138 THE FIRESIDE SPHINX 



is still often called a Cyprus cat ; though the cloth 

 woven of hair and silk in wavy lines, and originally 

 brought from Cyprus, (as were many cats,) has dis- 

 appeared from English markets for perhaps two 

 hundred years. Cats can be "brindled tortoise- 

 shell," and are occasionally so described ; though, 

 when well-bred, the colour lies in broad deep 

 blotches, rather than in bars. That Gray did not 

 mean to indicate Selima's sex by the word tabby — 

 an inaccuracy of which the precise little poet was 

 wholly incapable — is proven by the letter in which 

 he refers to Fatima and Selima, both plainly fe- 

 males, and says, " I would rather seem to mistake, 

 and to imagine to be sure it must be the tabby one 

 that has met with this sad accident." 



After Herrick, no English poet seems to have 

 fully recognized the domestic qualities of the cat 

 until Cowper paid her his litttle tribute of song. 

 •From Goldsmith, indeed, we have the pretty verse 

 which illustrates his cheerful British conception of 

 a hermitage. 



" Around, in sympathetic mirtli, 

 Its tricks the Icitten tries ; 

 The criclcet chirrups on the hearth, 

 The crackling fagot flies." 



But Cowper is more explicit. The well-ordered 

 household at Olney must necessarily have been 

 dominated by a cat. It offered precisely the atmos- 



