Dhan Gopal Mukerji was bom July 6, 1890, the last of eight children in a village near Calcutta. Many of his jungle tales come from his childhood in this village, and his thorough knowledge of Indian philosophy and Hindu religious practices comes from his being a member of a Brahmin family. Although he attended Indian schools, he attributes much of his education to his mother, who told him many of the stories that he later collected in Hindu Fables: For Little Children.

In 1904 Mukerji served as a Hindu priest for a year. That experience showed him that there were other ways more suitable for him to live. In 1909 at the age nineteen he went to Japan to study engineering. He then moved to the United States and attended the University of California at Berkeley from 1910 to 1913 and Stanford University in 1914. He remained in America for the...