CAT. 
231 
hare was soon lost, and was supposed to have been 
killed by some dog or cat. However, in about a 
fortnight, as the master was sitting in his garden, in 
the dusk of the evening, he observed his cat, with 
tail erect, trotting towards him, and calling with 
little short inward notes of complacency, such as 
these animals use towards their kittens ; and some- 
thing gamboling after her, which proved to be the 
leveret, that the cat had nourished with her milk, 
and continued to support with great affection. Thus 
was a granivorous animal nurtured by a carnivorous 
and predacious one! This strange affection was 
probably occasioned by those tender maternal feel- 
ings which the loss of her kittens had awakened ; 
and by the complacency and ease she derived from 
the procuring of her teats to be drawn, which were 
too much distended with milk. From habit she 
became as much delighted with this foundling as if 
it had been her real offspring.” 
Another example of a similar nature is recorded 
by the same gentleman in his Naturalist’s Calendar. 
<£ A boy had taken three young squirrels in their 
nest. These small creatures he put under a cat 
who had lately lost her kittens ; and found that she 
nursed and suckled them with the same assiduity 
and affection as if they had been her own progeny. 
So many persons went to see the little squirrels 
suckled by a cat, that the foster-mother became 
jealous of her charge, and in pain for her safety ; 
and therefore hid them over the ceiling, where one 
died. This circumstance showed her affection for 
