# Is "The Second Jungle Book" by Rudyard Kipling a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Second Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling (The Century Co., 1895) is identified by: Two editions, both collected; name both. Census claim CORRECTED.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- Two editions, both collected; name both
- US (true first): The Century Co., New York, 1895, printed by the De Vinne Press — decorated cloth with the central elephant device stamped in BLACK (the inverse of the London edition's gilt), illustrations after John Lockwood Kipling; two binding variants are recorded, green cloth and terra-cotta cloth, with no priority established between them, and an original orange-and-white dust wrapper is reported
- English: Macmillan & Co., London, 1895 — royal blue cloth elaborately stamped in gilt with a gilt vignette to the front board and the spine lettered and decorated in gilt, all edges gilt, illustrated by J. Lockwood Kipling; it was issued with a dust jacket, unlike the 1894 Jungle Book UK first which had none, and jacketed copies are of the greatest rarity
- The cardinal textual point of the first ENGLISH edition is the truncated 'The King's Ankus': the first English edition ends at the words 'lay the ruby-and-turquoise ankus,' inadvertently omitting the final c.500 words in which Mowgli returns the treasure to its hiding place to prevent further killings
- That omission was made good in the first reprint, when the c.500 words were added, so the truncated ending is a positive first-printing point for the Macmillan
- This textual point rests principally on the Kipling Society's Readers' Guide annotation to the story, and is repeated in general reference
- Publisher imprint reads The Century Co.

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Rudyard Kipling |
| Publisher | The Century Co. |
| Year | 1895 |
| True first | American edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | Two editions, both collected; name both |
| Book-club edition exists? | Yes |

## Points of issue
Two editions, both collected; name both. US (true first): The Century Co., New York, 1895, printed by the De Vinne Press — decorated cloth with the central elephant device stamped in BLACK (the inverse of the London edition's gilt), illustrations after John Lockwood Kipling; two binding variants are recorded, green cloth and terra-cotta cloth, with no priority established between them, and an original orange-and-white dust wrapper is reported. English: Macmillan & Co., London, 1895 — royal blue cloth elaborately stamped in gilt with a gilt vignette to the front board and the spine lettered and decorated in gilt, all edges gilt, illustrated by J. Lockwood Kipling; it was issued with a dust jacket, unlike the 1894 Jungle Book UK first which had none, and jacketed copies are of the greatest rarity. The cardinal textual point of the first ENGLISH edition is the truncated 'The King's Ankus': the first English edition ends at the words 'lay the ruby-and-turquoise ankus,' inadvertently omitting the final c.500 words in which Mowgli returns the treasure to its hiding place to prevent further killings. That omission was made good in the first reprint, when the c.500 words were added, so the truncated ending is a positive first-printing point for the Macmillan. This textual point rests principally on the Kipling Society's Readers' Guide annotation to the story, and is repeated in general reference.

## Is this the true first?
Census claim CORRECTED. The census asserts that Macmillan (London) 1895 precedes the Century (New York) issue; the reverse is true. The Century Co. edition was published three days BEFORE the Macmillan London edition, making the American the true first by date, and dealer cataloguing further records that the American text carries a number of alterations against the English. The Macmillan London 1895 is the first English edition; it is the more sought-after of the two and it alone carries the celebrated truncated 'King's Ankus' ending, so both editions must be named and neither collapses into the other. The sources consulted fix the interval at three days but do not pin the exact calendar dates, which is left open here; all of the stories had appeared previously in magazines during 1894–95, so neither book is the first appearance of the text.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
The title predates the book-club era and no book-club issue exists. The dominant reprint is the Macmillan (London) Standard Edition, published and frequently reprinted between 1899 and 1950 — it is in this and every other reprint that the restored 'King's Ankus' text appears (at p. 173 of the Standard Edition), so any copy with the complete ending is not the first English printing. Later Century printings are likewise common. As with all Kipling, the gilt elephant and Ganesha devices persist across reprints and are not by themselves a first-edition point.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Second Jungle Book* by Rudyard Kipling a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-second-jungle-book
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.