The Sa'-Zada Tales Read online

  Introduction

  _All his life Sa'-zada the Keeper had lived with animals. That was whyhe could talk to them, and they to him; that was why he knew thatsomething must be done to keep his animal friends from frettingthemselves to death during the dreadful heat that came like a diseaseover their part of the Greater City._

  _In the Greater City itself the sun smote with a fierceness that waslike the anger of evil gods. The air vibrated with palpitating whiteheat, and the shadows were as the blue flame of a forge. Men and womenstole from ovened streets, wide-mouthed, to places where trees swayedand waters babbled feebly of a cooler rest; even the children were sentaway that they might not die of fevered blood._

  _But in the Animal City there was no escape. The Dwellers from distantdeep jungles and tall forests had only blistering iron bars betweenthem and the sirocco that swept from the brick walls of the GreaterCity._

  _It was because of this that Sa'-zada said, "I must make them talk oftheir other life, lest they die of this."_

  _In the Greater City men thought only of themselves; but with Sa'-zadait was different. The animals were his children--his friends; so he hadcontrived that all of the Peace-kind--the Grass-feeders andothers--should come from their cages and corrals and meet each eveningin front of the iron-bound homes which contained those of theBlood-kind, to tell stories of their past life._

  _Sa'-zada had asked Hathi, the one-tusked Elephant, who had been Ganeshin Hindustan, about it. In Hathi's opinion those who had seen theleast, and were of little interest, would do all the talking--that washis experience of jungle life; so the Keeper had wisely arranged thateach evening some one animal, or group, should tell the tale._