CHUNKY IN THE MUD
Poor Chunky was having a dreadful time. Never before had he been caught
by a crocodile. It would not have been so bad, he thought in his hippo
way, if it had happened on top of the water. There some of the big
animals might have seen him and they would have helped him. But down
under the muddy river――who could help him there?
Chunky flopped about in the water, sticking his feet deep down in the
muddy bottom, and pushing back as hard as he could, trying to get his
nose loose from the crocodile’s teeth. But the crocodile held fast to
the hippo.
“Let me go! Let me go!” blubbered Chunky, speaking in a strange way
because his mouth was partly closed by the crocodile.
“Indeed and I’ll not let you loose!” answered the crocodile. “I want
you for my supper!” At least he might have answered that if his mouth
had not been busy holding fast to Chunky’s nose.
Chunky pulled and pulled and pulled, but still he could not get loose,
and the crocodile was slowly, but surely, dragging him out to a deeper
part of the river, when, all at once, there was a great splashing in
the water, and something big and heavy sank down beside the little
hippo boy.
“Get away from here, Mr. Crocodile!” a voice shouted, sounding like
thunder under the water. “Leave my Chunky alone.”
And then a great, big body began pushing and shoving the crocodile, and
Chunky saw that it was his father who had come to save him.
Mr. Hippo, being big and strong, squeezed the crocodile up against the
hard bank of the river, down under the water, and nearly squeezed the
breath out of him. So the crocodile was very glad, indeed, to take his
jaws off Chunky’s nose and let the little hippo go. Then, with another
shove of his big body, Mr. Hippo thrust the crocodile far out into the
river. The crocodile made a snap at Mr. Hippo, trying to bite him, but
the big hippo floated out of the way just in time, and that was the end
of the fight.
“Oh dear!” cried Chunky to his father, who swam up beside him under
water. “Oh dear! How my nose hurts!”
“Yes, I guess it does, little chap,” said Mr. Hippo. “Come along with
me and I’ll get your mother to put a grass poultice on it. Or you can
hold it in the soft, cool mud on the edge of the river. That will cure
it.”
Of course I don’t mean to say that sick animals really _doctor_
themselves, but if you ever see your cat or dog eat grass, you may be
sure it is doing it because it feels ill, so, in a way, it is taking
medicine.
And if you have ever watched a dog when it has been stung by a bee, you
may have seen him go to some place where there is cool, wet mud that he
can lie down in, and so get some plastered on the stung place, to make
it pain less. So he takes this kind of medicine.
In the jungle wild animals, when they are shot, or hurt by one of their
own kind, or by another kind, get away if they can, where they can
drink water and let some of it wash up on their wound. Water, mud and
some kinds of grass and leaves are jungle medicines for the animal folk.
And that is what Mr. Hippo meant. He did not mean that Mrs. Hippo
would make a _real_ grass poultice for Chunky’s sore nose, only that
she might chew up some grass until it was soft and mushy and then her
little boy hippo could lay his nose against it to make the bites of the
crocodile feel better.
“Where have you been?” asked Mrs. Hippo, as she saw Mr. Hippo and
Chunky coming home.
“Oh, the boy got into trouble――one of those crocodiles,” said the
father hippo, in his own kind of talk. “We’ll have to move away from
here, I guess, if many more crocodiles come to this river.”
Jungle animals do move from place to place; hippos, monkeys and
elephants especially. They stay around one spot until they have eaten
all the good food there, or until all the water is gone, and then they
move on to a new home. Sometimes they move from one place to another
because of danger, such as crocodiles or snakes might make.
“Oh, Chunky, your nose is bleeding!” said Mrs. Hippo.
“That’s where the crocodile bit me,” he answered.
His mother showed him a place where he could lie down and put his nose
in some soft mud. Then she brought him some sweet lily-plant roots to
eat, and made a little cushion of soft grass for his sore nose to rest
on that night.
Chunky did not sleep very well. His nose pained him too much, but he
did not cry. Wild animals do not know anything about crying, no matter
how much pain they may feel. In the morning the sore nose was a little
better, but Chunky could not go to play with his brother and sister and
the other young hippos. He had to stay on the river bank.
Still he was quite happy, for all the other animals were kind to him,
and brought him nice things to eat. Mumpy and Bumpy came to see him,
and told him what fun they were having playing water-tag and other
games in the river.
“I wish I could play!” said Chunky.
“Oh, but you can’t go into deep water until your nose gets better!”
said his mother. “You must stay on shore. Perhaps you might go in
wading, but even then you must keep your head out of water. In a few
days you will be better, and then you can have fun.”
“Did you see any crocodiles?” asked Chunky of Bumpy.
“No. But if I do I’ll step on ’em and make ’em go away!” he answered
boastfully.
