monster from the deep! a monster from the
deep!" to return with a large body of their companions in full war
array, with spears, clubs, and shields, and faces blackened with
charcoal. The cat, however, was too nimble for them, and escaped through
the midst of their ranks, sending these brave warriors flying in every
direction.

That night, however, Puss, tired of her lonely life, foolishly entered a
native hut, and creeping beneath the coverlet under which the whole
family were lying, fell asleep. Her purring awoke the owner of the hut,
who procured the help of some other models of valor, and with their
assistance murdered poor Pussy in her tranquil and confiding slumbers.

But cats, though thus at first misunderstood, were afterward welcomed in
Raratonga, which was devastated with a plague of rats. The missionaries
imported a cargo consisting of pigs, cocoa-nuts, and cats.

A youthful clerk who was once appointed to make out an invoice of
shipments on a Mississippi steamer, was perplexed by the item of "Four
boxes of tom-cats." On inquiry, the mystery was solved. "Why," said the
indignant sutler, "that means four boxes of _tomato catsup_. Don't you
understand abbreviations?"

An amusing reason is given for cats washing their faces after a meal. A
cat caught a sparrow, and was about to devour it, but the sparrow said,

"No gentleman eats till he has first washed his face."

The cat, struck with this remark, set the sparrow down, and began to
wash his face, on which the sparrow flew away. This vexed Pussy
extremely, and he said,

"As long as I live I will eat first, and wash my face afterward."

Which all cats do even to this day.

Here is another cat and sparrow fable:

"I wonder," said a sparrow, "what the eagles are about, that they don't
fly away with the cats? And now I think of it, a civil question can not
give offense." So the sparrow finished her breakfast, went to the eagle,
and said: "May it please your Majesty, I see you and your race fly away
with the birds and the lambs, that do no harm. But there is not a
creature so malignant as a cat; she prowls about our nests, eats up our
young, and bites off our own heads. She feeds so daintily that she must
be herself good eating. Why do you not feed upon a cat?"

"Ah!" said the eagle, "there is sense in your question. I had a worm
here this morning, asking me why I did not breakfast upon sparrows. Do I
see a morsel of worm's skin on your beak, my child?"