since somebody wrote that pretty fable about the "Babes in the Wood." And apropos of the Robin, do you remember Canning's verses?
"Tell me, tell me, gentle Robin,
What is it sets thy heart a-throbbing?
Is it that Grimalkin fell
Hath killed thy father or thy mother,
Thy sister or thy brother,
Or any other?
Tell me but that,
And I'll kill the Cat.
But stay, little Robin, did you ever spare,
A grub on the ground or a fly in the air?
No, that you never did, I'll swear;
So I won't kill the Cat,
That's flat."
But all the cruel and unjust things that have been said about poor pussy I will tell you in another chapter. I mean to try and begin at the beginning. In the first place, what is the meaning of the word "Cat." Let us look in the dictionary. A Cat, according to Dr. Johnson, is "a domestick animal that catches mice." But the word has one or two other meanings, for instance:—
In thieves' slang the word "Cat" signifies a lady's muff, and "to free a cat" to steal a muff. Among soldiers and sailors a "Cat" means something very unpleasant indeed, with nine tingling lashes or tails,
