was Jimmy's gratis full length it will be in the years Academy of Pen Pen 10 you who has returned to his own place now and again from a far off between the slam and bump of his shifting scenery the glare of his manipulated limelight and the control rolling of his thunder drums I catch his voice lifted in encouragement and advice to his fellow countrymen he is quite sound on ties of sentiment and alone of colonial statesmen ventures to talk of the ties of common funk herein I have my reward in section 11 section 12 of actions and reactions this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by phone actions and reactions by Richard Kipling the puzzler poem the Kelt in all his variants from Bilt to Ballyhoo his mental processes are plain one knows what he will do and can logically predicate his finish by his start but the English ah the English they are quite a race apart their psychology is bovine their outlook crude and rare they abandon vital matters to be tickled with a straw but the straw that they were tickled with the chafe that they were fed with they convert into a weaver's beam to break their foeman's head with for undemocratic reasons and promotives not of state they arrive at their conclusions largely in orculate being void of self-expression they confide their views to none but sometimes in a smoking room one learns why things are done in telegraphic sentences half swallowed at the ends they hint a man a matter's inwardness and there the matter ends and while the Kelt is talking from Valencia to Kerhole the English ah the English don't say anything at all end of section 12 recording by phone section 13 of actions and reactions this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org actions and reactions by Rudyard Kipling Little Foxes a tale of the Gijon hunt a fox came out of his earth on the banks of the great river Gijon which waters Ethiopia he saw a white man riding through the dry Dura stocks and that his destiny might be fulfilled barked at him the rider drew rain among the villagers around his stirrup what said he is that that said the shake of the village is a fox oh excellency our governor it is not then a jackal no jackal but Abu Hussein the father of cunning also the white man spoke half allowed I am mudir of this province it is true they cried Yasart el mudir oh excellency our governor the great river Gijon well used to the moods of kings slid between his mile wide banks towards the sea while the governor praised god in a loud and searching cry never before heard by the river when he lowered his right forefinger from behind his right ear the villagers talked to him of their crops barley, dura, millet, onions and the like the governor stood in his stirrups north he looked up a strip of green cultivation a few hundred yards wide that lay like a carpet between the river and the tawny line of the desert 60 miles that strip stretched before him and as many behind at every half mile a groaning waterwheel lifted the soft water from the river to the crops by way of a mud-built aqueduct a foot or so wide was the water channel five foot or more high was the bank on which it ran and its base was broad in proportion Abu Hussain misnamed the father of cunning drank from the river below his earth and a shadow was long in the low sun he could not understand the loud cry which the governor had cried the shake of the village spoke of the crops from which the rulers of all lands draw revenue but the governor's eyes were fixed between his horse's ear on the nearest water channel very like a ditch in Ireland he murmured and smiled dreaming of a razor-topped bank in distant Kildare encouraged by that smile the shake continued when crops fail it is necessary to remit taxation then it is a good thing oh excellency our governor that you come and see the crops which have failed and discovered that we have not lied assuredly the governor shortened his reigns the horse cantered on rose at the embankment of the water channel changed leg cleverly on top and hopped down in a cloud of golden dust Abu Hussain from his earth washed with interest he had never before seen such things assuredly the governor repeated and came back by the way he had gone it is always best to see for oneself an ancient and still bullet speckled stern wheeled steamer with a barge lash to her side came round the river bend she whistled to tell the governor his dinner was ready and the horse seeing his fodder piled on the barge whinnied back moreover the shake added in the days of the oppression the emirs and their creatures dispossessed many people of their lands all up and down the river our people are waiting to return to their lawful fields judges have been appointed to settle that matter said the governor there will presently come in steamers and hear the witnesses wherefore did the judges kill the emirs we would rather be judged by the men who executed God's judgment on the emirs we would rather abide by your decision oh excellency our governor the governor nodded it was a year since he had seen the emirs stretch clothes and still round the redened sheepskin where lay El-Emaddi the prophet of God remained no trace of their dominion except the old steamer once part of a dervish flotilla which was his house and office she sidled into the shore lowered a plank and the governor followed his horse aboard lights burned on her till