Rikki Tikki Quotes & Sayings

(Here Rikki-tikki interrupted, and the rest of the song is lost.) — Rudyard Kipling

Well," said Rikki-tikki, and his tail began to fluff up again, "marks or no marks, do you think it is right for you to eat fledglings out of a nest? — Rudyard Kipling

Who has delivered us, who? Tell me his nest and his name. Rikki, the valiant, the true, Tikki, with eyeballs of flame, Rikk-tikki-tikki, the ivory-fanged, the hunter with eyeballs of flame! — Rudyard Kipling

Because of Kipling, I've sometimes wondered about keeping a mongoose about the house. But given the cobra population in Silver Spring, Maryland - zero, when last I checked - we hardly need a Rikki-Tikki-Tavi. — Michael Dirda

Early in the morning Rikki-tikki came to early breakfast in the veranda riding on Teddy's shoulder, — Ruskin Bond

They gave him a little piece of raw meat. Rikki-tikki liked it immensely, and when it was finished he went out into the veranda and sat in the sunshine and fluffed up his fur to make it dry to the roots. Then he felt better. — Rudyard Kipling

Rikki-tikki had a right to be proud of himself. But he did not grow too proud, and he kept that garden as a mongoose should keep it, with tooth and jump and spring and bite, till never a cobra dared show its head inside the walls. — Rudyard Kipling

He spread out his hood more than ever, and Rikki-tikki saw the spectacle-mark on the back of it that looks exactly like the eye part of a hook-and-eye fastening. He was afraid for the minute, but it is impossible for a mongoose to stay frightened for any length of time, and though Rikki-tikki had never met a live cobra before, his mother had fed him on dead ones, and he knew that all a grown mongoose's business in life was to fight and eat snakes. Nag knew that too and, at the bottom of his cold heart, he was afraid. — Rudyard Kipling

(Sung in honor of Rikki-tikki-tavi) — Rudyard Kipling

every predator loves easy prey. Her lip curled, baring fangs that there was no one there to see. Because she wasn't prey. In the vamp world, she was pretty much the apex predator, the mongoose to his snake. And she was about to Rikki Tikki Tavi his ass. Dory — Karen Chance

Nag coiled himself down, coil by coil, round the bulge at the bottom of the water jar, and Rikki-tikki stayed still as death. — Rudyard Kipling

Rikki-Tikki-Tavi"
At the hole where he went in
Red-Eye called to Wrinkle-Skin.
Hear what little Red-Eye saith:
"Nag, come up and dance with death!"
Eye to eye and head to head,
(Keep the measure, Nag.)
This shall end when one is dead;
(At thy pleasure, Nag.)
Turn for turn and twist for twist
(Run and hide thee, Nag.)
Hah! The hooded Death has missed!
(Woe betide thee, Nag!) — Rudyard Kipling

It is the hardest thing in the world to frighten a mongoose, because he is eaten up from nose to tail with curiosity. The motto of all the mongoose family is "Run and find out," and Rikki-tikki was a true mongoose. — Rudyard Kipling