the floor, broken to pieces. Dear me! thought Wishie, this is
rather too much of a good thing; if the old housekeeper should come
in!

But the mad ball never stopped to think about the housekeeper; now it
took a long roll upon the floor, as if to entice Wishie to run after
it; then, suddenly darting up, would hurl itself with all its might,
against one of the grim old pictures; Wishie, who had by this time
quite forgotten the pain of her paw, jumping as high as ever she could
reach after it. It really was something like a game at play! Just
then, bounce it went against a superb mirror at the upper end of the
room, shivering it to atoms; but not a whit did the ball care for
that--with a tremendous spring, it cleared the whole length of the
room, and alighted on one of the picture-frames near the door.

But Wishie was getting much too frightened now to enjoy the fun any
longer: she stood, gazing with rueful looks at the broken mirror--O if
the cross old housekeeper should find it out! She thought the best
plan would be to steal out of the room, but on turning round, she
perceived that the door had become most unaccountably shut--there was
no getting out. What was to be done? While she was turning it over in
her mind, down came the ball directly upon Wishie's tail, with such a
thump! Wishie thought her poor tail must be utterly demolished--she
heard an odd sort of chuckling laugh up in the air, and, looking up,
saw that the ball had seated itself, very quietly, in its old place on
the top of the cabinet. How her tail smarted! it was worse a great
deal than the sting. She was just trying to curl it round to lick it,
when the door opened, and in came the housekeeper! She had not
advanced many steps when the broken china caught her eye; her back was
towards the mirror, so she did not see _that_--but she _did_ see
Wishie, and exclaiming, 'You naughty little kitten, you have been
throwing down the china!' She flew towards Wishie, and if she could
have caught her, would, no doubt, have given her a dreadful whipping;
but, as she had luckily left the door open, Wishie contrived to slip
past her, and dart out of the room. When the housekeeper turned round,
she spied the broken mirror; which put her into such a consternation,
that, for a few minutes, she was really too much thunderstruck to run
after Wishie. And there sate the ball on the cabinet, very quietly,
and nobody ever suspected it.

It was lucky for Wishie that she gain