late duly reflected in the river that tugged at her mooring ropes the governor read not for the first time the administration reports of one John Jorak's MFH we shall need he said settling to his inspector about ten couple I'll get him when I go home you'll be whip baker the inspector who was not yet 25 signified his assent in the usual manner while others said barked at the vast desert moon ha! said the governor coming out in his pajamas we'll be giving you kipivi in another month my friend it was four as a matter of fact air steamer with melodious barge full of hounds anchored at that landing the inspector leaped down among them and the homesick wanderers received him as a brother everybody fed him everything on board ship but there are real dainty hounds at bottom the governor explained that's royal you've got hold of the pick of the bunch and the bitch that's got hold of you she's a little excited is May Queen Maryman out of Coatsman modeling you know I know, ground old batch with a tan eyebrows the inspector cooed oh ben I shall take an interest in life now harp to him oh harp Abu Hussein under the high bank went about his night's work and eddie carried his scent of the barge and three villagers heard the crash of music that followed even then Abu Hussein did not know better than to bark in reply well what about my province the governor asked not so bad the inspector answered with royals head between his knees of course all the villagers want taxes but as far as I can see the whole country is stinking with foxes our trouble will be chomping him in cover I've got a list of the only villages entitled to any remission what do you call this flat sided blue muddle beast with a jowl beagle boy I have my doubts about him do you think we can get two days a week easy and as many buys as you please the shake of this village here tells me that his barley has failed and he wants a 50% remission we'll begin with him tomorrow and look at his crops as we go nothing like personal supervision said the governor they began at sunrise the pack flew of the barge in every direction and after gambles dug like terriers at Abu Hussein's many earths then they drank themselves pot bellied on Guihon river while the governor and the inspector chastised them with whips scorpions were added and was removed to the barge lamenting mystery a puppy alas met a snake and the blue muddle beagle boy never a dainty hound ate that which he should have passed by only royal of the bell war tan head and the sad discerning eyes made any attempt to uphold the honour of England before the watching village you can't expect everything said the governor after breakfast regarded though everything except foxes have you seen May Queen's nose said the inspector and mystery's dead we'll keep them coupled next time till we get well in among the crops I say what a babbling body snatcher that beagle boy is ought to be drowned they worry people so damn casual here about give him another chance the inspector pleaded not knowing that he should live to repent most bitterly talking of chances said the governor this shake lies about his burly being a failure if it's high enough to hide a hound at this time of the year it's alright and he wants a 50% remission you said you didn't go on past the melon patch where I tried to turn wanderer it's all burnt up from there on to the desert his other water wheel has broken down to the inspector replied very good we'll split the difference and allow him 25% off where will we meet him tomorrow there's some trouble among the villages down the river the land titles it's going good ground there too the inspector said the next meet then was some 20 miles down the river and the pack were not enlarged till they were fairly among the fields Abu Hussein was there in force four of them four delirious hunts of four minutes each four hounds per fox ended in four earths just above the river all the village looked on we forgot about the earths this will defeat us wait a moment the governor drew forth the sneezing hound I've just remembered I'm governor of these parts then turn out a black battalion to stop for us we'll need him old man the governor straightened his bag give euro people he cried I make a new law the villagers closed in he called henceforth I will give one dollar to the man on whose land Abu Hussein is found and another dollar he held up the coin to the man on whose land these dog shall kill him but to the man on whose land Abu Hussein shall run into a hole such as is this hole I will give not dollars but a most unmeasurable beating is it understood oh excellency a man stepped forward on my land Abu Hussein was found this morning is it not so brothers none denied the governor tossed him over four dollars without a word on my land they all went into their holes cut another therefore I must be beaten not so the land is mine and mine are the beatings the second speaker thrust forward his shoulders already buried and the villagers shouted hello two men anxious to be licked there must be some swindle about the land said the governor then in local vernacular what are your rights to the beating as a river reached changes beneath a slant of the sun that which has been a scattered mob changed to a court of most ancient justice the hounds tore and sobbed at Abu Hussein's heart stone all unnoticed among the legs of the witnesses and