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MUNGROO, THE BEAR'

BY ERIC H. N. GILL

THE scene as it unfolded itself before my vision that fine spring morning was one of exceptional grandeur. A winding, picturesque gorge several hundred yards in length; its precipitous sides covered with scrub and bramble about three quarters of the way up, their tops crowned with piled-up slabs of granite and sandstone-grim, impregnable, and forbidding; the slopes inclining sharply to the bottom, and terminating in a dry stream-bed where the polished surface of the stones marked its course quite distinctly as it meandered through the undergrowth to join a sparkle of water away in the distance.

Beyond lay range upon range of flattopped, jungle-covered hills, harboring in their midst a veritable museum of botanic interest. Here it was that one met with the ganiar with its wealth of brilliant yellow flowers, brought into relief by the refreshing green of the large-leaved though stunted teak and the thrice-blessed mohua, from whose fleshy and overpowering flowers comes the country liquor so beloved of the peasantry.

Lower in the valleys grew the milkexuding pipal, sacred to the Hindu gods, with its heart-shaped leaves protesting vehemently against the scarlet splendor of the gigantic, thornstemmed simal. Lower still, the figLower still, the figfruited bargat, encompassing with its serpentlike roots some ancient cenotaph erected in perpetual memory

1 From the Cornhill (London literary monthly), February

of some village godling; and high up the granite precipices, clinging limpetlike to the rock-faces, the sinister 'ghost-tree,' pointing derisively with pink, diseased fingers toward those aristocratic would-be ensnarers of the deity; and, as though endeavoring to pour oil on troubled waters, the delicately fashioned amaltas showering downward its beautiful cascades of yellow flowers.

The jungle was wrapt in profound silence that weird, uncanny calm which precedes the breaking of dawn. Presently the eastern sky glowed with an opalescent light, a jungle cock crowed aggressively in the gorge, and a peacock greeted the dawn with his loud trumpeting. A monkey overhead called plaintively, and suddenly, as if at some appointed signal, the whole teeming bird-world burst into vigorous song. The medley of voices rose in joyful crescendo, when, without the least warning, there reached my ears the unmistakable sounds of a vulgar brawl, distinctly unmusical and not a little disconcerting on account of its close proximity; which brings me to the beginning of my story about Mungroo.

Mungroo, as my readers must have already guessed, was an Indian sloth bear, and a bear of bears in that wild and unfashionable tract of country. And a power in the State was old Mungroo, for the many who knew him by sight and reputation, and the few who had survived his personal acquaintance, spoke of him with bated breath. He was notorious throughout

the range of hills fringing the Takaria Nala. Subtle, formidable, truculent, even supernatural, he dominated the sylvan surroundings with his aweinspiring presence. Village housewives found in the mere mention of his name an infallible antidote for the waywardness of defiant and refractory children; from which my readers might conclude that Mungroo was no ordinary bear. He was not.

Some years previously Mungroo had first seen the light of day in that very Nala. For two weeks he had lain in a black cave as blind as a newborn pup, fed and cared for by the most devoted, kind, and indulgent of mothers. His wee companion, a sickly morsel, had died very shortly after birth, so, having consumed the sustenance intended for two, he had flourished and grown apace. Came a day when, with the gaudy barbets serenading each other in the silent gorge and the peacocks challenging their fellows to mortal combat, Mungroo followed his mother out of the cave and beheld for the first time the inimitable glory of an Eastern sun resting like a golden orb on the rim of the earth.

The big she-bear, however, exhibited little interest in the surrounding grandeur. Being a child of darkness, she was afraid of the light. Experience had taught her that it was just this transition period between light and darkness when her safety was most threatened. Man, her archenemy, cunningly perched on boulder or tree-top, was able to watch all her movements and plan her destruction accordingly. She licked her cub affectionately and put a great claw-surmounted paw protectingly round him. Her sensitive silvery muzzle wandered this way and that while she studied carefully the message of the wind. Then, finding the coast clear, she scrambled slowly down the precipitous slope with her offspring

perched securely on her spacious back.

Thus did the little cub take his first joy-ride into the great unknown. Thus did he return the next morning and several subsequent mornings, having in the interval been taught how to grub for ants, termites, and other insect delicacies; not to mention his introduction to the intriguing flavors of the intoxicating mohua, luscious tendu, and delicious wild honey.

