Just So Stories (Oxford World’s Classics) by Rudyard Kipling

Author:Rudyard Kipling
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 1998-03-14T16:00:00+00:00

‘I shall be glad of that,’ said Taffy, ‘because, after all, though you’ve brought every single other spear in the Tribe of Tegumai, you’ve forgotten my Daddy’s black-handled spear.’

Then the Head Chief cried and said and sang, ‘Taffy dear, the next time you write a picture-letter, you’d better send a man who can talk our language with it, to explain what it means. I don’t mind it myself, because I am a Head Chief, but it’s very bad for the rest of the Tribe of Tegumai, and, as you can see, it surprises the stranger.’*

Then they adopted the Stranger-man (a genuine Tewara of Tewar) into the Tribe of Tegumai, because he was a gentleman and did not make a fuss about the mud that the Neolithic ladies had put into his hair. But from that day to this (and I suppose it is all Taffy’s fault), very few little girls have ever liked learning to read or write. Most of them prefer to draw pictures and play about with their Daddies—just like Taffy.

THERE runs a road by Merrow Down—*

A grassy track to-day it is—

An hour out of Guildford town,

Above the river Wey it is.

Here, when they heard the horse-bells ring,

The ancient Britons dressed and rode

To watch the dark Phoenicians bring

Their goods along the Western Road.

And here, or hereabouts, they met

To hold their racial talks and such—

To barter beads for Whitby jet,

And tin for gay shell torques and such.

But long and long before that time

(When bison used to roam on it)

Did Taffy and her Daddy climb

That down, and had their home on it.

Then beavers built in Broadstonebrook

And made a swamp where Bramley stands;

And bears from Shere would come and look

For Taffimai where Shamley stands.

The Wey, that Taffy called Wagai,

Was more than six times bigger then;

And all the Tribe of Tegumai

They cut a noble figure then!

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