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{{Short description|1895 children's book by Rudyard Kipling}}
{{about|the 1895 book|the 2003 animated film|The Jungle Book 2|the 1997 live-action film|The Second Jungle Book: Mowgli & Baloo}}
{{More citations needed|date=March 2024}}
{{Wikisource}}
{{Use British English|date=September 2013}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2024}}
{{Infobox book
| name                 = The Second Jungle Book
| title_orig           =
| translator           =
| image                = SecondJungleBookCover1895.jpg
| caption              = Gilt-stamped cover from the original edition of '''''The Second Jungle Book''''', based on interior illustrations by [[John Lockwood Kipling]]. The front cover depicts the white cobra from "The King's Ankus"; the spine art shows Mowgli and Kaa wrestling from the same story.
| author               = [[Rudyard Kipling]]
| illustrator          = [[John Lockwood Kipling]] (Rudyard's father)
| cover_artist         =
| country              = United Kingdom
| language             = English
| series               = ''The Jungle Book''
| genre                = [[Children's book]]
| publisher            = [[Macmillan Publishers]]
| release_date         = November 1895
| english_release_date =
| media_type           = Print (hardback & paperback)
| pages                =
| preceded_by          = [[The Jungle Book]]
}}
'''''The Second Jungle Book''''' is a sequel to ''[[The Jungle Book]]'' by [[Rudyard Kipling]].<ref>{{Cite journal |date=December 1895 |title=Our Book Table |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/epdf/10.1177/002205749504202530 |journal=[[Journal of Education]] |volume=42 |issue=25 |pages=439 |doi=10.1177/002205749504202530 |issn=0022-0574 |via=[[SAGE Publications]]|url-access=subscription }}</ref> First published in 1895, it features five stories about [[Mowgli]] and three unrelated stories, all but one set in India, most of which Kipling wrote while living in [[Vermont]]. 

All of the stories were previously published in magazines in 1894{{ndash}}5, often under different titles. The 1994 film ''[[The Jungle Book (1994 film)|The Jungle Book]]'' used it as a source.

==Contents==
Each story is followed by a related poem:

# "How Fear Came": This story takes place before Mowgli fights [[Shere Khan]]. During a drought, Mowgli and the animals gather at a shrunken Wainganga River for a "Water Truce" where the display of the blue-colored Peace Rock prevents anyone from hunting at its riverbanks. After Shere Khan was driven away by him for nearly defiling the Peace Rock, [[Hathi]] the elephant tells Mowgli the story of how the first tiger got his stripes when fear first came to the jungle. This story can be seen as a forerunner of the ''[[Just So Stories]]''.
# "[[The Law of the Jungle]]" (poem)
# "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 whom he has befriended.
# "A Song of Kabir" (poem)
# "[[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.
# "Mowgli's Song Against People" (poem)
# "The Undertakers": A [[mugger crocodile]], a [[jackal]] and a [[greater adjutant|greater adjutant stork]], 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.
# "A Ripple Song" (poem)
# "The King's [[Ankus]]": Mowgli discovers a jewelled object beneath the Cold Lairs, which he later discards carelessly, 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.
# "The Song of the Little Hunter" (poem)
# "Quiquern": A teenaged [[Inuit|Inuk]] boy and girl set out across the [[arctic]] ice on a desperate hunt for food to save their tribe from starvation, guided by the mysterious animal-spirit [[Qiqirn|Quiquern]]. However, Quiquern is not what he seems.
# "Angutivaun Taina" (poem)
# "[[Red Dog (Kipling short story)|Red Dog]]": Mowgli's wolfpack is threatened by a pack of rampaging [[dhole]]s. Mowgli asks [[Kaa]] the [[Pythonidae|python]] to help him formulate a plan to defeat them.
# "Chil's Song" (poem)
# "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 (Jungle books)|Messua]] is now living with her two-year-old son, and is torn between staying with her and returning to the jungle.
# "The Outsong" (poem)

==Characters==
{{main|List of The Jungle Book characters}}
* [[Mowgli]] – a young human boy of Indian ancestry who has been raised by wolves since infancy.
* Father Wolf – an [[Indian wolf]] who is Raksha's mate.
* [[Raksha (The Jungle Book)|Raksha]] – an [[Indian wolf]]
* Mang – a [[bat]]
* [[Bagheera]] – a [[black panther#Leopard|black panther]]
* [[Baloo]] – a [[bear]]
* [[Kaa]] – an [[Python molurus|Indian python]]
* Tabaqui – a [[golden jackal]]
* [[Akela (The Jungle Book)|Akela]] – an Indian wolf
* Jacala – a [[mugger crocodile]]
* The Red Dogs – [[dhole]]s
* Ikki – an [[Indian crested porcupine]]
* [[Hathi]] – an [[Indian elephant]]
* Grey Brother – one of Mother and Father Wolf's cubs.
* Ko – a [[carrion crow]]

==Derivative sequels==
* ''[[The Third Jungle Book]]'', 1992 book by Pamela Jekel, consisting of new Mowgli stories, in an imitation of Kipling's style.
* ''[[The Second Jungle Book: Mowgli & Baloo]]'', 1997 film starring Jamie Williams as [[Mowgli]], but the film's story has little or no connection with the stories in Rudyard Kipling's ''The Second Jungle Book''.

==See also==
{{Portal|Children's literature}}
* [[Works of Rudyard Kipling]]
* [[Feral children in mythology and fiction]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
{{Wikisource}}
{{Commons category|The Second Jungle Book}}
{{Gutenberg|no=1937|name=The Second Jungle Book}}
* [http://www.jb-c.eu/ ''The Jungle Book'' Collection]: a website demonstrating the variety of merchandise related to the book and film versions of The Jungle Books
* {{librivox book | title=The Second Jungle Book | author=Rudyard Kipling}}

{{The Jungle Book}}
{{Rudyard Kipling}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Second Jungle Book, The}}
[[Category:1895 short story collections]]
[[Category:Short story collections by Rudyard Kipling]]
[[Category:19th-century British children's literature]]
[[Category:The Jungle Book]]
[[Category:Macmillan Publishers books]]
[[Category:British children's books]]
[[Category:Children's short story collections]]
[[Category:Animal tales]]
[[Category:1890s children's books]]
[[Category:Sequel books]]
[[Category:Children's books set in India]]