Ghaut and the Envy of the River----"

"A liar, a flatterer, and a Jackal were all hatched out of the
same egg," said the Adjutant to nobody in particular; for he
was rather a fine sort of a liar on his own account when he
took the trouble.

"Yes, the Envy of the River," the Jackal repeated, raising his
voice. "Even he, I doubt not, finds that since the bridge has
been built good food is more scarce. But on the other hand,
though I would by no means say this to his noble face, he is so
wise and so virtuous--as I, alas I am not----"

"When the Jackal owns he is gray, how black must the Jackal be!"
muttered the Adjutant. He could not see what was coming.

"That his food never fails, and in consequence----"

There was a soft grating sound, as though a boat had just
touched in shoal water. The Jackal spun round quickly and faced
(it is always best to face) the creature he had been talking
about. It was a twenty-four-foot crocodile, cased in what looked
like treble-riveted boiler-plate, studded and keeled and
crested; the yellow points of his upper teeth just overhanging
his beautifully fluted lower jaw. It was the blunt-nosed Mugger
of Mugger-Ghaut, older than any man in the village, who had
given his name to the village; the demon of the ford before the
railway bridge, came--murderer, man-eater, and local fetish in
one. He lay with his chin in the shallows, keeping his place by
an almost invisible rippling of his tail, and well the Jackal