The Second Jungle Book

The Second Jungle Book is a sequel to The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling. First published in 1895, it features five stories about Mowgli and three unrelated stories, all but one set in India, which Kipling wrote while living in Vermont. All of the stories were previously published in magazines in 1894-5, often under different titles. The book is less well-known than the original even though it arguably contains some of Kipling's best animal stories.

Stories in The Second Jungle Book:

Spoiler warning: Plot or ending details follow.

You can find the complete text at Project Gutenberg's official website.

• "How Fear Came": During a drought, Mowgli and the animals gather at a shrunken river for a 'water truce', during which Hathi the elephant tells the story of how the first tiger got his stripes. This story can be seen as a forerunner of the Just So Stories.

• "The Miracle of Purun Bhagat": An influential Indian politician abandons his worldly goods to become an ascetic holy man. Later he must save a village from a landslide with the help of the local animals.

• "Letting In the Jungle": Mowgli has been driven out of the human village for witchcraft, and the superstitious villagers are preparing to kill his adopted parents Messua and her (unnamed) husband. Mowgli rescues them and then prepares to take revenge.

• "The Undertakers": A crocodile, a jackal and an adjutant crane, three of the most unpleasant characters on the river, spend an afternoon bickering with each other until some Englishmen arrive to settle some unfinished business with the crocodile.

• "The King's Ankus": Mowgli discovers a jewelled object which he later discards carelesslly, not realising that men will kill each other to possess it. Note: the first edition of The Second Jungle Book inadvertently omits the final 500 words of this story, in which Mowgli returns the treasure to its hiding-place to prevent further killings. Although the error was corrected in later printings, it was picked up by some later editions.

• "Quiquern": A young Inuit hunter and his girlfriend set out across the arctic ice on a desperate hunt for food to save their tribe from starvation, guided by the mysterious animal-spirit Quiquern. But Quiquern may not be what it seems....

• "Red Dog": Mowgli's wolfpack is threatened by a pack of rampaging dhole. Mowgli asks Kaa the python to help him formulate a plan to defeat them.

• "The Spring Running": Mowgli, now almost seventeen years old, is growing restless for reasons he cannot understand. On an aimless run through the jungle he stumbles across the village where his adopted mother Messua is now living with her two-year old son, and is torn between staying with her and returning to the jungle.

In 1992 Pamela Jekel wrote The Third Jungle Book, consisting entirely of new Mowgli stories, in a passable imitation of Kipling's style.

See also

Works of Rudyard Kipling

The Jungle Book characters

Feral children in mythology and fiction