kindness. She loves us all, and will let my sister,wife, or little niece do anything with her, but she is still mostviciously savage to nearly all strangers. She is the best guard-dogthat I ever possessed, and a terror to tramps. She is very wise too,this Dandie of mine, for when out walking with any one of my relations,she is as gentle as a lamb, and will let anybody fondle her. She maythus be taken along with us with impunity when making calls uponfriends, but very few indeed of those friends dare go near her when inher own garden or kennel. We have been well rewarded for our kindnessto Dandie, for although her usual residence by day is her own barrel,and by night she has a share of the straw with the other dogs, she isoften taken into the house, and in spite of our residence being in asomewhat lonely situation, whenever I go from home for the night shebecomes a parlour boarder, and I feel quite easy in my mind because_Dandie is in the house_.
"Well," said Frank, when I had finished, "if that little story provesanything, it proves, I think, that almost any dog can be won bykindness."
"Or any animal of almost any kind," I added.
"Ah!" cried Frank, laughing, "but you failed with your hyaena. Didn'tyou?"
"Gratitude," I replied, smiling, "does not occupy a very large corner ina hyaena's heart, Frank."
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Note. Since writing the above, poor Dandie has gone to her little gravein the orchard.
CHAPTER FOUR.
DEDICATED TO GIRLS AND BOYS ONLY.
"A little maiden, frank and fair, With rosy lips apart, And sunbeams glinting in her hair, And sunshine at her heart."
In my last chapter I mentioned the name of Ida. Ida Graham was mylittle niece. Alas! she no longer brightens our home with the sunshineof her smile. Poor child, she was very beautiful. We all thought so,and every one else who saw her. I have but to close my eyes for amoment and I see her again knitting quietly by the fire on a winter'sevening, or reading by the open window in the cool of a summer's day;or, reticule in hand, tripping across the clovery lea, the two greatdogs, Aileen and Nero, bounding in front of her; or blithely singing asshe feeds her canaries; or out in the yard beyond, surrounded by hensand cocks, pigeons, ducks, and geese, laughing gaily as she scatters thebarley she carries in her little apron.
It was not a bit strange that every creature loved Ida Graham, from thedogs to the bees. We lost her one day, I remember, in summer-time, andfound her at last sound asleep by the foot of a tree, with deer browsingquietly near her, a hare washing its face within a yard of her, and wildbirds hopping around and on her.
Such was Ida. It is no wonder, then, that we miss the dear child.
Very often I would have Ida all to myself for a whole day, when my wifewas in town or visiting, and Frank was gardening or had the gout, for hesuffered at times from that aristocratic but tantalising ailment.
On these occasions, when the weather was fine, we always took the dogsand went off to spend an hour or two in the woods. If it rained westayed indoors, seated by the open window in order to be near the birds.But wet day or fine, Ida generally managed to get a story from me. Itwas in the wood, and seated beneath the old pine-tree, that I told herthe following. I called it--
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PUFF: THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A PERSIAN PUSSY.
I am one of seven. Very much to the grief and sorrow of my poor patientmother, all the rest of my little brothers and sisters met with a waterygrave. I did not know what mother meant when she told me this, withtears in her eyes. I was too young then, but I think I know now. But Iwas left to comfort my parent's heart. This was humane at least in mymistress, because, although it seems the fate of us poor pussies thatvery many of us come into the world to be speedily drowned, it is cruel,for many reasons, to destroy all a mother's darlings at once.
Well, the very earliest thing that I can remember is being taken up inthe arms of a pretty young lady. I was two months old then, and hadbeen playing with a ball of worsted, which I had succeeded in gettingentangled among the chair-legs.
"Oh, what a dear, beautiful, wee puss!" said this young miss, holding meround, so that she might look at my face. "And, oh!" she added, "it hassuch lovely eyes, and such a nice long coat."
"You may have it, Laura dear," said my mistress, "if you will be kind toit."
"Thank you so very much," said Laura, "and I know I shall be fond of italways."
