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'Little toad! why have you left the pond? Isn't there food there for your little belly? Rice and cocoanuts and mangoes and little cakes of kurakkan? Is the belly full, that you have left the pond for the jungle? Foolish little toad! The water is good, but the trees are evil. You have come to a bad place of dangers and devils. Yesterday, little toad, I lay under a domba-tree by the side of a track, my gun in my hand, waiting for what might pass. The devils are very angry in the jungle, for there has been no rain now for these three months. The water-holes are dry; the leaves and grass are brown; the deer are very thin; and the fawns, dropped this year, are dying of weakness and hunger and thirst. Therefore, the devils are hungry, and there is nothing more terrible than a hungry devil. Well, there I lay, flat on the ground, with my gun in my hand; and I saw on the opposite side of the track, lying under a domba-tree, a leopardess waiting for what might pass. I put down my gun, and, "Sister," I said, "is the belly empty?" For her coat was mangy, and the belly caught up below, as though with pain. "Yakko, he-devil," she answered, "three days now I have killed but one thin grey monkey, and there are two cubs in the cave to be fed. Yakkini, she-devil," I said, "there are two little toads at home to be fed. But I still have a handful of kurakkan in my hut, from which my sister can make cakes. It remains from last year's chena, and after it is eaten there will be nothing. The headman, too, is pressing for the three shillings[3] body tax. 'How,' I say to him, 'can there be money where there is not even food?' But the kurakkan will last until next poya day. Therefore, your hunger is greater than mine. The first kill is yours." So we lay still a long time, and at last I heard far away the sound of a hoof upon a dry stick. "Sister," I whispered, "I hear a deer coming this way. Yakko, have you no ears?" she said. "A long while now I have been listening to a herd of wild pig coming down wind. Can you not even now hear their strong breathing, and their rooting in the dry earth, and the patter of the young ones' feet on the dry leaves? Yakkini," I said, for I heard her teeth clicking in the darkness, "the ear of the hungry is in the belly: the sound of your teeth can be heard a hoo[4] cry's distance away." So we lay still again, and at last the herd of pigs came down the track. First came an old boar, very black, his tusks shining white in the shadows; then many sows and young boars; and here and there the little pigs running in and out among the sows. And as they passed, one of the little pigs ran out near the domba-bush, and Yakkini sprang and caught it in her teeth, and leapt with it into the branch of a palu-tree which overhung the path. There she sat, and the little pig in her mouth screamed to its mother. Then all the little pigs ran together screaming, and stood on one side, near the bush where I lay; and the great boars and the young boars and sows ran round the palu-tree, looking up at Yakkini, and making a great noise. And the old sow, who had borne the little pig in Yakkini's mouth, put her forefeet against the trunk of the tree, and looked up, and said, "Come down, Yakkini; she-devil, thief. Are you afraid of an old, tuskless sow? Come down." But the leopardess laughed, and bit the little pig in the back behind the head until it died, and she called down to the old sow, "Go your way, mother. There are two cubs at home in the cave, and they are very hungry. Every year I drop but one or two cubs in the cave, but the whole jungle swarms with your spawn. I see eight brothers and sisters of your child there by the domba-bush. Go your way, lest I choose another for my mate. Also, I do mot like your man's teeth." The old boar and the sows were very angry, and for a long while they ran round the tree, and tore at it with their tusks, and looked up and cursed Yakkini. But Yakkini sat and watched them, and licked the blood which dripped from the little pig's back. I too lay very still under my domba-bush, for there is danger in an angry herd. At last the old boar became tired, and he gathered the little pigs together in the middle of the herd, and led them away down the track. Then Yakkini dropped to the ground, and bounded away into the jungle, carrying the little pig in her mouth. So you see, little crow, it is a bad place to which you have come. Be careful, or some other devil will drop on you out of a bush, and carry you off in his mouth.'