on. The words "Strange!"
"Singular!" and other similar expressions, excited my curiosity. I
approached and saw, as if graven in _bas relief_ upon the white surface
the figure of a gigantic _cat_. The impression was given with an
accuracy truly marvellous. There was a rope about the animal's neck.

When I first beheld this apparition--for I could scarcely regard it as
less--my wonder and my terror were extreme. But at length reflection
came to my aid. The cat, I remembered, had been hung in a garden
adjacent to the house. Upon the alarm of fire this garden had been
immediately filled by the crowd, by some one of whom the animal must
have been cut from the tree and thrown through an open window into my
chamber. This had probably been done with the view of arousing me from
sleep. The falling of other walls had compressed the victim of my
cruelty into the substance of the freshly-spread plaster; the lime of
which, with the flames and the _ammonia_ from the carcass, had then
accomplished the portraiture as I saw it.

Although I thus readily accounted to my reason, if not altogether to my
conscience, for the startling fact just detailed, it did not the less
fail to make a deep impression upon my fancy. For months I could not rid
myself of the phantasm of the cat, and during this period there came
back into my spirit a half-sentiment that seemed, but was not, remorse.
I went so far as to regret the loss of the animal, and to look about me
among the vile haunts which I now habitually frequented for another pet
of the same species, and of somewhat similar appearance, with which to
supply its place.

One night, as I sat half-stupefied in a den of more than infamy, my
attention was suddenly drawn to some black object, reposing upon the
head of one of the immense hogsheads of gin or of rum, which constituted
the chief furniture of the apartment. I had been looking steadily at the
top of this hogshead for some minutes, and what now caused me surprise
was the fact that I had not sooner perceived the object thereupon. I
approached it, and touched it with my hand. It was a black cat--a very
large one--fully as large as Pluto, and closely resembling him in every
respect but one. Pluto had not a white hair upon any portion of his
body; but this cat had a large, although indefinite splotch of white,
covering nearly the whole region of the breast.

Upon my touching him he immediately arose, purred loudly, rubbed against
my hand, and ap