Gihon also accustomed to laws purred approval you will not wait till the judges come up the river to settle the dispute said governor at last no shouted all the village save the man who had first asked to be beaten by our excellency's decision let our excellency turn out the creatures of the emirs who stole our lands in the days of the oppression and thou sayest the governor turned to the man who had first asked to be beaten I say I will wait till the wise judges come down in the steamer then I will bring my many witnesses he replied he is rich he will bring many witnesses the village shake muttered no need the governor cried no man lawfully entitled to his land would wait one hour before entering upon it stand aside the man fell back and the village jeered him the second claimant stooped quickly beneath the lifted hunting crop the village rejoiced oh such a one son of such a one said the governor prompted by the shake learn from the day when I send the order to block up all the holes where Abu Hussein may hide on thy land and at flick's end the man stood up triumphant by that accolade had the supreme government acknowledged his title before all men while the village praised the perspicacity of the governor a naked pop mark child stood forward to the earth and stood on one leg unconcerned as a young stork Hal he said, hands behind his back this should be blocked up with bundles of durastocks or better bundles of thorns better thorns said the governor the shake ends innermost the child nodded gravely and squatted on the sand an evil day for the Abu Hussein he shrilled into the mouth of the earth a day of obstacles to tie flagitious returns in the morning who is it the governor asked the shake it thinks farad the fatherless his people were slain in the days of depression the man to whom our excellency has awarded the land is as it were his maternal uncle will it come with me and feed the big dogs said the governor the other peering children drew back run they cried our excellency will feed Farag to the big dogs I will come sit Farag and I will never go he threw his arm round Royals neck and the wise beast licked his face Benjamin by Jove Bane Specter cried no said the governor I believe he has the makings of a James pig Farag waved his hand to his uncle and led a royal on to the barge the rest of the pack followed Guihon that had seen many sports learn to know the hunt barge well he met her rounding his bends on a great December dawns to music wild and lamentable as the almost forgotten throbe of dervish drums went high above the royals tenor bell sharper even than lying beagles boys full setter break Farag chanted deathless war against Abu Hussein and all his seed at sunrise the river would shoulder her carefully into her place and listen to the rush and scutter of the pack fleeing up the gank plank and the tramp of the governor's Arab behind had them they would pass over the brow into the dueless crops where Guihon, Lowen Shrunken could only guess what they were about when Abu Hussein flew down the bank to scratch at a stopped earth and flew back into the barley again as Farag had foretold it was evil days for Abu Hussein and he learned to take necessary steps and to get away crisply sometimes Guihon saw the whole procession of the hunt silhouetted against the morning blue bearing him company for many merry miles at every half mile the horses and the donkeys jumped the water channels up on change your leg and off again like figures in zoetrope till they grew small among the line of water wheels then Guihon waited their rustling return through the crops and took them to rest on his bosom at 10 o'clock while the horses ate and Farag slept with his head on royal flank the governor and his inspector worked for the good of the hunt and his province after a little time there was no need to beat any man for neglecting his earths the steamer's destination was telegraphed with a wheeled water wheel and the villagers stopped out and put to according if an earth were overlooked it meant some dispute as to the ownership of the land and then and there the hunt checked and settled it in this wise the governor and the inspector side by side but the latter half a horses length to the rear both bare-shoulded claimants well in front the villagers half mooned behind them and Farag with the pack the children sitting down on the left 20 minutes were enough to settle the most complicated case for as the governor said to the judge on the steamer one gets at the truth in a hunting field a heap quicker than in your law courts but when the evidence is conflicting the judge suggested wash the field they'll throw tongue fast enough if you're running a wrong scent you've never had an appeal from one of my decisions yet the shakes on horseback the lesser folk on clever donkeys the children so despised by Farag soon understood that villages which repaired their water wheels and channels stood highest in the governor's favor he bought their barley for his horses channels he said are necessary that we may all jump them be unnecessary more over for the crops let there be many wheels and sound channels and much good barley without money replied an aged shake there are no water wheels I will lend the money said governor at what interest or excellency take you two of me queens puppies to bring up in your village in such a manner they did they