"MR URBAN,--Convinced that you despise no communications that may
gratify curiosity, amuse rationally, or add, though but a little, to the
stock of public knowledge, I send you a circumstantial account of an
animal, which, though its general properties are pretty well known, is
for the most part such a stranger to man, that we are but little aware
of its peculiarities. We know indeed that the hare is good to hunt and
good to eat; but in all other respects poor Puss is a neglected subject.
In the year 1774, being much indisposed, both in mind and body,
incapable of diverting myself either with company or books, and yet in
a condition that made some diversion necessary, I was glad of anything
that would engage my attention without fatiguing it. The children of a
neighbour of mine had a leveret given them for a plaything; it was at
that time about three months old. Understanding better how to tease the
poor creature than to feed it, and soon becoming weary of their charge,
they readily consented that their father, who saw it pining and growing
leaner every day, should offer it to my acceptance. I was willing enough
to take the prisoner under my protection, perceiving that in the
management of such an animal, and in the attempt to tame it, I should
find just that sort of employment which my case required. It was soon
known among the neighbours that I was pleased with the present; and the
consequence was, that in a short time, I had as many leverets offered to
me as would have stocked a paddock. I undertook the care of three, which
it is necessary that I should here distinguish by the names I gave
them--Puss, Tiney, and Bess. Notwithstanding the two feminine
appellatives, I must inform you that they were all males. Immediately
commencing carpenter, I built them houses to sleep in. Each had a
separate apartment, so contrived that their ordure would pass through
the bottom of it; an earthen pan placed under each received whatsoever
fell, which being duly emptied and washed, they were thus kept perfectly
sweet and clean. In the daytime they had the range of a hall, and at
night retired each to his own bed, never intruding into that of another.

"Puss grew presently familiar, would leap into my lap, raise himself
upon his hinder feet, and bite the hair from my temples. He would suffer
me to take him up, and to carry him about in my arms, and has more than
once fallen fast asleep upon my knee. He was ill three days, during
whi