of
four-footed animals, and feline war-cries and songs.

"Every year, at the period of the Bubastis festival, all superfluous
cats may be brought to the temple of the cat-headed goddess Pacht, where
they are fed and cared for, or, as I believe, when they multiply too
fast, quietly put out of the way. These priests are knaves!

"Unfortunately the journey to the said temple" did not occur during the
time of our stay in Memphis; however, as I really could not tolerate
this army of tormentors any longer, I determined at least to get rid
of two families of healthy kittens with which their mothers had just
presented me. My old slave Mus, from his very name a natural enemy of
cats, was told to kill the little creatures, put them into a sack, and
throw them into the Nile.

"This murder was necessary, as the mewing of the kittens would otherwise
have betrayed the contents of the sack to the palace-warders. In the
twilight poor Muss betook himself to the Nile through the grove of
Hathor, with his perilous burden. But alas! the Egyptian attendant who
was in the habit of feeding my cats, had noticed that two families of
kittens were missing, and had seen through our whole plan.

"My slave took his way composedly through the great avenue of Sphinxes,
and by the temple of Ptah, holding the little bag concealed under
his mantle. Already in the sacred grove he noticed that he was being
followed, but on seeing that the men behind him stopped before the
temple of Ptah and entered into conversation with the priests, he felt
perfectly reassured and went on.

"He had already reached the bank of the Nile, when he heard voices
calling him and a number of people running towards him in haste; at the
same moment a stone whistled close by his head.

"Mus at once perceived the danger which was threatening him. Summoning
all his strength he rushed down to the Nile, flung the bag in, and then
with a beating heart, but as he imagined without the slightest evidence
of guilt, remained standing on the shore. A few moments later he was
surrounded by at least a hundred priests.

"Even the high-priest of Ptah, my old enemy Ptahotep, had not disdained
to follow the pursuers in person.

"Many of the latter, and amongst them the perfidious palace-servant,
rushed at once into the Nile, and there, to our confusion, found the
bag with its twelve little corpses, hanging entirely uninjured among the
Papyrus-reeds and bean-tendrils. The cotton coffin was