And I do not doubt for a moment that Laura meant what she said. Herfault, however, and my misfortune lay, as you shall see, in the factthat she did not know a bit how to treat a pussy in order to make ithappy.
Laura liked me, and romped with me morning and night, it is true; butalthough cats are ever so fond of attention and of romps, they cannotlive upon either, and often and often I have gone hungry to my saucerand found it empty, which made me feel very cold and sad and dispirited.Yet, in spite of this, I grew to be very fond indeed of my newmistress, and as I sometimes managed to catch a mouse I was not so verybadly off after all.
When I gazed at Miss Laura's gentle face and her sweet eyes--they werejust like my own--I could not help thinking that if she only knew howhungry and cold I often was, she would surely feed me twice a day atleast. But my crowning sorrow was to come; and this was nothing lessthan the loss, I fear entirely, of my mistress's affection.
My grief was all the more bitter in that I was in some measure to blamefor it myself. You see, I was a growing cat, and every day the pangs ofhunger seemed more difficult to bear; so one day, when left by myself inthe kitchen, I found out a way to open the cupboard, and--pray do notblame me; I do think if you had seen all the nice things therein, andfelt as hungry as I felt, you would have tasted them too.
One little sin begets another, and before two months were over I wasknown in the kitchen as "that thief of a cat." I do not think MissLaura knew of my depredations downstairs, for I was always honest in theparlour, and she would, I feel certain, have forgiven me even if she hadknown. As I could not be trusted in the kitchen, I was nearly alwaystamed out-of-doors of a night. This was exceedingly unkind, for it wasoften dark and rainy and cold, and I could find but little shelter. Ondry moonlight nights I did not mind being out, for there was fun to begot--fun and field-mice. Alas! I wish now I had kept to fun andfield-mice; but I met with evil company, vagrant outdoor cats, who tooka delight in mewing beneath the windows of nervous invalids; whodespised indoor life, looked upon theft as a fine art, and robbedpigeon-lofts right and left.
Is it any wonder, then, that I soon turned as reckless as any of them?I always came home at the time the milk arrived in the morning, however;and even now, had my young mistress only fed me, I would have changed myevil courses at once. But she did not.
Now this constant stopping out in all weathers began to tell on mybeautiful coat; it was no longer silky and beautiful. It became mattedand harsh, and did show the dirt, so much so that I was quite ashamed tolook in the glass. And always, too, I was so tired, all through mywanderings, when I returned of a morning, that I did nothing all day butnod drowsily over the fire. No wonder Miss Laura said one day--
"Oh, pussy, pussy! you do look dirty and disreputable. You are nolonger the lovely creature you once were; I cannot care for such a catas you have grown."
But I still loved her, and a kind word from her lips, or a casual caresswas sure to make me happy, even in my dullest of moods.
The end came sooner than I expected, for one day Miss Laura went fromhome very early in the morning. As soon as she was gone, Mary Jane, theservant, seized me rudely by the neck. I thought she was going to killme outright.
"I'll take good care, my lady," she said, "that you don't stealanything, at any rate for four-and-twenty hours to come."
Then she marched upstairs with me, popped me into my mistress's bedroom,locked the door, and went away chuckling. There was no one else in theroom, only just myself and the canary. And all that lo
ng day no oneever came near me with so much as a drop of milk. When night came Itried to sleep on Miss Laura's bed, but the pangs of hunger effectuallybanished slumber. When day broke I felt certain somebody would come tothe door. But no. I thought this was so cruel of Mary Jane, especiallyas I had no language in which to tell my mistress, on her return, of mysufferings. Towards the afternoon I felt famishing, and then my eyesfell upon the canary.
"Poor little thing!" said I; "you, too, are neglected and starving."
"Tweet, tweet!" said the bird, looking down at me with one eye.
"Now, dicky," I continued, "I'm going to do you a great kindness. Ifyou were a very, very large bird, I should ask you to eat me and put meout of all this misery."
"Tweet, tweet!" said the bird very knowingly, as much as to say,
Aileen Aroon, A Memoir Page 6