1 64 THE FIRESIDE SPHINX 



hand, found in Pussy's gentle presence a balm for 

 their sensitive souls. Lord Byron stands forth, 

 a striking exception to this rule. He was sensitive 

 enough, and irritable enough, Heaven knows, and 

 he had plenty of cats — five at one time in Ravenna 

 — to have afforded him all the consolation of which 

 he stood in need ; but he harboured them rather 

 from a passionate fancy for every kind of animal 

 than from a particular grace in selection. They 

 shared his indiscriminate hospitality with eight 

 dogs, ten horses, three monkeys, an eagle, a crow, 

 a falcon, five peacocks, two guinea-hens and an 

 Egyptian crane ; and must have had scant pleasure 

 in such varied and over-animated society. There 

 was even at one time a civet-cat added to this 

 menagerie intime ; but it wisely ran away, after 

 scratching one of the monkeys, and was never heard 

 of again. Shelley, being of a nervous temperament, 

 was made unspeakably wretched by the superabun- 

 dance of birds and beasts in the Ravenna palace, 

 and expressed his views forcibly to Byron, who 

 could not be made to understand such discomfort. 

 He himself found them all delightful, and noted 

 down with deep concern in his journal the tempo- 

 rary lameness of the crow, and his apprehension 

 lest " some fool " had trodden on its foot. 



In more homely households, Pussy's recognized 

 corner was the kitchen hearth. There dwelt the 



