They are children in the matter of tales.’

‘But none are so terrible as the little ones, if a man misplace a word, or in a second telling vary events by so much as one small devil.’

‘Ay, I also have told tales to the little ones, but do thou this—’ His old eyes fell on the gaudy paintings of the wall, the blue and red dome, and the flames of the poinsettias beyond. ‘Tell them first of those things that thou hast seen and they have seen together. Thus their knowledge will piece out thy imperfections. Tell them of what thou alone hast seen, then what thou hast heard, and since they be children tell them of battles and kings, horses, devils, elephants, and angels, but omit not to tell them of love and suchlike. All the earth is full of tales to him who listens and does not drive away the poor from his door. The poor are the best of tale-tellers; for they must lay their ear to the ground every night.’

After this conversation the idea grew in my head, and Gobind was pressing in his inquiries as to the health of the book.

Later, when we had been parted for months, it happened that I was to go away and far off, and I came to bid Gobind good-bye.

‘It is farewell between us now, for I go a very long journey,’ I said.

‘And I also. A longer one than thou. But what of the book?’ said he.

‘It will be born in due season if it is so ordained.’

‘I would I could see it,’ said the old man, huddling beneath his quilt. ‘But that will not be. I die three days hence, in the night, a little before the dawn. The term of my years is accomplished.’

In nine cases out of ten a native makes no miscalculation as to the day of his death. He has the foreknowledge of the beasts in this respect.

‘Then thou wilt depart in peace, and it is good talk, for thou hast said that life is no delight to thee.’

‘But it is a pity that our book is not born. How shall I know that there is any record of my name?’

‘Because I promise, in the forepart of the book, preceding everything else, that it shall be written, Gobind, sadhu, of the island in the river and awaiting God in Dhunni Bhagat’s Chubara, first spoke of the book,’ said I.

‘And gave counsel—an old man’s counsel. Gobind, son of Gobind of the Chumi village in the Karaon tehsil, in the district of Mooltan. Will that be written also?’

‘That will be written also.’

‘And the book will go across the Black Water to the houses of your people, and all the Sahibs will know of me who am eighty years old?’

‘All who read the book shall know. I cannot promise for the rest.’

‘That is good talk. Call aloud to all who are in the monastery, and I will tell them this thing.’

They trooped up, faquirs, sadhus, sunnyasis, byragis, nihangs, and mullahs, priests of all faiths and every degree of raggedness, and Gobind, leaning upon his crutch, spoke so that they were visibly filled with envy, and a white-haired senior bade Gobind think of his latter end instead of transitory repute in the mouths of strangers. Then Gobind gave me his blessing and I came away.

These tales have been collected from all places, and all sorts of people, from priests in the Chubara, from Ala Yar the carver, Jiwun Singh the carpenter, nameless men on steamers and trains round the world, women spinning outside their cottages in the twilight, officers and gentlemen now dead and buried, and a few, but these are the very best, my father gave me. The greater part of them have been published in magazines and newspapers, to whose editors I am indebted; but some are new on this side of the water, and some have not seen the light before.

The most remarkable stories are, of course, those which do not appear— for obvious reasons.

Table of Contents Next

Last updated on Fri Mar 27 14:07:25 2009 for eBooks@Adelaide.

Rudyard Kipling

Life's Handicap

The Lang Men O’ Larut

The Chief Engineer’s sleeping suit was of yellow striped with blue, and his speech was the speech of Aberdeen. They sluiced the deck under him, and he hopped on to the ornamental capstan, a black pipe between his teeth, though the hour was not seven of the morn.

‘Did you ever hear o’ the Lang Men o’ Larut?’ he asked when the Man from Orizava had finished a story of an aboriginal giant discovered in the wilds of Brazil. There was never story yet passed the lips of teller, but the Man from Orizava could cap it.

‘No, we never did,’ we responded with one voice. The Man from Orizava watched the Chief keenly, as a possible rival.

‘I’m not telling the story for the sake of talking merely,’ said the Chief, ‘but as a warning against betting, unless you bet on a perrfect certainty. The Lang Men o’ Larut were just a certainty. I have had talk wi’ them. Now Larut, you will understand, is a dependency, or it may be an outlying possession, o’ the island o’ Penang, and there they will get you tin and manganese, an’ it mayhap mica, and all manner o’ meenerals. Larut is a great place.’

‘But what about the population?’ said the Man from Orizava.

‘The population,’ said the Chief slowly, ‘were few but enorrmous. You must understand that, exceptin’ the tin-mines, there is no special inducement to Europeans to reside in Larut. The climate is warm and remarkably like the climate o’ Calcutta; and in regard to Calcutta, it cannot have escaped your obsairvation that—’

‘Calcutta isn’t Larut; and we’ve only just come from it,’ protested the Man from Orizava. ‘There’s a meteorological department in Calcutta, too.’

‘Ay, but there’s no meteorological department in Larut. Each man is a law to himself. Some drink whisky, and some drink brandipanee, and some drink cocktails—vara bad for the coats o’ the stomach is a cocktail— and some drink sangaree, so I have been credibly informed; but one and all they sweat like the packing of piston-head on a fourrteen-days’ voyage with the screw racing half her time.