crept into the shade of one of the heavy broad-stone carvings beneath
the window, and there she lay, panting with fright, to get her breath
a little, and think what was to be done. To go back to the Palace was
out of the question. But then, where could she go? Poor cat! What a
muddle she was in! She lay snug for the best part of an hour before she
dared venture out of her hiding-place. At last, peeping all about her,
she crept out and ran, with all her speed, down the street, not knowing
in the least where she was flying. She had not gone far before some
ragamuffins caught sight of her. Shouting, whooping, laughing, they
chased her. She ran faster and faster, and darting suddenly down an
alley, was soon out of sight of her pursuers. She heard their screams
and yellings growing fainter and fainter in the distance, and feeling
that the immediate danger was past, she stopped to look, and see where
she was. She found that she was in a little, dirty, miserable court,
open at one end, through which she saw trees and green fields. So she
ran on, and, in a short time, she found that she had left the town
behind her, and was once more in the open country. At last she came to
a small clump of trees which put her in mind of the forest near her old
mistress’s hut. She climbed up in the largest one, knowing that she
would be safe from dogs there at least, and finding a snug place among
the branches in the middle of the tree,--for though it was autumn, yet
the leaves were still pretty thick,--she made up her mind to pass the
night there.
But what was she to do for supper? Her squabble with Viper had taken
place before dinner, and now there was no chance of anything but
what she could get herself. Perhaps she might, with good luck, catch
a bird before night, but that could not take the place of the nice
bits of fowl and saucers of rich milk that Ermengarde gave her every
night. However, she was too glad to be safe and snug up in the tree
to be very fussy. So she made up her mind to lie there till it grew
towards roosting time, and then see what she could find for supper. At
last nightfall came, and the birds flew back to their nests. In a few
minutes she caught a robin, but that was all she had that night, and
weary and hungry the cat climbed back in the tree again, and was soon
asleep. When she woke, she was still hungry, and she ached in every
bone. So three or four days passed, until poor puss began to think she
would never be able to find her way back to her old home in the forest,
and, at last, quite ready to die of cold and hunger, she stretched
herself out on a thick bed of leaves, and cried, “Oh, that I had never
listened to that deceitful, mischievous magpie!”
It was drawing towards sunset; there had been several storms during the
day, but, as the evening came on, the weather had cleared up a little,
and a gleam of sunshine just then shot out from among the black
clouds, and fell upon something glittering beside her.
She lifted her eyes slowly, for she had no strength to be alert now,
and saw the bright and beautiful fairy, with her car drawn by the
silver pheasants.
“Have you learnt yet to be contented with plain fare at home?” asked
the fairy.
“Oh, if you would only take me back to my old mistress,” cried the poor
cat, “I should never, never be discontented again!”
The fairy smiled, and touching her lightly with her silver wand,
bade her close her eyes--another moment, and she bade her open them:
and--most wonderful of all wonderful things that had happened to
her--the trees, the country, the distant city, all were gone! There was
a fine log-fire on the hearth, sparkling and crackling; whirr, whirr,
whirr, went the old woman’s wheel, and there she sat in her chair just
as usual. The wind was blowing and the rain was pelting against the
shutters, exactly as it had done the night puss left the cottage in
such a strange way. In fact, everything looked entirely the same. The
cat rubbed her eyes, but nothing could she see of the fairy, or the
car, or the silver pheasants.
How had she got back, and so quick, too? And the old woman did not
seem at all surprised to see her. It was very odd! She could not make
it out, anyhow; and at last it struck her that perhaps she might have
been dreaming, and never been out of the hut at all. Yet those terrible
growls of Viper’s, and those dismal nights and days in the trees! No,
they must have been real!
But her puzzling was broken into by the cheerful voice of her old
mistress, calling out, “Come, my pussy! It is supper-time!” As she
spoke, she rose from her spinning-wheel, and taking down some eggs and
a cake of brown bread, with a large jug from her corner cupboard, she
broke the eggs into the frying-pan, and they were soon hissing and
sputtering over the fire. Then she placed a large saucer on the table,
and broke some bread into it; and, turning to the fire, she took off
the frying-pan, and emptied the eggs into a dish on the table, and sat
down to her supper. But before she tasted a bit herself, she poured
some nice goat’s milk over the bread, and set it down on the hearth
before the cat.
