98 The Pond-Meadow. 



walking particularly disagreeable, and the high lifting and 

 oft shaking of the feet become still more pronounced. But 

 I must say, as it were in parenthesis, that I once saw a cat 

 from my seat on the trestle, splashing about in the water, 

 and interesting accounts have been given of felines that 

 went fishing, and dove and swam with evident pleasure. 

 Nevertheless the average Tabby is averse to a soaking, and 

 the exceptions to the rule may be likened to that fraternity 

 of tramping naturalists, who spend hours in ponds, in 

 swamps, and in sundry swaley places. 



Domestic fowls are also averse to standing in water, 

 and are generally very quick to seek shelter in a heavy 

 rain. If it is not a complete protection, they will slope 

 their backs considerably, so that the water may run as 

 speedily as possible down to their tails, and drip off on the 

 ground. The hen that goes out in the morning after a 

 light fall of snow, walks as if her own legs were borrowed 

 ones, and that she was learning how to use the newly 

 acquired members. She lifts her feet high, looks about 

 circumspectly, and utters a " my, my " sort of chuckle, and 

 presently goes back into the house or under the shed. Thus 

 do wet feet prove unpleasant to cats, to hens, and to the 

 majority of humans, who have invented rubber shoes so 

 that they may keep out of the water when they go in it. 

 Even barefooted boys have to exercise an effort to go 

 through a puddle, and if they are thinking about some- 

 thing else, their instinct is to go round. 



There are times of the year when the earth seems to 

 have become semi-aqueous, and the hill-sides and the 

 vales are soaking wet, and the little brooks go wandering 



