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Introduction
In Rudyard Kipling’s story The Jungle Book, a prolonged drought has left Mowgli and the animals with no food and little water. The waterhole has sunk so low that the Peace Rock is showing, and Hathi, the elephant, has called the Water Truce so hunter and hunted alike can drink. As dusk falls, the truce is holding — though Bagheera, the blank panther, isn’t much help.
Up-stream, at the bend of the sluggish pool round the Peace Rock, and Warden of the Water Truce, stood Hathi, the wild elephant, with his sons, gaunt and gray in the moonlight, rocking to and fro — always rocking. Below him a little were the vanguard of the deer; below these, again, the pig and the wild buffalo; and on the opposite bank, where the tall trees came down to the water’s edge, was the place set apart for the Eaters of Flesh — the tiger, the wolves, the panther, and the bear, and the others.
“We are under one Law, indeed,” said Bagheera,* wading into the water and looking across at the lines of clicking horns and starting eyes where the deer and the pig pushed each other to and fro. ‘Good hunting, all you of my blood,” he added, lying down at full length, one flank thrust out of the shallows; and then, between his teeth, “But for that which is the Law it would be very good hunting.”
* Kipling has already introduced us to Bagheera in the story ‘Mowgli’s Brothers’. “A black shadow dropped down into the circle. It was Bagheera, the Black Panther, inky black all over, but with the panther markings showing up in certain lights like the pattern of watered silk. Everybody knew Bagheera, and nobody cared to cross his path; for he was as cunning as Tabaqui, as bold as the wild buffalo, and as reckless as the wounded elephant. But he had a voice as soft as wild honey dripping from a tree, and a skin softer than down.”
Précis
In ‘The Jungle Book’, Kipling described the Water Truce, an agreement among the animals to refrain from hunting during a severe drought. Predators lounged by one side of the diminishing waterhole, prey crowded nervously at the other; but despite the truce, Bagheera the black panther could not resist commenting on the temptation presented by the sight of so much game. (60 / 60 words)
In ‘The Jungle Book’, Kipling described the Water Truce, an agreement among the animals to refrain from hunting during a severe drought. Predators lounged by one side of the diminishing waterhole, prey crowded nervously at the other; but despite the truce, Bagheera the black panther could not resist commenting on the temptation presented by the sight of so much game.
Variations: 1.increase the length of this precis to exactly 65 words. 2.reduce the length of this precis to exactly 55 words. 3.introduce one of the following words into the precis: about, because, may, must, otherwise, until, whether, who.
Word Games
Sevens Based on this passage
Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.
Variations: 1.expand your answer to exactly fourteen words. 2.expand your answer further, to exactly twenty-one words. 3.include one of the following words in your answer: if, but, despite, because, (al)though, unless.
Jigsaws Based on this passage
Express the ideas below in a single sentence, using different words as much as possible. Do not be satisfied with the first answer you think of; think of several, and choose the best.
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