rvous, and if he was in the room made a flying leap as
far as she could to her bed, to escape those keen claws. Indeed,
old Israel found her more than once sitting in the middle of the
kitchen-floor with Toby crouched for a spring under the table, his
poor mistress afraid to move, for fear of her unlucky ankles. And this
literally cat-ridden woman was hazed about and ruled over by her feline
tyrant to that extent that he occupied the easiest chair, the softest
cushion, the middle of the bed, and the front of the fire, not only
undisturbed, but caressed. This is a veritable history, beloved reader,
and I offer it as a warning and an example: if you will be an old maid,
or if you can't help it, take to petting children, or donkeys, or even a
respectable cow, but beware of domestic tyranny in any shape but man's!

No wonder Miss Lucinda took kindly to the pig, who had a house of his
own, and a servant, as it were, to the avoidance of all trouble on her
part,--the pig who capered for joy when she or Fun approached, and had
so much expression in his physiognomy that one almost expected to see
him smile. Many a sympathizing conference Miss Lucinda held with Israel
over the perfections of Piggy, as he leaned against the sty and looked
over at his favorite after this last chore was accomplished.

"I say for 't," exclaimed the old man, one day, "I b'lieve that cre'tur'
knows enough to be professor in a college. Why, he talks! he re'lly
doos: a leetle through his nose, maybe, but no more 'n Dr. Colton allers
does,--'n' I declare he appears to have abaout as much sense. I never
see the equal of him. I thought he'd 'a larfed right out yesterday, when
I gin him that mess o' corn: he got up onto his forelegs on the trough,
an' he winked them knowin' eyes o' his'n, an' waggled his tail, an' then
he set off an' capered round till he come bunt up ag'inst the boards. I
tell _you_,--that sorter sobered him; he gin a growlin' grunt, an' shook
his ears, an' looked sideways at me, and then he put to and eet up that
corn as sober as a judge. I swan! he doos beat the Dutch!"

But there was one calculation forgotten both by Miss Lucinda and Israel:
the pig would grow,--and in consequence, as I said before, Miss Lucinda
came to grief; for when the census-taker tinkled her sharp little
door-bell, it called her from a laborious occupation at the sty,--no
more and no less than trying to nail up a board that Piggy had torn down
in struggling to get