Now I will venture to say puss never before in her life ate a meal so
thankfully. She made a resolution after every mouthful never to say
one word to that silly, chattering magpie again; and never to wish any
more foolish wishes, but to stay at home, do her duty in catching her
mistress’s mice, and be contented and thankful for the brown bread and
milk, without troubling her head about countesses and buttered crumpets
any more.
She kept her word. She never spoke to the magpie afterwards, but was a
steady friend of the owl until the day of his death; and when he did
die, which was not until he was very old, he left to her, in his will,
his share of the mice that lived in the neighborhood of the cottage.
As to the magpie, finding that her company was no longer wanted in
that part of the world, she very wisely took her flight far away to the
other side of the wood.
Whether she still lives there, and goes on chattering about the
grand things she used to see in the Palace of the Countess von
Rustenfustenmustencrustenberg, is more than I can tell you. If you
want to find out, you must go to the northern part of the Duchy of
Kittencorkenstringen; and then you must walk seventeen leagues and
three-quarters still farther north; and then you must turn off to your
right, just where you see the old fir-stump with the rook’s nest in
it; and then you must walk eleven leagues and a quarter more, and then
turn to your left, and after you have kept on for about fifteen leagues
more, you will see the wood where the magpie lives; and then if you
walk quite through it to the other side, you will see the old woman’s
cottage; and, if it should happen to be a fine day, I dare say you will
see her sitting in the sunshine spinning, and, curled round beside
her, the Contented Cat.
* * * * *
“What a nice story, Impty,” said Dolly, as the black kitten purred out
the last word. “And don’t you just love that old owl?”
“I always _did_ like owls myself,” Impty answered. “They seem so much
more like cats than birds. Their feathers are so thick they look like
fur, and then, owls see in the dark as well as cats do, and they eat
mice, and are really _most_ respectable. But good night, now,” he
added, jumping down from the bed, “we’ve had such a long story-time
this evening, that I must go to sleep at once, if I am to have another
tale ready for you to-morrow.”
THE FOURTH NIGHT
“We sat up so disgracefully late last night,” began Impty, yawning,
“that I’m sleepy yet. _I_ had to go to Cat-Land, you know, and although
that’s very pleasant, still, it isn’t much of a rest.”
“What are you going to tell me to-night?” Dolly asked, as she made a
place on the pillow for the black kitten.
“To-night it’s going to be a shorter story,” Impty replied. “They call
it, in Cat-Land, ‘The Cat Who Married a Mouse.’”
[Illustration:
THE CAT WHO MARRIED A
MOUSE
]
Once upon a time, a cat and a mouse made friends, and at last they grew
to love each other very much, for the mouse was a clever little thing,
and puss was as fine a cat as you could hope to see in a day’s journey.
So they decided to marry, and live always in the same house, and be
very comfortable indeed.
One day, during the summer, the cat said to his wife, “My dear, we
must take care to lay in a store for the winter, or we shall die with
hunger; you, little Mousey, cannot venture to go about anywhere for
fear you should be caught in a trap, but I had better go and see about
it.”
This good advice was followed, and in a few days Tom came safely back
with a large jar full of beautiful meat covered with fat, which he
had found. They had a long talk about a place in which to hide this
treasure; but at last Tom said: “I don’t know a better place than the
church. No one ever thinks of robbing a church; so if we place the jar
under the altar, and take care not to touch it, then we shall have
plenty to eat in the winter.”
The jar was carried to church, and put in a place of safety, but the
meat did not stay there long.
Tom kept thinking of what was in the jar, and longing so much for a
taste, that at last he made an excuse to get away from home.
“Mousey,” he said, one day, “I have had an invitation from one of my
cousins to be present at the christening of her little son who was born
a few weeks ago. He is a beautiful kitten, she tells me,--gray, with
black stripes,--and my cousin wishes me to be godfather.”
“Oh, yes! Go, by all means,” replied the mouse. “But when you are
enjoying yourself, think of me, and bring me a drop of the sweet, red
wine if you can.” Tom promised to do as she asked him, and went off as
if he were going to see his cousin. But after all it was not true. Tom
had no cousin, nor had he been asked to be godfather.
No, he went right off to the church, and slipped under the table where
the jar of meat stood, and sat looking at it. He did not look for
long, however, for presently he went close up and began licking and
licking the fat on the top of the jar, till it was nearly all gone.
Then he took a walk on the roofs of the houses in the town, and finally
stretched himself out in the sun, and stroked his whiskers as often
as he thought of the delicious feast he had just had. As soon as the
evening closed in, he returned home.
