LET US examine the interior of the cat, and take an inventory of his moral and intellectual furniture.

Webster, in an early edition of his dictionary, goes out of his way to abuse the creature, and even makes himself little less than slanderous. “The domestic cat,” he says, “is a deceitful animal, and when enraged extremely spiteful. It is kept in houses, chiefly for the purpose of catching rats and mice.”

Would a dog have done worse? In all the sixty thousand words of the English language, which of course the great lexicographer knew by heart, could he not find a couple of dozen that would have been more applicable, or at least more charitable? If he had been born as weak as pussy, and had found it as hard to escape kicks and pick up a living, might he not have grown up a bit of a diplomatist? I should like to know, also, whether he was not himself subject to be “extremely spiteful when enraged.”

Then, too, “kept in houses chiefly for the purpose of catching rats and mice!” No account taken of the gamesome ways of kittens; of the pleasure derivable from the grateful purr, the gracious movements, the furry caresses; of the affection which man, woman, and child have lavished upon the most pettable of all pets. It is enough to make one reject Webster’s derivations and throw overboard his new orthographies.

As a member of the living household which man has pleased himself in collecting, the cat is useful but not slavish. The bargain which he struck with us was not submission, as was the case with the dog, but alliance. “House me,” he said, “smooth my back, give me a bed for my morning naps, and I’ll kill your rats and purr to you.” What right have we to demand slavishness? We are too ready to suppose that everything was made for man. Perhaps the feline intellect and sense of justice have reached the conclusion that cats were made for themselves. Have they not a right to be as egotistic as we ?

According to a late census there are three hundred and fifty thousand cats in England. Counting their board and stealing, here seems a waste; but counting the vermin they destroy, what a prodigious saving! A venerable and trustworthy grimalkin (attached to the editorial staff of the London Standard) assures me that he estimates one mouse and five rats to every acre in England, making a total of ninety-one million one hundred and sixteen thousand of these animals, which annually consume grain enough to feed nearly three million human beings. He adds that, if it were not for the incessant exertions of his kind, these rodents might root out the present population of the island, as the Saxons rooted out the Celtic Britons.

Add to this salvation the innocent and home-like pleasure furnished; the amusing pranks of say one hundred thousand kittens; the multitudinous purrings and rubbings and grave trickeries and expositions of instinct; the old ladies and invalids and lonesome ones whose lives are cheered; the children who are provided with a living doll. True, some birds suffer; but may there not be birds enough for all? On the whole, there must be a large balance due the cats.

In spite of slanders to the contrary, the animal is capable of affection for persons. I had one that used to walk up and down the room with me; another that ran about after me all over the house. A third, after a separation of five months, greeted me with extravagant demonstrations of joy, leaping into my lap, down again, up again, rolling over, tremulous from head to foot, and all the while purring to split his throat. A cat belonging to a lady who died some years since was one of the most pathetic of mourners, insisting with affectionate persistence upon sitting by the body, wailing as if his heart would break, and remaining for a long time inconsolable. Instances of this sort are by no means uncommon.

It is true that in general the cat is fonder of places than of people. He likes the old home because he knows it thoroughly; because he has investigated its every mouse-hole and studied the advantages of its every retreat from dogs and other enemies; because he, a weak animal, feels sure that he can there feed and protect himself. Moreover, his bump of locality is prodigious, as is shown by the ease with which he finds his way back to the familiar spot, though carried blindfold a long distance from it. A friend of mine transported a cat several times five miles from home, and dismissed it into the wide liberty of earth, only to find it at his house when he returned, or very shortly afterward. A Flemish peasant, says Champfleury, offered to bet that his cat would get home from a distance of eight leagues s