`` Are all these tales such cobwebs and moon talk ? '' said Mowgli . `` That tiger limps because he was born lame , as everyone knows . To talk of the soul of a money-lender in a beast that never had the courage of a jackal is child 's talk . '' Buldeo was speechless with surprise for a moment , and the head-man stared . `` Oho ! It is the jungle brat , is it ? '' said Buldeo . `` If thou art so wise , better bring his hide to Khanhiwara , for the Government has set a hundred rupees on his life . Better still , talk not when thy elders speak . '' Mowgli rose to go . `` All the evening I have lain here listening , '' he called back over his shoulder , `` and , except once or twice , Buldeo has not said one word of truth concerning the jungle , which is at his very doors . How , then , shall I believe the tales of ghosts and gods and goblins which he says he has seen ? '' `` It is full time that boy went to herding , '' said the head-man , while Buldeo puffed and snorted at Mowgli 's impertinence . The custom of most Indian villages is for a few boys to take the cattle and buffaloes out to graze in the early morning , and bring them back at night . The very cattle that would trample a white man to death allow themselves to be banged and bullied and shouted at by children that hardly come up to their noses . So long as the boys keep with the herds they are safe , for not even the tiger will charge a mob of cattle . But if they straggle to pick flowers or hunt lizards , they are sometimes carried off . Mowgli went through the village street in the dawn , sitting on the back of Rama , the great herd bull . The slaty-blue buffaloes , with their long , backward-sweeping horns and savage eyes , rose out their byres , one by one , and followed him , and Mowgli made it very clear to the children with him that he was the master .
He beat the buffaloes with a long , polished bamboo , and told Kamya , one of the boys , to graze the cattle XXXXX themselves , while he went on with the buffaloes , and to be very careful not to stray away from the herd .
because by for if in of on that to with