overcoat, and Two Tails shuffled and stamped and growled to himself.
"Extraordinary! Most extraordinary!" he said. "It runs in our family. Now, where has that nasty little beast gone to?"
I heard him feeling about with his trunk.
"We all seem to be affected in various ways," he went on, blowing his nose. "Now, you gentlemen were alarmed, I believe, when I trumpeted."
"Not alarmed, exactly," said the troop-horse, "but it made me feel as though I had hornets where my saddle ought to be. Don't begin again."
"I 'm frightened of a little dog, and the camel here is frightened by bad dreams in the night."
"It is very lucky for us that we have n't all got to fight in the same way," said the troop-horse.
"What I want to know," said the young mule, who had been quiet for a long time—"what I want to know is, why we have to fight at all."
"Because we are told to," said the troop-horse, with a snort of contempt.
"Orders," said Billy the mule; and his teeth snapped.
"Hukm hai!" (It is an order), said the camel with a gurgle; and Two Tails and the bullocks repeated, "Hukm hai!"
