DISPOSITIONS OT CATS. 99 



A lady, residing in Glasgow, had a cat sent to her from Edinburgh, in a closed basket, which was 

 placed in a carriage. Puss was carefully watched for two months, but having had two young ones, she was 

 left to herself at the end of that time, and soon disappeared with both her kittens. Her last owner, 

 prizing her highly, wrote to her friends in Edinburgh, lamenting the loss' of the cat, and, about a fort- 

 night after she was missed at Glasgow, her well-known mew was heard at the street-door of her old 

 mistress. As soon as it was opened, there were puss and her kittens : they looking plump and well, but 

 she extremely thin ; and no wonder, when the task she had performed is duly considered. The distance 

 between Glasgow and Edinburgh is forty miles ; and as the cat could only carry one kitten at a time, 

 if she took it part of the way, then went back for the other, and thus conveyed them by turns, she 

 must have travelled at least a hundred and twenty miles ; while her sagacity must have suggested the 

 necessity of her travelling in the night, as well as other precautions, for the safety of her young. Her 

 strong attachment to her former abode is also remarkable. 



" A favourite cat," says the late Dr. Mason Good, " that was accustomed from day to day to take her 

 station quietly at my elbow, on the writing-table, sometimes for hour after hour, whilst 1 was engaged 

 in study, became at length less constant in her attendance, as she had a kitten to take care of. One 

 morning she placed herself in the same spot, but seemed unquiet, and, instead of seating herself as 

 usual, continued to rub her furry sides against my hand and pen, as though resolved to draw my atten- 

 tion, and make me leave off. 



" As soon as she had accomplished this point, she leaped down on the carpet, and made towards 

 the door, with a look of great uneasiness. I opened the door for her, as she seemed to desire ; but, 

 instead of going forward, she turned round, and looked earnestly at me, as though she wished me to 

 follow her, or had something to communicate. I did not fully understand her meaning, and, being much 

 engaged at the same time, shut the door upon her, that she might go where she liked. In less than an 

 hour afterwards, she had again found an entrance into the room, and drawn close to me ; but, instead 

 of mounting the table, and rubbing herself against my hand as before, she was now under the table, 

 and continued to rub herself against my feet ; on moving which, I struck them against something 

 which seemed to be in their way, and, on looking down, beheld, with equal grief and astonishment, the 

 dead body of her little kitten, covered over with cinder-dust, and which I supposed had been alive 

 and in good health. 



" I now entered into the entire train of this afflicted cat's feelings. She had suddenly lost the 

 nursling she doted on, and was resolved to make me acquainted with it assuredly that I might 

 know her grief, and probably, also, that I might inquire into the cause ; and, finding me too dull to 

 understand her expression, motioning that I would follow her to the cinder-heap on which the dead 

 kitten had been thrown, she took the great labour of bringing it to me herself, from the area on the 

 basement floor, and up a whole flight of stairs, and laid it at my feet. I took up the kitten in my 

 hand, the cat still following me, made inquiry into the cause of its death, which I found, on summoning 

 the servants, to have been an accident, in which no one was much to blame ; and the yearning mother 

 having thus obtained her object, and got her master to enter into her cause, and divide her sorrows 

 with her, gradually took comfort, and resumed her former station by my side." 



There are no records of the histrionic powers of cats, like those of rats* and poodles, t already 

 described. Even when there have been dramatic representations of Whittingtoii's Cat, a dog, sewed 

 up in some pussy's skin, has been the actual performer ; and if he had been called to the footlights in 

 his own proper person, to receive the plaudits of old and young for his destruction of the king's rats 

 and mice, a terrier must have stood confessed. Cats may be taught to perform tricks, such as leaping 

 over a stick, but they always do such feats unwillingly. About thirty years ago, there was an exhibi- 

 tion of cats in Regent-street, where the animals, at the bidding of their master, an Italian, turned a 

 wheel, drew up a bucket, and rung a bell, at the word of command. But the sight was a melancholy 

 one ; for the commences, corUinuez, arretez of their keeper, always enforced with a threatening eye, and 

 often with, a heavy blow, showed how reluctant was their obedience. Their aspect, too, was subdued 

 and piteous ; but the scratches on their master's arms proved that his task was nofr always an easy one. 



De la Croix witnessed, however, a display of extraordinary sagacity. " I once saw," he says, "a 

 lecturer on experimental philosophy place a cat under the glass receiver of an air-pump, for the pm- 



* Vol. i., page 316. t Page 53. 



