=THE CAT 



The Cat's Coronach 



And art thou fallen, and lowly laid, 

 The housewife's boast, the cellar's aid, 



Great mouser of thy day ! 

 Whose rolling eyes and aspect dread 

 Whole whiskered legions oft have fled 



In midnight battle fray. 

 There breathes no kitten of thy line 

 But would have given his life for thine. 



Oh, could I match the peerless strain 

 That wailed for black Sir Roderic slain, 



Or that, whose milder tone, 

 O'er Gertrude, f all'n in beauty's prime, 

 The grace of Pennsylvania's clime, 



Raised the sepulchral moan; 

 Such strain might burst th' eternal bar, 

 And reach thy spirit from afar. 



But thou, remote from pain and strife, 

 Now reap'st the meed of virtuous life 



In some Elysian grove, 

 Where endless streams of milk abound, 

 And soft valerian paints the ground 



Thy joyous footsteps rove; 

 With Tasso's cat by poems named, 

 And Whittington's, in story famed, 



Requies cat in pace. Anonymous. 



72 



