up the mad whirl until, grown dizzy as
waltzing belles, they would sink on the
turf panting and dishevelled. The young
mother, though usually maintaining proper
dignity and discipline, sometimes frolicked
and gambolled with the merriest, and
showed herself to be the most kittenish of
them all, as well as the most comely and
graceful.

They were touching examples of sisterly
affection, these soulless little things. They
drank in harmony with their mother-milk.
They purred in concert, took sweet counsel
together, washed each other's faces, did
each other's back hair, and always slept in
each other's arms. Sometimes they were
so conglomerated, in slumber, into a shining,
palpitating, murmurous heap, that it
was hard to tell where one kitten left off
and another began. To most of our visitors
they were objects of ardent admiration, but
so meek and sweet-tempered were they, that
we always dreaded the coming of certain
small children, who insisted on lugging
them about by the handle, and squeezing
them. Much we marvelled at the great
patience of the little victims, whose satin
paws sheathed such keen weapons. Ah,
pleasant and innocent distraction for sad
heart and weary brain to watch those
dainty delirious bits of vitality, in their
mad antics of fun and adventure; to see
them develop, day after day, new arts of
cunning and agility, new powers of
mischief and gymnastics; to watch them
scaling walls, mounting trees, wrestling,
rolling, and tumbling, darting out upon
each other sideways, from behind bush, or
bench, or other "coin of vantage,"
skirmishing with beetles and grasshoppers,
and making mad leaps after butterflies.
Once we saw Miss Daisy dealing rather
roughly with a honey-bee, who seemed
disabled in a wing, and was making his
way across the flag-stones of the walk,
bound, perhaps, for some bee's hospital,
when puss surprised him. He wheeled
and retreated, but she anticipated him and
made hostile demonstrations. Considering
the strength of the enemy, the contest was
a serious one for him. Life was at stake,
and life was sweet in honey time. So he
valiantly showed fight, and poor puss soon
retired in confusion, with a hot foot.

But more laughable it was to watch an
attack made by the combined kitten forces
on a poor old hermit of a toad, who once
upon a time ventured forth from his cell,
under the stone door-step, to enjoy the
evening air. While hopping quietly along,
he was discovered and surrounded by the
saucy little troop, who charged upon him,
and followed him up, and headed him off,
pestered him, and made game of him, and
looked all the while as frisky and bewitching
as the pretty she devils that tormented
poor Saint Anthony.

But more laughable still was an affair we
witnessed between one of the older cats and
a large mud-turtle, found one day foraging
in the garden. The cat made a careful
reconnaissance before moving on the enemy's
works, then pranced up in gallant style,
but catching sight of an ugly, outstretched,
vibrating head, he fell back to a new base,
from which he made a second advance.
Suddenly the pickets were called in, on
front, flank, and rear, the enemy had
retired into his entrenchments, whence it
would be difficult to shell him out. It
was evidently a position hard to take by
strategy or assault, and after sitting down
before it for awhile, our old moustache
abandoned the siege.

This may have been the same turtle that
our hostess told us of, who had given her a
great deal of annoyance by devouring her
young cucumbers. At last, after having
graven on his shell certain letters by which
he might be known, if again encountered,
she banished him as a trespasser. The very
next morning he was found in his old haunts,
having made a night march. She sent
him yet further off, and again he returned.
Then she had him blindfolded and carried
to the extremity of the farm, beyond the
creek. But he must have taken up his
steady tardigradous march at once, without
waiting for pontoons: for in a wonderfully
short time he was back on the field of his
old operations.

But to return to the five little sisters.
Though so full to overflowing of frolic and
mischief, wild tricks, and merry whimsies,
they were yet rare and excellent sleepers.
To their pampered senses, life was a fine
frolic, a tipsy delight, or a soft oblivion.
They knew, however, a twilight state of
half consciousness a neutral ground of
being and dreaming when they dozed in
the sun, or under the roses, and purred
and winked and were deliciously lazy,
senseless prodigals of time! On moonlight
nights they positively refused to sleep, but
were all abroad, gleaming and leaping over
the lawn, lighting up shadowy places, and
looking like stray bits of moonlight incarnated.

Later in the season, on chill and rainy
afternoons, we had that rare old-fashioned