Perched comfortably on his mother's back or trotting merrily at her heels, the little cub had never a thought of danger. He was quick to notice how all other four-footed wanderers, occasionally met with, gave them right of way; and once, when returning later than usual, how some villagers had shot up trees at their approach, and how terribly angry and formidable his mother had appeared on that occasion; and yet another occasion when a rumbling growl from her had sent another bear fleeing headlong down a boulder-strewn slope. Verily his mother was the terror that stalked by night, and woe betide anyone, whether animal or human, who happened to impede her path.

Came a day when the cub sought no longer to ride on his mother's back. The mohua had all but ceased to yield its succulent fruit, and the old peacock, roosting each night on the hive-ridden simal, had grown a jeweled tail wellnigh six feet in length. An overpowering hot wind had blown unceasingly from the west, causing even the barbets to cease their vociferous serenading. A crimson sun was just having his last peep at a topsy-turvy world when the big she-bear, emerging from the cave entrance, rose steadily on her hind legs and sniffed suspiciously toward an overhanging ledge of rock. Suddenly the sylvan stillness was punctuated by the startling explosion of a rifle. A red-hot flame tore through

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Those simple villagers had not been jungle-dwellers all their lives without knowing that a child of the jungle returns to the jungle, yet there was not a man nor a woman, for that matter who would not have wagered all his meagre belongings on Mungroo's being an exalted exception. And they were not far wrong. That great lumbering, lovable bear bade fair to justify all the faith, trust, and simple beliefs of his human foster-parents until he was faced unexpectedly with nature's greatest law. Mungroo was never restrained. It would have mattered little if he had been, for one bright starry night, when the wild plum was beginning to bear its stringent fruit and a low-lying smoke-haze spoke softly of an early winter, a plaintive, crooning call-oft repeated and remarkably human-arose from the adjoining scrub; subsided, and rose again. Mungroo, grubbing in the village dustbin, stopped to listen, and as

he recognized that crooning invitation something thrilled within him-something which, unknowingly, filled a blank in his otherwise happy existence; something which would not be denied. Mungroo straightway lost interest in his grubbing, and the forest, that home of unraveled mysteries, claimed him for a spell as its own.

The simple but practical villagers wondered and speculated as to his fate, even grieved for a space, and then Mungroo, village comedian and sport of men and maidens, was relegated to the limbo of village memories. A few moons came and went, and one hot morning, when the village housewives were gathering in the last of the mohua, a huge bear strode boldly into the village. It was the once popular Mungroo, but nobody recognized him. The alarm had been sudden and general. Wiry men, armed with sticks and hatchets, emerged from every hut and made toward the intruder, who, mildly wondering what all the commotion meant, waited patiently for the onslaught.

If a slap in the face is ordinarily enough to rouse the ire, imagine the mortification attendant upon the violent impact of several sticks, not to mention the kindly ministrations of an axe or two. Mungroo's sluggish and slow-thinking brain suddenly saw red. He fought, as only a big bear can fight, with teeth and claws, and retired from the fray with an awkward limp, leaving on the field of battle two men dismembered and a third with his head scalped clean. Again the forest enfolded Mungroo in its mighty embrace, this time for good. It healed his wounds and hardened his one-time loving heart, but it did not eradicate that pathetic limp, which at once identified old Mungroo from a hundred of his kind. So here he was again, as I saw him that fine spring morning,

The

the moving spirit of a vulgar brawl. Seated on the polished surface of a gigantic rock overlooking the Takaria Nala, I watched and waited. sounds of strife so suddenly commenced were as suddenly subdued. There followed a crash of falling débris, and down the boulder-strewn slope barged and bucketed an animated mass of black hair in a frantic endeavor to get clear of the vicinity in the shortest possible time.

Having thus seen the last of one participant, I looked about carefully for the other, and, as I half expected, saw an enormous bear, exhibiting a curious limp as he moved about, making romantic overtures to a smaller though no less enthusiastic and flattered member of the weaker sex. Mungroo was justifying his reputation with

a vengeance.

A monkey coughed aggressively from a tree-top, and immediately the whole troop were chattering and jumping about like friends on a holiday. Mungroo, however, took not the least notice of them, but after some silent communion with his companion led the way down to the stream-bed and began a rapid ascent of the opposite slope. Up and up they went, never stopping or faltering, scrambling straight over rocks and boulders in their path till they arrived at the base of a rocky ridge, and there they stopped.

