THE CAT TRIUMPHANT 137 



No Dolphin came, no Nereid stirred, 

 Nor cruel Tom, nor Susan heard ; 

 A Favourite has no friend I 



" From hence, ye Beauties, undeceived. 

 Know one false step is ne'er retrieved, 



And be with caution bold. 

 Not all that tempts your wandering eyes 

 And heedless hearts is lawful prize ; 



Nor all that glisters, gold." 



Mr. Edmund Gosse, in his notes on this poem, 

 objects to Gray's use of the word " tabby," "as if it 

 were synonymous with female cat." " Selima," he 

 says, " cannot have been a tabby, if, as we presently 

 read, she was a tortoise-shell. Tabby cats are those 

 whose fur is of a cold brindled grey, like the surface 

 of the rich watered silk from Bagdad, called 'attdbi, 

 and, in English, tabby." Mr. Harrison Weir, how- 

 ever, who is an excellent authority upon cats, points 

 out conclusively that the word tabby, though de- 

 rived from ribbed or watered silk, refers to the 

 markings only, and does not designate any especial 

 colour. He quotes, to prove his words, two lines 

 of English verse, dating from 1682, 



" Her petticoat of satin, 

 Her gown of crimson tabby.'' 



A brindled or brinded cat, 



" Thrice the brinded cat hath mewed," 



is the same as a tabby, and in Norfolk and Suffolk 



