madly whenever I touched her; she came with 

 me toward the house and accepted a bowl of 

 milk with rapture. Thenceforward she was 

 my intimate and affectionate friend. Yet it 

 was only by slow degrees that I was able to 

 coax her into the house, and her attitude in it 

 never was one of complete ease. She was a 

 wild free thing and could not brook the con- 

 finement of four walls. Where she slept I 

 never discovered, but after breakfast I always 

 found her waiting for me (and milk) near 

 the library window. When she was about to 

 become a mother a comfortable box was pre- 

 pared for her in a shed, and it was hoped that 

 she would use it for the interesting event. 

 However, she preferred a thick patch of 

 bushes in the garden, and there one morning 

 we discovered her, supremely happy, with 

 four plain kittens. Twice they were trans- 

 ferred to the box in the shed, and twice Venus 

 bore them back to the bushes one by one. 

 While she was carrying a kitten on one of 

 these maternal excursions I met her. She 

 47 s hesitated 



