Pussy-cat sits by the fire--how should she be fair?
In walks the little dog--says "Pussy are you there?
How do you do mistress Pussy? Mistress Pussy, how do you do?"
"I thank you kindly, little dog, I fare as well as you!"
Old Rhyme.
ONCE upon a time there was a Pussy-cat called Ribby, who invited a
little dog called Duchess to tea.
"Come in good time, my dear Duchess," said Ribby's letter, "and we will
have something so very nice. I am baking it in a pie-dish--a pie-dish
with a pink rim. You never tasted anything so good! And YOU shall eat it
all! _I_ will eat muffins, my dear Duchess!" wrote Ribby.
Duchess read the letter and wrote an answer:--"I will come with much
pleasure at a quarter past four. But it is very strange. _I_ was just
going to invite you to come here, to supper, my dear Ribby, to eat
something MOST DELICIOUS."
"I will come very punctually, my dear Ribby," wrote Duchess; and then at
the end she added--"I hope it isn't mouse?"
And then she thought that did not look quite polite; so she scratched
out "isn't mouse" and changed it to "I hope it will be fine," and she
gave her letter to the postman.
But she thought a great deal about Ribby's pie, and she read Ribby's
letter over and over again.
"I am dreadfully afraid it WILL be mouse!" said Duchess to herself--"I
really couldn't, COULDN'T eat mouse pie. And I shall have to eat it,
because it is a party. And MY pie was going to be veal and ham. A pink
and white pie-dish! and so is mine; just like Ribby's dishes; they were
both bought at Tabitha Twitchit's."
Duchess went into her larder and took the pie off a shelf and looked at
it.
"It is all ready to put into the oven. Such lovely pie-crust; and I put
in a little tin patty-pan to hold up the crust; and I made a hole in the
middle with a fork to let out the steam--Oh I do wish I could eat my own
pie, instead of a pie made of mouse!"