_The Biographer returns to the history of his own hero, after a
short remark on landing on an enemy’s country._
We would not be understood to reflect any oblique hints, innuendos,
or insinuations on our own affairs, by this landing of a single
ship’s company on an enemy’s coast, and we desire the politicians
to forbear construing the affair of the barrels being taken from
the stocks by an army of Monkeys, to the disadvantage of the
ministry. Far be it from us to frame any such sly reflections: This
landing of forty men, on an unknown island, can bear no analogy to a
premeditated plan of harrassing the well-known boast of a well-known
enemy. There is so great a disparity between the two incidents, that
we hope to be acquitted of this charge, by every wise politician, as
it is remote from our purpose to make any such odious comparisons.
We shall resume our respectable history, verily believing, and
nearly assured, that when it is read and thoroughly examined by the
reviewers, whether monthly, or critical, it will appear, for truth,
candor, wit, humour, learning, ingenuity and invention to exceed,
either the ancient history of _Reynard_ the Fox, or the modern one of
_Pompey_ the little.
_Tom_ the _Cat_, being rejoiced at his releasement, exerted himself
that night in the greatest inactivity, according to the philosophic
dream of _bis inertiæ_. For he slept heartily and had several
pleasant dreams, which _Artemidorus_ never dreamed of, as we do not
find one of them in his collection of dreams. His fellow servant
lately discharged, had ever since her quarrel fell enamoured of
_Tom_’s beauty, and consequently resolved to wheedle him away the
first opportunity she could lay hold of. _Tom_, she knew would follow
her all over the world, and she thought it was a thousand pities,
so fine a fellow as _Tom_ should spend his days with so despicable
a wretch as her late mistress, to which species of women, I think
they give the common name of a _Brimstone_, and others tack that of a
dog’s wife to it.
_Tom_ was now a quarter old, being born on the 21st of _December_
1751, whence some think he was called _Tom_: However, as his mistress
_Clotilda_ was a Methodist, we can give no credit to this surmise.
Though he was but three months of age, yet was he gigantic in his
stature, being at this age as large, as some old full-grown Cats.
His make was of the athletic; his shoulders were brawny, and his
hinder parts resembling those of the tyger, but in nothing more did
his beauty consist, than in the exteriour, which strikes first, and
which saved him from being drowned; for he was beautifully variegated
in colour like the leopard, neither two much streaked, nor too
much spotted, but finely intermingled on a milk-white ground, the
streaks and spots justly proportioned in the most admirable symmetry:
His belly and breast were immaculate as the swans, which greatly
heightened the characteristic beauty of his face, which looked like
that of a fine woman, when she adds half a dozen small patches,
disposed with art in such a manner, as to impart an additional
strength to each charm. His eyes, which were of the sapphire, had
an unspeakable tenderness, mixed with a masculine significancy, and
the other appurtenances of his face, his whiskers long and short were
of an elegant projection. His constant play-fellow, his tail was of
the serpentine spiral, sometimes he would curl it, and then it bore
a near resemblance to the streamer of a man of war when the breezes
curl it, at the top-mast head. It was _tipt_ with _silver_, like a
_verger_, when he introduces one into a pew of the Cathedral. His
mien and carriage were stately, august, and solemn, except when he
ran, and then neither the _Hind_ nor the _Panther_ could vie with him
in fleetness.
Thus formed, thus arrayed in robes of ermin, who could have eyes,
and not confess the superiour beauties of _Tom_, in comparison of
which all other _Cats_ seemed _Rats_, either in size or excellence.
In genius he was a _Mouser_, but many and great were his acquired
abilities. The boys, who loved him from a kitten, had taught him to
play at leap-frog, but he soon exceeded his young masters by leaping
over half a dozen of them standing. They used him to leap over a
horizontal stick as high as they could hold it up. They had taught
him to pick pockets with his mouth, as well as his paw, by putting
a bit of meat or cheese therein, and he was able at length to cap
a man of six feet high, by jumping at his hat, and pulling it off
with admirable dexterity. It would be tedious to enumerate all his
parts, natural and acquired, be it sufficient to say, that he was
possessed of all those eminent good qualities, which distinguish
the monkey.—One evening, his fellow-servant seized a favourable
opportunity, and calling to him, _Tom, Tom_, she turned the corner
to be out of sight; he followed the well-known voice, and leapt into
her arms; she covered him with her apron, and during the eclipse,
he was agreeably entertained with a slice of very fine _Glou’ster_.
When she brought him home, she performed the ceremonies of _Extreme
Unction_, rubbing the soles of his feet with butter. This extreme
unction differs from that of the papists, as the _feline_ is purely
_local_, and applied to those extreme parts of the Cat, called the
feet, whereas the other is temporal, and applied at the last moments
to persons expiring. Those wags, called the casuists, will have it
that this temporal application at the hour of death, is in imitation
of a heathen custom, common among the Roman Athletæ, or wrestlers,
who used to anoint their naked bodies with oyl, the better to _slip_
out of the _gripe_ of their antagonist. But whether this analogy
will bear, we leave to those profound theologists, who deal in such
learned disquisitions. _Tom_’s new mistress, the better to endear
herself to his affections, poured out a libation of sweet milk to
entertain him the longer in lapping, that during his perambulations
across the room, he might be induced at every stage to visit the
fountain-head, which she liberally supplied. And thus _Tom_ became
intimately acquainted with his new appartment, and his new mistress,
both of which he was so well satisfied with, that tho’ he had known
the way, he had not the least inclination to revisit the place of
his _Nativity_; and thus he absolutely forgot, or neglected all his
_domal_ dignities to the great disgrace of _judicial Astrology_,
wherein, however, he very much excelled most of his cotemporaries
whether of the feline or human species.