although she could
reason, she did not appear to have learned wisdom from experience. This
last misfortune, however, taught her prudence, as she was never again
caught in a trap.

You will agree with me that Pussy was wise in going to her best friends
for help when in distress; and foolish, having once suffered, again to
run into the same danger.

You, my young reader, will be often entrapped, if you lack strength to
resist temptation. Your kind friends at home will, I am sure, help you
as far as they have the power; but, that they may do so, you must on all
occasions trust them.

AFFECTION EXHIBITED BY A CAT.

I was one day calling in Dorsetshire on a clever, kind old lady, who
showed me a beautiful tabby cat, coiled up before the fire. "Seventeen
years ago," said she, "that cat's mother had a litter. They were all
ordered to be drowned with the exception of one. The servant brought me
one. It was a tortoise-shell. `No,' I said; `that will always be
looking dirty. I will choose another.' So I put my hand into the
basket, and drew forth this tabby. The tabby has loved me ever since.
When she came to have a family, she disappeared; but the rain did not,
for it came pouring down through the ceiling: and it was discovered that
Dame Tabby had made a lying-in hospital for herself in the thatched roof
of the house. The damage she did cost several pounds; so we asked a
friend who had a good cook, fond of cats, to take care of Tabby the next
time she gave signs of having a family, as we knew she would be well
fed. We sent her in a basket completely covered up; and she was shut
into a room, where she soon exhibited a progeny of young mewlings. More
than the usual number were allowed to survive, and it was thought that
she would remain quietly where she was. Not so. On the first
opportunity she made her escape, and down she came all the length of the
village, and early in the morning I heard her mewing at my bed-room door
to be let in. When I had stroked her back and spoken kindly to her, off
she went to look after her nurslings. From that day, every morning she
came regularly to see me, and would not go away till she had been spoken
to and caressed. Having satisfied herself that I was alive and well,
back she would go. She never failed to pay me that one visit in the
morning, and never came twice in the day, till she had weaned her
kittens; and that very day she came back, and nothing would induce her
to