“Better not try that!” said Mr. Hippo. “You are not yet big enough to
fight the crocodiles. Leave that to me!”
For three days Chunky had to keep out of the deep part of the river. He
could only wade about and splash near shore, not diving or swimming.
And as he had been used to going far out in the water ever since he was
a tiny baby, he missed this very much indeed.
But at last his nose was almost well, and his mother said it would be
good for him to go in the water. Then Chunky was happy. He splashed in
the river, dived away down to the bottom, rolled over and over in the
mud and swam about as much as he pleased.
“Glad to see you!” cried Big Foot, for he and Chunky had become good
friends since their little quarrel. “Is your nose all well?”
“Almost,” Chunky answered. “But I don’t want to see any more
crocodiles!”
“I should say not!” agreed Big Foot. “But when I get larger I’m going
to fight them, same as your father did.”
Then Chunky played with the other hippos in the water, diving and
having games of what you would call tag, until finally Big Foot said:
“Oh, come on! Let’s wade ashore and go into the jungle!”
“All right!” agreed Chunky. “Maybe we can have some fun there.”
So into the jungle they went, trampling their way through the thick
tangle of vines, chasing one another and grunting like pigs; and indeed
they looked something like pigs as they pushed their noses in wet and
muddy places to get at the sweet roots underneath.
All at once Big Foot, who was walking ahead, cried:
“Look out, Chunky! I hear something coming! Maybe it’s a crocodile!”
“Crocodiles don’t come this far into the jungle,” said Chunky.
“Well, it’s _something_!” went on Big Foot. “Oh, look what a big
animal, Chunky! I’m going to run back to the river! I’m afraid!”
Chunky looked at the animal to which Big Foot was pointing with his
ears, and then the little hippo laughed.
“You don’t need to be afraid of him!” he said.
“Why, do you know him?” asked Big Foot.
“Yes, that is Tum Tum, the jolly elephant,” was the answer. “I met him
here in the jungle the other day, and he told me about being in a book
and having adventures. Hello, Tum Tum!” cried Chunky in jungle talk.
“Hello yourself,” answered the big, jolly elephant. “I see you have a
friend with you.”
“Yes, Tum Tum, this is Big Foot,” said Chunky, waving his ears toward
the other hippo. Big Foot, though older than Chunky, had never seen
an elephant before, and he was much surprised. Just as Chunky had
supposed, Big Foot thought Tum Tum had two tails, but he soon learned
better, and he, too, liked the jolly elephant.
“What are you doing here in the jungle?” asked Chunky of his big friend.
“Oh, I’m looking to see if there are some wild elephants about, so the
men with whom I am staying can catch them and train them for a circus,”
was the answer.
“Are there men hunters around here?” Big Foot asked in an awed and very
rumbling whisper.
“Yes, they are back in the jungle, and they will soon be here,”
answered Tum Tum.
“Then we’d better run!” cried Big Foot to Chunky. “My folks always told
me to look out for hunters.”
“That’s right!” agreed Chunky. “We had better go back to the river.”
“Oh, don’t be in a hurry,” said Tum Tum. “The hunters are not here yet.
I can hear them coming long before they can see you, and I’ll tell you
in time for you to get away. Still, maybe you _would_ like to be caught
and sent to a circus.”
“Not _me_!” cried Big Foot.
“Nor I,” added Chunky, though the more he thought about it the more he
wished he could have some adventures, such as Tum Tum had had, many of
them being written about in a book like this one you are reading.
So the elephant and the two hippos stayed in the jungle for some little
time, talking. Then, all of a sudden, Tum Tum raised his big ears,
lifted his trunk, sniffed the air, and said:
“The hunters are coming now. You had better run if you do not want to
be caught. Good-bye! I hope I’ll see you again some day.”
“Good-bye!” called Chunky and Big Foot to Tum Tum, and then the hippos
went back to their river, while Tum Tum began his search for wild
elephants.
It was two or three days after this that Chunky, who had gone off by
himself up along the river bank to look for a certain kind of sweet
grass, had another adventure.
The little hippo was thinking of what Tum Tum had said about the
circus, and how nice it was there, when, all of a sudden, Chunky
stepped into a pool of water, which he did not think was very deep. But
it was, and the worst of it turned out to be that under the water was
some very sticky mud. So sticky, in fact, that Chunky sank down deep
in it, being quite heavy and fat for his age. He tried to pull out his
little short, stumpy legs, one after the other, but he could not. He
only sank deeper and deeper in the mud. He was held fast there.
“Oh, dear!” thought Chunky. “I’m stuck tight! I wonder if this can be a
trap of the hunters to catch me for the circus. Oh, I wish Tum Tum were
here to help me out! Oh, dear!”