do not eat filth nor lose their hair no catch fever from lying in the sun but become wise hounds like Royale not like Bigelby already it was an insult along the river to compare a man to the shifty anthropophagus blue-modeled Harrier certainly like Royale not in the least like Bigelby that shall be on the interest on the loan let the puppies thrive and the water wheel be built and I shall be content said the governor the wheel shall be built but oh our excellency if our gods favor the pups grow to be wealth smelters not filth eaters not unaccustomed to their names not lawless who will do them and meet justice at the time of judging the young dogs hounds man hounds hawans oh shake we call them in their manhood the hawans when they judged are at the shah-ho I have unfriends down the river to whom our excellency has also entrusted Hawans to bring up puppies man puppies we shall call them oh shake in their childhood but Pete my enemies may judge my puppies unjustly at the shah-ho this must be thought of I see the obstacle here now if the new water wheel is built in a month without oppression thou oh shake shall be named one of the judges to judge the puppies at the shah-ho is it understood understood we will build the wheel I and my seed are responsible for the payment of the loan where are my puppies if they eat fowl must they on any account eat the feathers on no account must they eat the feathers frog in the barge will tell thee how they are to live there is no instance of any default in the personal and unauthorized loans for which they call them the father of water wheels but the first puppy show at the capitol needed enormous tact and the presence of a black battalion stentatiously drilling in the barrack square to prevent trouble after the price-giving but who can chronicle the glories of the gihan hunt or their shames who remembers the kill in the marketplace when the governor bade the assembled shakes and warriors observe how the hounds would instantly devour the body of Abu Hussein but how when he had scientifically broken it up the weary path turned from it in loathing and frog wept because he said the world's face had been blackened what men who have not yet written beyond the sound of any horn recall the midnight run which ended beagle boy leading among tunes the hasty whip off and the oaths taken a bow a bone to forget the worries the desert run when Abu Hussein first took the cultivation and made a six mile point to earth in a desolate core when strange armed riders on camel swooped out of a ravine and instead of giving battle offered to take the tired hounds home on their beasts which they did and vanished above all who remembers the death of royal when a certain shake wept above the body of the hound as it might have been his sons and that day the hunt rode no more the badly kept logbook sells little of this but at the end of their second season 49 brace appears the dark entry new blood badly wanted they are beginning to listen to beagle boy the inspector attended to the matter when his leave fell due remembers of the governor you must get as the best blood in England real dainty hounds expense no object but don't trust your own judgment present my letters of introduction and take what they give you the inspector presented his letters in a society where they make much of horses more of hounds and are tolerably civil to men who can ride they passed him from house to house mounted him according to his merits and fed him after years of goat chop and Worcester sauce perhaps a thought too richly the seat or castles where he made his great coup does not much matter four masters of fox hounds were able and in a mellow hour the inspector told them stories of the geon hunt he ended then said I wasn't to trust my own judgment about hounds but I think there ought to be a special terror for empire makers as soon as his host could speak they reassured him on this point and now tell us about your first puppy show all over again said one about the earth stopping was that all Ben's own invention said another wait a moment said a large clean shaven man not an MFH at the end of the tale are your villagers habitually beaten by your governor when they fail to stop fox's holes the tone and the phrase were enough even if as an inspector confessed afterwards the big blue double chin man had not looked so like beagle boy he took him on for the honor of Ethiopia we only had twice a week sometimes three times I have never known a man chastised more than four times a week unless there is a buy the large loose lipped man flung his napkin down came around the tip and cast himself into a chair next to the inspector and leaned forward earnestly so that he breathed in the inspector's face chastised with what he said with the corbash on the feet a corbash is a strip of old hippo hide with a sort of keel on it like the cutting edge of a boar's tusk but we use the rounded side for a first offender and do any consequences follow this sort of thing for the victim I mean not for you very rarely let me be fair I have never seen a man die under the lash but gang green may set up if the corbash has been pickled pickled and what all the table was still uninterested in copper us of course didn't you know that inspector thank god I didn't the large man sputtered visibly the inspector wiped his face and grew bolder you mustn't think we're