With a pair of powerful glasses I watched every movement. After pacing up and down the ridge for a few minutes they finally squatted opposite each other on their haunches and embraced in the most human fashion imaginable, at the same time uttering queer crooning sounds which I could hear quite distinctly. After this they separated and lay down under overhanging ledges of rock, now flat on their stomachs, now on their sides, and

occasionally on their backs, with great hairy legs waving ludicrously in the air above them.

This spot, as I ascertained later, was the entrance to a cave which old Mungroo had decided to make his summer home. Duty kept me wandering in the neighborhood, and as Mungroo emerged from his underground habitation about the same hour each evening, and returned to it regularly each morning accompanied by his devoted wife, I was afforded unlimited opportunity for prying into their jealously guarded private affairs. Not that I have any apology to offer for this reprehensible conduct, for it taught me, in an irrefutable manner, how closely the follies of mankind resemble those of the brute creation.

When forest paths, beloved of man and beast on account of the immunity they offer from formidable thorns, converge in one direction there will be occasions when inadvertent meetings might not be regarded as the long arm of coincidence. Mungroo and I met not infrequently, mostly when he was accompanied by his youthful wife. Between us there had arisen an indescribable, spontaneous feeling of mutual respect on my part for his enormous thews and formidable claws, on his for a mechanical device which, in the days of his youth, he had learned to fear, and which had become inscribed on his memory as being associated with violent explosions, acrid fumes, and sudden death. Whether he recognized me as the purveyor of golden syrup and other delectable viands which used to please his youthful palate is somewhat problematical. Personally I do not think, or rather I like not to think, that he identified me with the murderous attempt on his profligate life; but his appearance on these occasions was so awe-inspiring, and any overtures on my part so obviously ill

advised, that it was always with mixed feelings of sorrow and relief that I would watch him step hurriedly off the path and allow me to pursue my lawful vocation unmolested.

Mungroo's treatment of the local villagers, however, was not so courteous. He was marvelously quick at differentiating between a white and a black skin, and they never stood their ground long enough to debate the question. Being well aware of the fact that poor old Mungroo was hopelessly lame, they immediately sought to exploit the weak spot in his armor.

Thus it was that Mungroo sailed again, as he did when he first abandoned his village existence, on the uncertain sea of matrimony; and, judging from the way in which he and his mate conducted their domestic affairs, they doubtless found the world in general, and the Takaria Nala in particular, a pleasant enough place to live in. For a space nature was merciful, and they were allowed to roam the rocky fastnesses in sweet communion together. Wild plum in plenty was theirs for the asking. A tropical moon lit the way to their favorite drinking-pool, and the monkeys on the hillside witnessed again their loving embrace. Presently the plum bushes ceased to yield fruit, the luscious tendu began to ooze with yellow pulp, and the fragrant mohua dominated the atmosphere with its intoxicating odor. The exotic 'flame of the forest' was enfolding the gorge with a mantle of red, and one night Mungroo wandered into the forest alone.

At dawn he returned, only to be greeted at the cave entrance with a warning growl, telling him that he might not enter on account of the wonderful thing that had happened during the night. Mungroo halted abruptly as the sound of those ominous rumblings reached his ears, paced up and down while the full meaning of

what it all meant to him permeated his senses, then, turning suddenly, his limp more pathetic than ever, he retraced his steps wearily to a distant ravine, condemned to a life of isolation, a lonely wanderer in the loneliest of worlds.

Chancing along a forest path the following morning, we met - or rather, when I observed the red soil of a termite mound flying in all directions, the motive power being supplied by a bear with an unmistakable lurch, I thought a meeting might prove instructive. Mungroo neither saw nor heard me coming, but when a stray eddy of wind conveyed the familiar human scent to his sensitive nostrils he ceased excavating and turned in my direction with an intimidating 'Woof!'

Poor old fellow! He looked tired, disheveled, and mud-bespattered. His small piglike eyes were red and inflamed, his smooth silvery muzzle streaked with crimson, in eloquent testimony to his riotous passage through the thorns in a ceaseless enIdeavor to shut out from his vision the suckling cubs which, in a single night, had changed his mate's affections to awful distrust. The mother-love had risen predominant within her, and he had been called upon to pay the penalty.

'Woof!' expostulated Mungroo again, and I could see that he was in no mood to be trifled with. It was with a pang of sorrow, however, that I beheld him; for his great size and formidable appearance did nothing but emphasize the picture of perfect misery which he presented, especially when his near hind-leg dragged painfully behind him. Presently his aggressive attitude changed to one of sorrowful resignation as with a deepthroated grunt he hobbled slowly

away.

On that warm summer's morning,

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