like a bit of old plaster as possible, but for
those bright eyes of his, which in his eagerness
for the capture, were intently fixed upon
the fly. Unlucky wight! Little did he think
that those very eyes had attracted the
attention of a fine tabby cat, who but a few
minutes before, with blinking eyes, presented
a perfect picture of contentment, but now
roused by a sudden temptation, was crouching
stealthily down as she beheld the lizard, for
whom she had so often watched in vain.
Down stole the lizard—on stole the cat; so
that here at the same moment were three
creatures so bent upon indulgence, that they
never even thought of looking about them!
But were these three all the parties to be
engaged? Alas! no. There was a sworn
enemy of the cat's approaching also (under
cover of a large basket), in the shape of a
mischievous white dog, kept by a very
quarrelsome man on the other side of the street.
This dog was the terror of all the cats in
the neighbourhood, and most of all, of the
flour-dealer's; so often had he chased her,
and so often experienced the bitter
disappointment of seeing her climbing up the
posts of the shop, and then spitting at him
from the top of the shed.

Infatuated lizard! Wretched fly! Betrayed
pussy! She heeded not the sly creep of the
dog, so intent was she upon the successful
issue of her spring upon the lizard. The fly
was gorging himself with honey. He alone
partook not of the intense anxiety of the
lizard, the cat, and the dog. He partook only
of—honey!

The crisis at length arrived. The lizard
made its nimble pounce at the fly. The cat
sprang at the lizard. The lizard missed its
footing in consequence, and would have been
the cat's portion—fly, honey, and all—but for
the dog's sudden attack upon puss. Here
was a scene! The lizard falling to the ground,
was at once involved in the consequences of
the quarrel between the dog and cat. What
were fly or honey to him at the moment,
when in a state between life and death he
crept back sore and wounded to his chinks
and cobwebs! The fly might or might not
have escaped. Not so the cat, now sorely
worried by the dog, in spite of all her
outcries and all she could do in the way of biting
and clawing; for it was an old score the dog
was paying her off, and that might soon have
cost her her life, if her master had not rushed
out of his shop with a broomstick, with
which he began to belabour the dog.

Now the owner of the dog had been as long
at enmity with the man of flour and honey,
as the dog had been at enmity with the cat,
and probably longer. Of course, therefore,
when he heard his animal's cries, and saw
the punishment inflicting, he armed himself
with a broomstick also; and rushing across
the street, gave the flour-dealer such a crack
upon his head, as knocked him down as flat as
a pancake.

'Take that you villain,' said he, 'for it's a
debt I've long owed you!'

'Have you?' said the flour-dealer's son, as
he rushed out with a cudgel in his hand.
'Then tell me how you like that'—giving him
such a hearty whack across the shoulders,
that he was fain to drop his broomstick.

Yet the blow had hardly been given, before
a friend of the dog's master ran up with a
drawn sword, and would have made mince-
meat of the flour-dealer's son, but for a soldier
who cried out, 'Shame, thou coward, and son of
a coward, who would attack a youth with only
a stick in his hand, and you armed with a
sword! Shame on you! It's just like you
rascally Hindoo fellows, who pretend to be
soldiers, and are as much like soldiers as that
poor cat. Why don't you try me?'

'Why not?' replied the man. 'Do you think
I'm afraid of such a bully as you? Come on,
you scoundrel, and I'll show you what difference
there is between a cat and a Hindoo!'

Upon this the soldier drew his sword, and
both began to cut at each other in good
earnest.

On this all the people cried out, 'Murder!
Murder!' and a great many soldiers running
to the spot, were soon engaged, always attacking
the Hindoos, who were on the dog's side,
and the Hindoos the Mussulmans, who were
on the side of the cat; and wherever a Hindoo
and a Mussulman were fighting, the Hindoos
aided the Hindoo, and the Mussulmans the
Mussulman; and the consequence was the
death of many on each side, and the wounding
of most of the foolish quarrelsome people
engaged.

Of course such a hubbub as this could not
be continued long without its being reported
to the Rajah, who forthwith hastened from
his palace with his body-guard and some
horsemen, and soon put a stop to this terrible
fray; and all the ringleaders were forthwith
seized and tied together, and marched off to
prison, there to be kept closely confined till
the sad business should be fully enquired into,
and the cause of so dreadful a riot ascertained,
and fixed upon the guilty.

All that night, therefore, were the
magistrates and police-officers hard at work listening
to evidence, but they did not advance a
single step in the business; no, nor for several
days after, notwithstanding the great
impatience of the Rajah, to whom they could
only report from time to time the hearing of
nothing but the words, 'Cat, Dog,'—'Cat and
Dog,'—'Dog and Cat,'—'Dog'—'Cat.'

A very similar feeling, also, was entertained
by the lawyers who were called in, and who,
after intense application, declared themselves
doubtful, very doubtful,—so much was
advanced and really to be said and supported
by various precedents, both on the side of
the cat and of the dog, and, consequently, of the
owner of the cat, as well as the owner of the
dog, and the partisans of the owners of the dog
and cat,—insomuch, that the whole city was