careless about our earth stoppers we have a hunt fund for hot tar tar's a splendid dressing if the toenails aren't beaten off but hunting as large a country as we do we may be back at the village for a month and if the dressings ain't renewed and gang green sets in often as not you find your man pecking about on his stumps we have a well-known local name for him down the river we call him the mudir's cranes you see I persuaded the governor only to bust dinado on one foot on one foot the mudir's crane the large man turned purple to the top of his bald head would you mind giving me the local word for mudir's cranes from a two well-stocked memory to one short adhesive word with surprises by itself even unblushing Ethiopia he spelt it out saw the large man write it down on his cuff and withdraw then the inspector translated a few of its significations and implications to the four masters of foxhounds he left three days later with eight couple of the best hounds in England a free and a friendly and an ample gift thanks to the ghion hunt he had honestly meant to un-deceive the large blue-modeled man but somehow forgot about it the new draft marks a new chapter in the hunt's history from an isolated phenomena in a barge it became a permanent institution with brick-built kennels ashore and an influence social political and administrative could terminus with the boundaries of province then the governor departed with the royal dainty hounds but never ceased to log for the old lawless lot his successors were ex-officio masters of the ghion hunt as all inspectors were whips for one reason Farag the kennel huntsmen and khaki and putties would obey nothing under the rank of an excellency and the hounds would obey no one but Farag for another the best way of estimating the returns and revenues was by riding straight to hounds for a third though judges down the river issued signed and sealed land titles to all lawful owners yet public opinion along the river never held any such title valid till it had been confirmed according to the precedent by the governor's hunting crop in the hunting field above the willfully neglected earth true the ceremony had been cut down to three mere taps on the shoulder but governors who tried to evade that much found themselves and their office compassed about with a great cloud of witnesses who took up their time with lawsuits and were still neglected the puppies the older sheiks indeed stood out for the unmeasurable beatings of the old days the sharper the punishment they argued the sureer the title but here the land of modern progress was against them and they contented themselves with telling tales of then the first governor whom they called the father of water wheels and of that heroic age when men horses and hounds were worth following this same modern progress which brought dog biscuits and brass water taps to the kennels was at work all over the world forces activities and movements rang into being agitated themselves coalesced and in one political avalanche overwhelmed a bewildered and not in the least intending it england the echoes of the new era were born into the province and the wings of inexplicable cables the gihan hunt read speeches and sentiments and policies which amazed them and they thanked god prematurely that their province was too far off too hot too hard worked to be reached by those speakers or their policies but they with others underestimated the scope and purpose of the new era one by one the provinces of the empire were hauled up and baited hit and held lashed under the belly and forced back on their haunches for the amusement of their new masters and the parish of Westminster one by one they fell away sore and angry to compare stripes with each other at the end of the uneasy earth even so the gihan hunt like Abu Hussein in the old days did not understand then it reached them through the press that they habitually flogged to death good revenue paying cultivators who neglected to stop earths but that the few the very few who did not die under hypohyde whips soaked in caparas walked about on their gangrenous ankle bones and were known in derision as the Madeir's cranes the charges were vouched for in the house of commons by a Mr. Latabi Groombright who had formed a committee and was disseminating literature the province groaned the inspector now an inspector of inspectors whistled he had forgotten the gentleman who sputtered in people's faces he shouldn't have looked so like beel boy was his sole defence on the steamer after a meet you shouldn't have joked with an animal of that class said Peter the governor look what Farag has brought me it was a pamphlet signed on behalf of a committee by a lady secretary but composed by some person who thoroughly understood the language of the province after telling the tale of the beatings it recommended all the beaten to institute criminal proceedings against their governor as soon as might be to rise against English oppression and tyranny such documents were new in Ethiopia in those days the inspector read the last half page but he stammered this is impossible white men don't write this sort of stuff don't they just said the governor they get made cabinet ministers for doing it too I went home last year I know ill blow over said the inspector weekly not it Groombright is coming down here to investigate the matter in a few