“Oh! Here you are again,” said the mouse. “Have you spent a pleasant
day?”
“Yes, indeed,” he replied. “Everything passed off very well.”
“And what name did they give the young kitten?” she asked.
“Top-off,” said Tom, quite coolly.
“Top-off!” cried the mouse. “That _is_ a curious and uncommon name! Is
it a family name?”
“It is a very old name in our family,” replied the cat. “And it’s not
worse than Thieves, as your ancestors were called.”
Poor little mousey made no reply, and for a while nothing more was said
about Tom’s cousins.
But Tom could not forget the jar of meat in the church, and the thought
of it made him long so much that he was obliged to make up another
tale of a christening. So he told the little mouse, that a lady-cat,
his aunt, had invited him this time, and that the kitten was a great
beauty, all black, excepting a white ring around its neck, so he could
not refuse to be present.
“For one day, dear Mousey, you will do me this kindness, and keep house
at home alone?” he asked.
The good little mouse willingly agreed, and Tom ran off; but as soon
as he reached the town, he jumped over the churchyard wall, and very
quickly found his way to the place where the jar of meat was hidden.
This time he feasted so greedily, that when he had finished, the jar
was more than half empty.
“It tastes as nice as it smells,” said the cat, after his joyful day’s
work was over and he had taken a nice nap. But as soon as he returned
home, the mouse asked what name had been given to the kitten this time.
Tom was a little puzzled to know what to say, but at last he replied:
“Ah! I remember now. They named it Half-Gone.”
“Half-Gone! Why, Tom, what a queer name! I never heard of it before in
my life, and I am sure it cannot be found in the ‘Register.’”
The cat did not answer, and for a time all went on as usual, till
another longing fit made him rub his whiskers and think of the jar of
meat. “Mousey,” said he, one day, “of all good things there are always
three; do you know I have had a third invitation to be godfather? And
this time the little kitten is quite black, without a single white
hair. Such a thing has not happened in our family for many years, so
you will let me go, won’t you?”
“Top-Off and Half-Gone are such curious names, Tom,” replied the mouse,
“that they are enough to make one suspicious.”
“Oh, nonsense!” said the cat. “What can you know about names, staying
here at home all day long in your gray coat and soft fur, with nothing
to do but catch crickets? You can know very little of what men do in
the world.”
Poor little mousey was silent, and she patiently remained at home
during the absence of the greedy, deceitful cat, who, this time,
feasted himself till he had quite cleaned out the jar and left it empty.
“When all is gone, then one can rest,” said he to himself, as he
returned home at night quite sleek and fat.
“Well, Tom,” said the mouse, as soon as she saw him, “and what is the
name of this third child?”
“I hope you will be pleased at last,” he replied; “it is All-Gone.”
“All-Gone!” cried the mouse, “that is the most suspicious name yet; I
can scarcely believe it. What does it mean?” Then she shook her head,
rolled herself up, and went to sleep.
After this Tom was not invited to any more christenings; but as the
winter came on, and in the night no provisions could be found, the
mouse thought of the careful store they had laid up, and said to the
cat, “Come, Tom, let us fetch the jar of meat from the church; it will
be such a nice relish for us.”
“Ah, yes,” he replied. “It will be a fine relish to you, I dare say,
when you stretch out your little tongue to taste it!” So he took
himself out of the way, and mousey went to the church by herself. But
what was her vexation at finding the jar still standing in the same
place, but quite empty.
Then she returned home, and found Tom looking as if he did not care,
although he was at first rather ashamed to face her.
“I understand now,” said the little mouse, quite gently. “I can see
what has happened. A fine friend you have been to deceive me in this
manner! When you told me you were going to stand godfather to the
three little kittens, you never visited your relations at all; but,
instead of that, you went to the church three times, and ate up all the
meat in the jar. I know, now, what you meant by Top-Off, Half-Gone,--”
[Illustration: “I UNDERSTAND NOW,” SAID THE LITTLE MOUSE, QUITE GENTLY.
_Page 136._ ]
“Will you be quiet?” cried the cat, in a rage. “If you say another
word, I will eat you.”
But the poor little mouse had got the name on the tip of her tongue
when Tom interrupted her, and she could not stop herself. Out it
came--“All-Gone!”
Tom, who only wanted an excuse to eat up his poor little wife, sprang
upon her the minute she uttered the word, broke her back with his paw,
and ate her up!
