Once upon a time, in a great jungle, there lived a great lion, who was king of all the country round. Every day he used to leave his den in the deepest shadow of the rocks and roar with a loud, angry voice. When he roared the other animals in the jungle ran here and there in great fright; and King Lion would pounce upon them and kill them and gobble them up for his dinner.
This went on for a long, long time, until at last there were no living creatures left in the jungle but two little Jackals.
A very hard time of it the poor little Jackals had, running this way and that to escape the terrible King Lion. Every day the little Mrs. Jackal would say to her husband, "I am afraid he will catch us to-day. Do you hear how he is roaring? Oh dear! Oh dear! " And Mr. Jackal would say, "Never fear, I will take care of you. Let us run on a mile or two. Come, come, quick, quick, quick. " And they would both run away as fast as they could.
One fine day, they found that the lion was so close upon them that they could not escape. Then the little Mrs. Jackal said, "Husband, husband, I feel very frightened. King Lion is so angry he will certainly kill us at once. What can we do?"But Mr. Jackal answered, "Cheer up; we can save ourselves yet. I"ll show you how we can do it. "So these cunning little Jackals went to the great Lion"s den. When he saw them coming he began to roar and shake his mane, and he said, "You little wretches, come and be eaten at once! I have had no dinner for three whole days, and all that time I have been running over hill and dale to find you. Ro-a-ar! Ro-a-ar! Come and be eaten, I say! " And he lashed his tail and gnashed his teeth and looked very terrible indeed. Then Mr. Jackal, creeping quite close up to him, said, "O great King Lion, we all know you are our master, and we would have come at your bidding long ago. But indeed, sir, there is a much bigger king even than you in this jungle. He tried to catch hold of us and eat us up, and he frightened us so much that we had to run away. ""What do you mean? " growled King Lion. " There is no King in this jungle but me! " "Ah, sir, " answered the Jackal, "it is as we say. We, with our own eyes, haveseen one who is more dreadful even than you. His face is as flaming fire, his step as thunder. " " It is impossible!" interrupted the old Lion. "But show me this king of whom you speak so much, that I may destroy him at once! "Then the little Jackals ran on before him until they reached a great well. Pointing down to the water, they said, "There lives the terrible king. " When King Lion looked down the well he became very angry, for he thought he saw another Lion there. He roared and shook his great mane, and the shadow lion shook his, and looked also very angry. At last, mad with rage, King Lion sprang down to kill his enemy at once. But no other lion was there, and the sides of the well were so steep that he could not get out again to punish the two Jackals, who peeped over the top. After struggling for some time in the deep water, he sank to rise no more. And the little Jackals threw stones down upon him from above, and danced round and round the well, singing, "Ao! Ao! Ao! Ao! The King of the forest is dead, is dead! We have killed the great Lion who would have killed us! Ao! Ao! Ao! Ao! Ring-a-ting-ding-a-ting! Ring-a-ting-ding-a- ting! Ao! Ao! Ao! "About the Author.-Mary Frere (1845-1911), was born in England. When she was eighteen she went to India, where her father was governor of Bombay. She went among the Indian people and learned their favourite stories from them. Then she re-told these stories in English in a book called Old Deccan Days.
About the Story.-How do you know from the first line that the story is not about Eskimos? To what large family does the jackal belong? Do you know another story about an animal and his shadow? Find Bombay and the Deccan in a map of India.