days for himself the imperial governments behind him perhaps you would like to look at my orders the governor laid down an uncoated cable the whiplash to it ran you will afford Mr Groombright every facility for his inquiry and will be held responsible that no obstacles are put in his way to the fullest possible examination of any witnesses which he may consider necessary he will be accompanied by his own interpreter who must not be tampered with that's to me governor of the province said peter the governor it seems about enough the inspector answered fraud kennel huntsman entered the saloon as was his privilege my uncle who was beaten by the father of water wheels would approach oh excellency he said and there are others on the bank admit said the governor sampled the porridge shakes in villages to the number of 17 in each man's hand was a copy of the pamphlet in each man's eye terror and uneasiness of the sword that governor spent and are spent to clear away for uncle now shake of the village spoke it is written in this book excellency that the beatings whereby we hold our lands are all valueless it is written that every man who received such a beating from the father of water wheels who slow the mirrors should instantly begin a lawsuit because the title to his land is still valid it is so written we do not wish lawsuits we wish to hold the land as it was given to us after the days of the oppression they cried the governor glanced at the inspector this was serious to cast doubt on the ownership of the land means in Ethiopia the letting in of waters and the getting out of troops your titles are good said the governor the inspector confirmed with the nod then what is the meaning of these writings which came from down the river where the judges are for uncle waved his copy by whose order I will order to slay you or excellency our governor it is not written that you are to slave me not in those very words but we leave an earth unstopped it is the same as though we wish to save a busain from the hounds these writings say abolish your rulers how can we abolish except we kill we hear rumors of one who comes from down the river soon to lead us to kill fools to the governor your titles are good this is madness it is so written they answered like a pack listen said the inspector smoothly I know who caused the writings to be written and sent he is a man of blue model gels in aspect like big old by who ate unclean matters he will come up the river and will give tongue about the beatings will he impeach our land titles it is an evil day for him go slow baker the governor whispered they'll kill him if they get scared about their land I tell a parable the inspector lit a cigarette declare which of you took to walk the children of nookmaid milik made first or second said farag quickly the second the one which was leamed by the thorn no no milik made the second strained her shoulder leaping my water channel a shake cried which was leamed by the thorns on the day when our excellency fell thrice true true the second milik made's mate was malvolio the pied hound said the inspector I had two of the second milik made's pups said for uncle they died of madness in their ninth month and how did they do before they died said the inspector they ran about in the sun and slaved it in the mouth till they died wherefore god knows the madness it was no fault of mine thy own mouth had answered thee the inspector laughed it is with men as it is with dogs god afflicts some with a madness it is no fault of ours if such men run about in the sun and fraught at the mouth the man who is coming will emit spray from his mouth and speaking and will always edge and push in towards his hearers when you see him and hear him you'll understand that he is afflicted of god being mad he is in god's hands but our titles our titles to our lands good the crowd repeated your titles are in my hands they are good said the governor and he who wrote the writings is an afflicted of god to fraught's uncle the inspector had said it cried the governor you'll see when the man comes oh shakes and men have we risen together and walked puppies together and bought and sold barley for the horses that after these years we should run riot on the scent of a madman an afflicted of god but the hunt pays us to kill mad jackals said fraught's uncle and he who questions my titles to my land ah we're a riot the governor's hunting crop cracked like a three pounder by Allah he thundered if the afflicted of god come to any harm at your hands I myself will shoot every hound and every puppy and the hunt shall ride no more on your heads be it go in peace and tell the others the hunt shall ride no more said fraught's uncle and how can the land be governed no no oh excellency our governor we will not harm a hair on the head of the afflicted of god he shall be to us as is Abu Hussein's wife in the breeding season when they were gone the governor mopped his forehead we must put a few soldiers in every village to screw and bride visits baker tell him to keep out of sight and have an eye on the villagers he's drawing him rather high oh excellency said a smooth voice of Farag laying the field and country life square on the table it's the afflicted of god who resembles bigel by one with the man whom the inspector met in the great house in England and to whom he told the tale of the mudir's crane