Red-Eye called to Wrinkle-Skin.
Hear what little Red-Eye saith:
'Nag, come up and dance with death!'

Eye to eye and head to head,
(_Keep the measure, Nag_.)
This shall end when one is dead;
(_At thy pleasure, Nag_.)
Turn for turn and twist for twist--
(_Run and hide thee, Nag_.)
Hah! The hooded Death has missed!
(_Woe betide thee, Nag!_)

This is the story of the great war that Kikki-tikki-tavi fought
single-handed, through the bath-rooms of the big bungalow in Segowlee
cantonment. Darzee, the tailor-bird, helped him, and Chuchundra, the
musk-rat, who never comes out into the middle of the floor, but
always creeps round by the wall, gave him advice; but Rikki-tikki did
the real fighting.

He was a mongoose, rather like a little cat in his fur and his tail,
but quite like a weasel in his head and habits. His eyes and the end
of his restless nose were pink; he could scratch himself anywhere he
pleased, with any leg, front or back, that he chose to use; he could
fluff up his tail till it looked like a bottle-brush, and his
war-cry, as he scuttled through the long grass, was:
'_Rikk-tikk-tikki-tikki-tchk!_'

One day, a high summer flood washed him out of the burrow where he
lived with his father and mother, and carried him, kicking and