elephant. Is
there a green branch and an iron ring hanging over a doorway? The old
Mugger knows that a boy has been born in that house, and must some
day come down to the Ghaut to play. Is a maiden to be married? The old
Mugger knows, for he sees the men carry gifts back and forth; and she,
too, comes down to the Ghaut to bathe before her wedding, and--he is
there. Has the river changed its channel, and made new land where there
was only sand before? The Mugger knows."

"Now, of what use is that knowledge?" said the Jackal. "The river has
shifted even in my little life." Indian rivers are nearly always moving
about in their beds, and will shift, sometimes, as much as two or three
miles in a season, drowning the fields on one bank, and spreading good
silt on the other.

"There is no knowledge so useful," said the Mugger, "for new land means
new quarrels. The Mugger knows. Oho! the Mugger knows. As soon as the
water has drained off, he creeps up the little creeks that men think
would not hide a dog, and there he waits. Presently comes a farmer
saying he will plant cucumbers here, and melons there, in the new land
that the river has given him. He feels the good mud with his bare
toes. Anon comes another, saying he will put onions, and carrots, and
sugar-cane in such and such places. They meet as boats adrift meet,
and each rolls his eye at the other under the big blue turban. The old
Mugger sees and hears. Each calls the other 'Brother,' and they go to
mark out the boundaries of the new land. The Mugger hurries with them
from point to point, shuffling very low through the mud. Now they begin
to quarrel! Now they say hot words! Now they pull turbans! Now they lift
up their lathis (clubs), and, at last, one falls backward into the mud,
and the other runs away. When he comes back the dispute is settled, as
the iron-bound bamboo of the loser witnesses. Yet they are not grateful
to the Mugger. No, they cry 'Murder!' and their families fight with
sticks, twenty a-side. My people are good people--upland Jats--Malwais
of the Bet. They do not give blows for sport, and, when the fight is
done, the old Mugger waits far down the river, out of sight of the
village, behind the kikar-scrub yonder. Then come they down, my
broad-shouldered Jats--eight or nine together under the stars, bearing
the dead man upon a bed. They are old men with gray beards, and voices
as deep as mine. They light a little fire--ah! how well I know that
fire!--