the same man Farag said the inspector I have often heard the inspector tell the tale to our excellency at feeding time in the kennels but since I'm in the government service I have never told it to my people may I lose that tale among the villagers the governor nodded no harm said he the details of Mr. Groombride's arrival with his interpreter whom he proposed should eat with him at the governor's table his allocution to the governor on the new movement and the sins of imperialism I purposely admit at three in the afternoon Mr. Groombride said I will go out now and address your victims in this village won't you find it rather hot said the governor they generally take a nap at sunset the year Mr. Groombride's large loose lips said that he replied pointedly would be enough to decide me I fear you have not quite mastered your instructions may I ask you to send for my interpreter I hope he has not been tampered with by your subordinates he was a yellowish boy called Abdul who had well eaten and drunk with Farag the inspector by the way was not present at the meal at whatever risk I shall go unattended said Mr. Groombride your presence would cow them from giving evidence Abdul my good friend would you very kindly open the umbrella he passed up the gang plank to the village and with no more prelude than a Salvation Army picket and a Portsmouth slum cried oh my brothers he did not guess how his path had been prepared the village was widely awake Farag and loose flowing garments quite unlike kennels huntsman cocky and pities leaned against the wall of his uncle's house come and see the afflicted God he cried musically whose face indeed resembled that of Bigelby the village came and decided that on the whole Farag was right I can't quite catch what they're saying said Mr. Groombride they saying they very much pleased to see you sir Abdul interpreted then I do think they might have sent a deputation to the steamer they were frightened of the officials tell them not to be frightened Abdul he says you are not to be frightened Abdul explained a child he has fluttered with laughter refrained from mirth Farag cried the afflicted of God is the guest of the Excellency our governor we are responsible for every hair of his head he has none a voice spoke he has the white and shining man now tell them what I've come for Abdul and please keep the umbrella well up I think I shall reserve myself for my little vernacular speech at the end approach look listen Abdul chanted the afflicted of God will now make sport presently he will speak in your tongue and will consume you with mirth I have been a servant for three weeks I will tell you about his undergarments and his perfumes for his head he told them at length and didst thou take any of his perfume bottles said Farag at the end I am his servant I took two Abdul replied ask him said Farag's uncle what he knows about our land titles ye young men are all alike he waved the pamphlet Mr. Groom's bright smile to see how the seeds sown in London had borne fruit by Gihan lo all the seniors held copies of the pamphlet he knows less than a buffalo he told me on the steamer that he was driven out of his own land which is a devil inhabiting crowds and assemblies said Abdul Allah between us and evil a woman cackled from the darkness of a hut come in children he may have the evil eye no my aunt said Farag no afflicted of God has an evil eye wait till you hear his mirth provoking speech which he will deliver I have heard it twice from Abdul they seem very quick to grasp the point how far have you got Abdul all about the beating sir they're highly interested don't forget about the local self-government and please hold umbrella over me it is hopeless to destroy unless one first builds up he may not have the evil eye Farag's uncle grunted but his devil led him too certainly to question my land title ask him whether he still doubts my land title or mine or mine cried the elders what odds he is an afflicted of God Farag called remember the tale I told you yes but he is an Englishman and doubtless of influence or our excellency would not entertain him bit the down country jackass ask him sir said Abdul these people much fearing they may be turned out of their land in consequence of your remarks therefore they ask you to make promise no bad consequences following your visit Mr. Groombright held his breath and turned purple then he stamped his foot tell them he cried that if a hair of any one of their heads is touched by an official on any account whatever all England shall ring with it good God what callous oppression the dark places of the earth are full of cruelty he wiped his face and throwing out his arms cried tell them oh tell the poor it serves not to be afraid of me tell them I come to redress their wrongs not heaven knows to add to their burden the long drawn gurgle of the practice public speaker pleased them much that is how the new water tap runs out in the kennels at frog the excellency our governor entertains him that he may make sport make him say the mirth moving speech what did he say about my land titles frog uncle was not to be turned he says frog interpreted that he desires nothing better than you should live on your lands in peace he talks as though he believed himself to be governor well we here are all witnesses to what he has said now go forward with the sport for our uncle smoothies