* * * * *
“Oh, Impty,” cried Dolly, as the story ended, “what a wicked cat! I
hope you would never, never do such a thing! You _wouldn’t_ would you?”
“No,” answered the kitten, yawning again, “I never should. In the first
place, I’d not dream of marrying a mouse. _I_ always eat ’em.”
THE FIFTH NIGHT
“I’m a little late this evening,” purred Impty, as he rubbed up against
Dolly the next night. “But the large yellow cat across the street is
giving a Catnip Tea, and I simply _had_ to stay for one cup.”
“I do hope that you’re going to tell me a pleasanter story this time,”
said the little girl. “I dreamed all night long about that poor mouse.”
“To-night,” said the black kitten, “I am going to tell you of Mother
Michel, and the wonderful adventures of her cat, Moumouth. It is
_very_ exciting, and it turns out beautifully in the end.”
[Illustration:
Mother Michel
And
Her Cat
]
More than a hundred years ago there lived in Paris an old countess,
Madame de la Grenouillière, a widow who had no children and who loved
animals very dearly. But she was quite unfortunate, for none of her
pets, no matter how much she loved or cared for them, ever lived. One
by one they died, and, at last, the Countess decided that she would
have no more. However, one day, as she was riding home in her chariot,
she saw a crowd of children tormenting a poor street-cat. They had tied
a sauce-pan to its tail, and goodness knows what would have happened if
Madame had not put her head out of the window and called to them that
whoever should bring the cat to her would be rewarded with a piece of
gold.
The crowd of children all ran after the cat, not to torment him now,
but to bring him safely to the rich lady and gain the reward; and he
was nearly as much in danger from kindness as he had been from cruelty.
At last he was caught, and brought safely to the Countess. Once she had
him safe in the chariot, she took a good look at him, and then said:
“Poor pussy! What a very ugly little cat you really are!” But when the
cat turned to look reproachfully at her, she exclaimed: “Well, he may
be ugly, but he certainly has very fine eyes. Here,” she added, turning
to her companion, “once more I will have a pet. Let us take this poor
pussy with us, and see what a comfortable, happy life at my fireside
will do for him.”
So saying, she placed him in the arms of her friend, Mother Michel, and
together they all three rode home.
Besides her companion, there was another one of her household upon
whom the Countess greatly relied, and this was her steward, whom the
old lady had nicknamed Lustucru. Now Lustucru was as bad as Mother
Michel was good; he hated all animals as much as the Countess and her
companion loved them; and, when he saw them bringing home another cat,
he was very angry, although he pretended to be pleased, and called the
cat “pretty puss” more than once. And this the cat seemed to know, for
he walked away from Master Lustucru whenever he saw him coming.
At the end of four or five weeks you would never have known Moumouth.
They had given him this name because, so an old scholar told the
Countess, that Moumouth, in Hebrew, meant “saved from the sauce-pans.”
And, in a second month, Moumouth had grown fat, and his fur shone as if
it were satin.
But something, which always does turn up, even in the happiest
cat’s life, came to disturb Moumouth’s peace of mind. Madame de la
Grenouillière was called to Normandy by the sickness of her sister,
and, alas, Moumouth could not go with her because the sick lady did not
like cats.
“Come here, Mother Michel,” said the Countess; “I am going to trust my
precious cat to you. Take care of him well, and if, on my return, he is
alive and thriving, I will leave you a pension of three hundred dollars
a year.”
“But, Madame,” replied her companion, “I will take care of Moumouth
because I love him as if he were my own.”
“I know that,” said the old Countess, “but be very, very careful, and I
will reward your zeal.”
When the steward heard this promise, he was wild with wrath. “Mother
Michel will have everything,” he said, “and there will be nothing left
for me. Well, Moumouth, once the Countess is out of the way, we’ll see
about your precious life.”
The Countess set out on her journey, and Mother Michel, worthy of the
confidence that had been shown her, now took the greatest care of
Moumouth. She petted him, she patted him, and fed him so well that he
grew even handsomer. All this time Lustucru was looking on, waiting
for a chance to kill Moumouth when his faithful guardian should not
be on the watch. One evening, when the cat was asleep before the fire,
Lustucru came to Mother Michel, and begged her to go down and see one
of the servants who was very ill with rheumatism. As soon as she had
left the room, he seized Moumouth, who had not even time to mew, and
threw him head over heels into a large bag. Then the wicked man ran
swiftly across the garden, and out into the street toward the Seine,
and, the river once reached, he opened the bag and tossed Moumouth into
the water. He was in such haste to get home that he did not wait to
see the poor cat struggling for his life in the river; nor did he see,
a moment later, Moumouth crawling to a little ledge just at the foot of
one of the arches of the bridge.
