arrangement was carried out to the letter ; therefore the amaze- 

 ment of the entire household may be easily imagined when on 

 reference being made to the cat-cupboard to see how Topsy 

 and her two young charges were getting on, to find no Topsy 

 at all, — only the strange cat and the two kittens. How the 

 cheat had been accomplished it was impossible to say. That 

 Topsy was not the cat placed in the basket was vouched for by 

 two witnesses — one of whom had held the basket-M open while 

 the other pushed the animal in. Perhaps in my own mind I 

 have little doubt how the business was so mulled, but I know 

 that in certain quarters there exists a belief either that by 

 some sort of witchery the strange cat put on so Topsioal 

 an appearance as to deceive her would-be smugglers, or that 

 after she was basketed she managed to sneak out, and either 

 by persuasion or force induced the unlucky Topsy to take her 

 place. 



However it came about, the result is that the strange cat 

 alone reigns at our house to the jealous exclusion of aU her 

 species. No one, I believe, has any particular affection for 

 her, but that circumstance is not observed to prey on her 

 mind or to interfere with her appetite. She devours her 

 rations with the air of a cat who is conscious that she has 

 earned them, and as though she is aware, and rather gloried 

 than otherwise in the knowledge that she is regarded as ai 

 cunning and manoeuvering beast, who first by hypocritical repre- 

 sentations induced an honest cat to obtain for her a situation, 

 and who afterwards ungratefully contrived to push out hei 

 benefactress and progeny and install herself in their place. 



In the form of a letter, a Mend of the Rev. J. Gr. Wood fur- 

 nishes that gentleman with some interesting particulars of two 

 commercial cats of his acquaintance. " I must now tell you 

 something about our Mincing Lane cats. Their home was the 

 cellar, and their habits and surroundings, as you may imagine 

 from the locality, were decidedly commercial. We had one 

 cunning old black fellow whose wisdom was acquired by sad 

 experience. In early youth he must have been very careless ; 

 he then was always getting in the way of the men and the 

 wine cases, and frequent were the disasters he suffered through 

 coming into collision with moving bodies. His ribs had often 

 been fractured, and when nature repaired them she must have 

 handed them over to the care of her ' prentice hand,' for the 

 work was done in rather a rough and knotty manner. This 

 battered and suffering pussy was at last assisted by a younger 



