54 THE FIRESIDE SPHINX 



dog, trotting soberly along the road, fell dead in 

 the dust, when the witch came to her doorway, and 

 fixed her cold malignant eye upon him. Who ever 

 heard of a cat dying of such delicate susceptibility ? 

 Perronon Meguin, another witch of the same town, 

 did indeed contrive to kill an enemy's cat by smear- 

 ing it with a poisonous ointment ; but this was a 

 natural and laborious method, akin to bootjacks and 

 blunderbusses. People, unaided by Satan, have 

 done as much. 



Finally, as proof indubitable of Pussy's guilt, we 

 have the report of the learned jurist, Kessner, who 

 collected the records of countless witch-trials, and 

 published them for the enlightenment of the curious, 

 and the edification of the devout. In the evidence 

 offered at these trials, it was shown that, whereas 

 the Arch-Fiend appeared to his followers but sixty 

 times as a cavalier, and but two hundred and fifteen 

 times as a he-goat, he took more than nine hundred 

 times the congenial form of a black cat ; — reason 

 enough for giving this accursed animal a wide and 

 cautious berth. 



So it came to pass that Pussy entered upon long 

 years of persecution, and her annals are so freighted 

 with misery that, to one who loves her dearly, the 

 mere recital of her pain is beyond measure griev- 

 ous. There is still to be seen a receipt for two 

 hundred "sols parisis" dated 1575, and signed by 