Instead, he ran home quickly, for fear Mother Michel would have
finished her visit, and come to look for Moumouth. He slipped quietly
into bed, and when, in a little while, she came and knocked at his
door, he pretended to have just waked up from a sound sleep.
[Illustration: HE OPENED THE BAG, AND TOSSED MOUMOUTH INTO THE WATER.
_Page 149._]
“Moumouth lost!” he cried, pretending to be very sorry indeed. “Oh,
I’ll get up immediately and help you look for him. Such a fine fellow!
It would be a thousand pities if anything happened to him.” And so,
at the head of all the servants of the house, Lustucru helped Mother
Michel search from garret to cellar.
But was Moumouth shivering all this time just above the cold waters
of the Seine? Oh, no, although there for a number of hours he sat all
huddled up, not daring to take his life in his paws and swim to shore.
But at daybreak, about five o’clock in the morning, two fishermen came
to the bridge to try their luck. What good-fortune for Moumouth! As
soon as the lines were let down he seized them, and the fishermen,
imagining from his weight that he must be some splendid fish, hauled
him quickly in. But when, instead of a fish, a cat bounded off on the
bridge, they stood in astonishment for a moment, and then ran after him
as fast as they could. Moumouth redoubled his speed, and escaped his
pursuers by jumping through the open windows of a bakery. Here he
found some bags of flour, and, tired out, he went to sleep at once. But
he was so hungry that he soon woke up, and remembering his old habit of
catching mice and rats when he was a gutter-cat, he sprang at the first
mouse that popped its head out of a hole. Round and round the room he
chased his prey, and the baker’s boy, seeing the hunt, lifted a broom
to hit him as he passed, but the baker forbade him to strike Moumouth.
“He is a good mouser,” he said; “he shall stay here and rid the bakery
of all the rats and mice that are eating us out of house and home.”
When Moumouth heard these words he grew so frightened--believing that
he would never see Mother Michel again--that he sprang through the
nearest window, and so escaped into the street. Here he wandered among
the back-alleys until nightfall, and then he scurried home as fast
as he could scamper. He hid in the garret and timidly crept behind
some boxes to wait until he should hear Mother Michel moving about
downstairs the next morning.
All this time the household was searching still for Moumouth. The
wicked Lustucru pretended to hear him crying in the garden; then, after
they had vainly searched in every thicket and hedge, he would cry: “No.
I’m sure that I heard him mewing in the cellar.” At last, laughing to
himself, he said, “Do you know, I think he must be in the garret.” Up
the long stairway Mother Michel ran, and who should come out and rub
affectionately against her skirts but Moumouth!
Never was any one so glad to see a cat before; and Lustucru pretended
to be as happy as the old lady herself. After this Mother Michel never
let Moumouth go out of her sight; she petted him nearly to death and
made him sleep in her room. There was no chance for Lustucru to catch
the cat alone again.
“But he shall not escape me,” thought the wicked steward, and keeping
this idea always in his mind, he bought a package of rat-poison,
and, as he hid it safely away, he cried to himself, “This ‘Death to
Rats’ shall soon be ‘Death to Cats!’” The next day, when Mother
Michel brought up Moumouth’s dinner,--good chicken patties,--Lustucru
sprinkled poison all over them. Moumouth, hungry as he was, refused to
eat, and Mother Michel, vexed at last with the whims of her charge,
said: “Well! If you don’t eat those patties, Sir, you’ll get nothing
else for dinner! Why, I’ve a good mind to eat them myself.”
“Oh, don’t!” cried Lustucru, jumping up in alarm. “A Christian should
not eat food that’s been prepared for an animal.”
“Well,” replied Mother Michel, “either the cat eats those patties, or
he goes hungry.”
And hungry poor Moumouth did go, all that day and all the next, living
on scraps which the cook threw to him. But eat the poisoned food
the clever cat would not. So the patties stayed locked up in Mother
Michel’s cupboard, and they were soon forgotten, except by Lustucru. He
had failed so often to kill Moumouth himself, that he knew he must try
some other means.