at the top of the wall, followed by Polly and Master Sambo. "Don't begin yet," said Sambo, "it is too early, the old lady cannot be in bed or the servants either." 66 'Oh yes s!" said Polly, "she has only one servant, and they are both of them old and go to bed at nine, and I like to rouse them out of their first slumbers; and, besides, it must be half-past ten nearly, so here goes," she said, and she immediately began that horrid, unmeaning, melancholy noise, that cats delight in !

Molly followed suit, in a higher key, and then they both struck up a duet; but, finding they were not noticed indoors as yet, they made a sign to Sambo, and he jumped upon a little balcony close by Miss Smith's window, and caterwauled as loud as he could! This delighted Molly and Polly, especially as the window opened, and an old head in a nightcap appeared, and Miss Smith screamed out to the cats to go away. The three were silent for a few minutes, as if they had obeyed her, and she then went back to her bed; but she had hardly been there many minutes, when all three cats jumped on to the balcony, and caterwauled again with all their might. This was preposterous, and the old lady jumped out of bed once more, and poured a jug of water out of the window, and the three cats jumped down just in time to escape it.

Now was our chance; we all sprang up from where we were, and with a loud barking (which always scares cats) we gave chase.

Sambo, Molly, and Polly, having guilty consciences, were dreadfully frightened, and ran away as hard as they could goanyhow, anywhere, all through the village, over walls, and ditches, and gates; and the hunt was really a famous one, until

they began to recover their senses, and remembered they could escape us better by running up something, and so Polly gave the lead and sprang quickly up a tree by a cottage, and from thence she jumped on to the roof, and there they all three stopped to recover their breath; and as soon as they could speak, they of course were impertinent enough to beg us to follow.

They were safe enough there for a time, as we could not get near them; but we felt sure their patience would be exhausted before ours, so we quietly remained below until they felt disposed to renew the battle by coming down, or would sue for terms of peace.

CHAPTER XII.

A CATASTROPHE.

WE were all three of us rather tired with our hunt, but we were determined not to go to sleep, or the game would be lost, and the cats would have a dreadful triumph. How well I remember how difficult Jack found it to keep awake; his sentimental eyes kept winking and blinking, and if it had not been for Tip's occasional reminder with his paw, he would certainly have gone fast asleep.

The cats showed more patience than I gave them credit for. They made several attempts to escape by means of the tree, but were obliged to give it up at last, and then they tried to drive us away by insolence, making disagreeable remarks, and spitting at us. Sambo was by far the most civil of the three, and if he had wished to come to terms with us, we should have allowed him to do so, but I suppose he felt it a point of honour to remain with Polly and Molly, as they had invited him to join them.

In return for all the incivility we received from the cats we gave them some excellent advice, and also told them pretty plainly what we thought of their conduct. Tip characterized it as very mean, and said that if he were King of England he should feel it his duty to exterminate cats, for they seemed

to have no object in life except to annoy people. Jack said he knew one very sensible, satisfactory cat, a large white one called Snowball, and I also spoke in favour of a young tortoiseshell kitten that lived near us, but we all agreed that black cats were very objectionable, and that unless they improved they ought to be sent out of the country.

Sambo assured us from the roof, that the complexion of a cat went for nothing-that there were different dispositions in cats as in dogs, and that some families were not so well brought up as others, and therefore some excuse ought to be made for them. He said he had had a good father and mother, and had been carefully educated. He allowed that he enjoyed a little mischief, but he was not malicious. He said his mother was a

black cat, and very sweet and amiable, and his father was a tabby, and had lived in good society. He felt sure that his father and mother would be angry if they knew how he had behaved to Miss Smith, and he never intended to worry her any more.

Molly and Polly told him he was a very silly fellow to talk like that, and a coward, and they would have nothing more to say to him, and they both of them ran at him with all their might, and as he was off his guard they pushed him off the roof, and he fell down on his feet close by me.

I believe it was a ruse of Polly's, for she thought that we should immediately get up and chase Sambo, and then they would be able to escape; but we were not so silly as to fall into that trap. By this time we had grown to like Sambo; we found that he was at heart a good cat, and had been led away by Polly and Molly, so we did not attempt to molest him, but advised him to go home at once like a respectable

animal, and not spend his days in idling, and his nights in annoying his neighbours. He assured us it was his first offence, and then he ran off home without paying any attention to Molly and Polly, who were abusing him at the top of the roof. When Sambo was quite out of sight Polly asked us if we had any intention of going home that night, "like respectable dogs"? "No," we said, "we had not."

"Then," said Molly, "do you mean to allow us to go home quietly as you have Sambo ?"

"Are you three dogs, then," said Molly, "mean enough," (with a strong accent upon mean, as we had accused them of meanness) "to attack two cats? Do we understand that it requires three dogs to dispose of two cats? and do you thereby allow, that two cats equal three dogs?"

Molly was very fast, and very sarcastic, but there was some truth in what she had said, about our uneven numbers now Sambo had gone; and so as Jack was very sleepy, we begged him to go home, and I said,

"Molly and Polly, you are both of you very impertinent, and do not improve your position by your remarks, but we have no idea of doing anything mean; in fact, dogs cannot ; and so Jack will go home, and only Tip and I remain to settle our disputes with you. If you wish for my opinion as to our relative positions, I should say one dog is equal to fifty cats, but as it is more gratifying to the vanity of cats to be equally matched as to numbers, Tip and I remain to oblige you in that matter, and I do not think we shall find it difficult to teach you that the impertinence of cats cannot go unpunished."