had attained a venerable
old age, he bequeathed to her his share of the mice that infested the
neighborhood of the cottage.

As to the magpie, finding that her company was no longer desired in
that part of the world, she very wisely took her flight far away to
the other side of the wood.

Whether she still lives there, and goes on chattering about the grand
things she used to see in the palace of the Countess Von
Rustenfustenmustencrustenberg, is more than I can inform you. If you
want to ascertain that fact, you must go to the northern part of the
Duchy of Kittencorkenstringen, and then you must walk seventeen
leagues and three quarters still further north, and then you must turn
off to your right, just where you see the old fir-stump with the
rook's nest in it; and then you must walk eleven leagues and a
quarter more, and then turn to your left, and after you have kept
straight on for about fifteen leagues more, you will see the wood
where the magpie lives;--and then, if you walk quite through it to the
other side, you will see the old woman's cottage; and if it should
happen to be a fine day, I dare say you will see her sitting in the
sunshine spinning, and, curled round beside her, the contented cat.

[Illustration]

THE WISHING-DAY.

Long, long ago, in the glorious reign of King Huggermuggerus, there
lived in an ancient castle a highly respectable cat and his wife. They
led a very comfortable life of it, for the castle belonged to an old
baron who kept very little company, and was very fond of his cats: so
it was very rarely that any strange dogs were admitted within the
walls; and the cats breakfasted every morning with their master. They
had only two children; all the rest of their numerous family having
been barbarously drowned by the housekeeper, who was a very cross old
woman, and did not like cats, nor anything else very much. But the
cats did not trouble their heads much about her; in fact, they had
very little to do with her, for they were allowed full liberty to
wander about the castle at their pleasure.

It was a delightful old castle, full of such queer odd nooks and
corners, that one might have been lost in it for days together; and
there were long corridors, in which the kittens used to run races on
moonlight nights, when the old housekeeper was safe in bed, and make
such a racket, it would have done your heart good to hear them. But
they chiefly took possession of a charming old room,