garments how diversely had Allah made his creatures on one he bestows strength to slay mirrors another he calls to go mad and wander in the sun like the afflicted sons of milkmaid yes and to emit spray from the mouth as the inspector told us all will happen as the inspector foretold said frog I've never yet seen the inspector thrown out during any run I think Abdul plucked at mr. groom's brides leaves I think perhaps it is better now sir if you give your final little native speech they not understanding English but much pleased at your condescensions condescensions mr. groom brides spun around if they only knew how I felt towards them in my heart if I could express a tith of my feelings I must stay here and learn the language hold of the umbrella Abdul I think my little speech will show them I know something of their valiant time it was a short simple carefully learned address accent supervised by Abdul on the steamer allowed the heroes to guess its meaning which was a request to see one of the midir's cranes since the desire of the speaker's life the object to which he would consecrate his days was to improve the condition of the midir's cranes but first he must behold them with his own eyes what then his brethren whom he loved show him a midir's crane whom he desired to love once twice and again in his preparation he repeated his demand using always that they might see he was acquainted with their local argot using always I say the word which the inspector had given him in England long ago the short adhesive word which by itself surprises even unlushing Ethiopia there are limits to the sublime politeness of an ancient people a bulky blue chin man in white clothes his name red lettered across his lower shirt front spluttering from under a green line umbrella almost tearful appeals to be introduced to be reproducible naming loudly the unnameable dancing as it seemed impoverished joy at Mary mention of the unmentionable found those limits there was a moment's hush and then such murder's Kuhn through his centuries had never heard her roar like the roar of his own cataracts and flood children cast themselves on the ground and rolled back and forth to cheering and whooping strong men their faces hidden their clothes swayed in silence till the agony became unsupportable and they threw up their hands and baited the son women mothers and virgins shrilled shriek upon mounting tried to draw breath some half-strung voice would quack out the word and the riot began afresh last to fall was a city trained up dual he held on to the edge of apoplexy then collapsed throwing an umbrella from him as your groom bread should not be judged too harshly exercise and strong emotion under a hot sun the shock of public ingratitude for the moment rude his spirit he furl the umbrella and whether beat the prostate of dual crying that he had been betrayed in which posture the inspector on horseback followed by the governor suddenly found him that's all very well so the inspector when he had taken abduals dramatically dying depositions on the steamer but you can't hammer a native merely because he laughs at you I see nothing for it but the law to take its course you might reduce the charge to a tampering with an interpreter said the governor mr. groom bride was far too gone to be comforted it's the publicity that I fear he wailed is there no possible means of hushing up the affair you don't know what a question a single question in the house means to a man of my position the ruin of my political career I assure you I shouldn't have imagined it said the governor thoughtfully and though perhaps I ought not to say it I am not without honor in my own country or influence word and season as you know your excellency it might carry an initial far the governor shuttered yes that had to come to he said to himself well look here if I tell this man of yours to withdraw the charge against you you can go to Gheina for odd I care the only condition I make is that if you write I suppose that's part of your business about your travels you don't praise me so far mr. groom bride has loyally adhered to this understanding end of section 13 section 14 of actions and reactions this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Cornel Nemes in Reno Nevada actions and reactions by Rudyard Kipling Gallios song all day long to the judgment seat the crazed provincials drew all day long at their rulers feet howled for the blood of the Jew insurrection with one accord banded itself and walk and Paul was about to open his mouth when a chaos deputy spoke whether the god the sand from above or the man sand upon high whether the smaker of tents be jove or a younger deity I will be no judge between your gods and your godless bickering lictor drive them hands with rods I care for none of these things where is the question of lawful do or a laborers hire denied a reason would I should bear with you and order it well to be tried but this is a question of words and names and I know the strife it brings I will not pass upon any your claims I care for none of these things one thing only I see most clear as I pray you also see Claudius Caesar had set me here Rome's deputy to be it is her peace that ye go to break not mine nor any kings but touching your clamor of conscience sake I care for none of these things end of section 14 recording by Cornel Nemes in Reno Nevada