the animal, as cats are wont
to do, squalled vehemently. Mr. Hardesty bounded from his seat.

'Dear me!' exclaimed Miss Sidebotton, 'don't do that!'

'Positively, Madam,' said Tom, 'I am very sorry, indeed--I am!'

'Poor thing!' said Belinda, taking the injured quadruped in her arms;
'poor thing!--did he hurt its tail?'

''Deed, Madam,' said Mr. Hardesty, stroking the animal's back, 'I wouldn't
have done that for forty ordinary cats. I may say, Madam, speaking
metaphorically, that your cat is of the short-horn Durham stock, and
wasn't made to be trod on.'

'Lor', Sir,' replied Miss Sidebottom, adjusting her cap, 'cats is cats,
and cattle is cattle--that's my sentiments; but as I was going to say, Mr.
Hardesty, I was telling Mrs. Jenkins to-night, not an hour ago, that I
felt a kind of nervous kind of feeling that somebody was coming; and sure
enough, here comes you. You see, Mrs. Jenkins was here to take tea with me
to-night, and beside the baby, why her little Jack and Sally and Bill and
Susan _would_ come, because, they said, pap wasn't at home, and they would
starve if they staid there. And here, sure enough, come they did, before
Mrs. Jenkins had fairly pulled off her bonnet; and stay they would, though
she boxed 'em well; but they didn't mind that, and I told her Christmas
come but once a year, and as it turned out, the poor things _were_ hungry,
in yearnest. And you never see children eat so; I do believe they hadn't
had a good meal for a fortnight. Well, we hadn't got fairly seated after
supper, when rap! rap! at the door, and there was Jake Crow had come for
Mrs. Jenkins; for Jenkins had got into a drunken row, and had his head cut
with a stick. And you never hearn sich a fuss; and Mrs. Jenkins and the
little brats went home crying all the way; and here me and Belinda have
been by ourselves ever since. But poor Mrs. Jenkins! I wonder men will get
drunk and leave their wives and children to starve. _You_ never get drunk,
Mr. Hardesty, do you?'

'Drunk! Madam, drunk!' said Mr. Hardesty, placing his hand over his heart,
and shaking his head emphatically. 'No, Madam; I only get what you may
call intoxicated, and not with liquor neither; and I feel it coming on me
now--I do indeed!'

'Well, well!' replies Mrs. Sidebottom, holding up her hands in utter
astonishment, 'I never heard tell of the like of that before. P'raps its
the cold, Mr. Hardesty.'

'No, Madam,' persisted the old gentleman; 'it's the heat.'