72 THE FIRESIDE SPHINX 



" Half gentle kindliness and half disdain, 

 In salutation courtly and urbane, 

 Where naught disturbs the concord of her reign." 



In the brilliant court of Louis the Fourteenth, 

 Pussy began that series of social triumphs which 

 led, step by step, to her grand apotheosis during the 

 following reign. Her beauty, her exquisite pro- 

 priety of demeanour, her velvet footfall, her gentle, 

 flattering purr, her love of luxury and repose, all 

 fitted her for the splendour of her surroundings. 

 The art with which she veiled her mind and mo- 

 tives was duly appreciated by courtiers, forever 

 occupied in masking their own emotions. She fol- 

 lowed unconsciously the advice of the old French 

 noble who sent his son to court with these wise 

 words : " Seize everything, speak ill of nobody, and 

 sit down whenever you have the opportunity." 

 " Gracieuse, supple et perfide," she harmonized ex- 

 quisitely with a society which reflected her dominant 

 traits. Saint Simon, in an amusing passage of his 

 Memoirs, describes the intrusion of a kitten upon 

 one of the Royal Councils, and the delight of the 

 little king, Louis the Fifteenth, — a boy of eight, — 

 at this pleasant interruption of business. The kit- 

 ten, with the audacity of kittenhood, jumped first 

 upon the princely knee, and thence to the council 

 table, where it pranced and paddled among the 

 papers, tolerated for the sake of the pale tired child 



