THE CAT TO-DAY 249 



The leal true cat they prize not, that if e'er compelled to roam, 

 Still flies, when let out of the bag, precipitately home." 



An amusing instance of Pussy's incurable nos- 

 talgia is related by M. Champfleury. A country 

 cure of his acquaintance received a more important 

 charge in a neighbouring town, and moved thither 

 with his little household, consisting of an old ser- 

 vant, a tame crow, and a female cat. The crow 

 was a clever and voluble vaurien ; the cat — despite 

 her sex — an unprincipled freebooter ; the servant 

 an affectionate scold ; and the cure an amused spec- 

 tator of their constant and animated bickerings. 

 Two days after the journey to town, Pussy disap- 

 peared. The crow, uneasy at her absence, hopped 

 disconsolately about his new abode. The house- 

 keeper was loud in her lamentations. The cure felt 

 a reasonable alarm lest the current of her hourly 

 reproaches, checked in its ordinary course, might 

 before long be diverted in his direction. 



A week passed, and a former parishioner came 

 to the priest's door, bearing in a bag the missing 

 cat, whom he had found mewing disconsolately at 

 the gate of her old home. She was welcomed with 

 delight, and the household seemed restored to its 

 former state of quarrelsome tranquillity, when, one 

 fair morning, behold ! her place by the hearth was 

 again vacant. This time she was promptly sought 

 for, and discovered prowling about the garden of 



