Concerning Cats
CONCERNING THE "PRETTY LADY"
She was such a Pretty Lady, and gentle withal; so quiet and eminently
ladylike in her behavior, and yet dignified and haughtily reserved as
a
duchess. Still it is better, under certain circumstances, to be a cat
than to be a duchess. And no duchess of the realm ever had more faithful
retainers or half so abject subjects.
Do not tell me that cats never love people; that only places have real
hold upon their affections. The Pretty Lady was contented wherever I,
her most humble slave, went with her. She migrated with me from
boarding-house to sea-shore cottage; then to regular housekeeping; up
to
the mountains for a summer, and back home, a long day's journey on the
railway; and her attitude was always "Wheresoever thou goest I
will go,
and thy people shall be my people."