Page:The fireside sphinx.djvu/104

 78 If Moncrif be the first genuine chronicler, the Froissart of cats, La Fontaine, says M. Feuillet de Conches, is their Homer. "He painted them, as he studied them, under all aspects, and with a master's skill." But that he painted them unkindly is too evident for denial. He borrowed Rodilardus from Rabelais, and turned that feline Samson into a cruel and insatiable tyrant,

who wages day and night a relentless war of extermination.

This "Alexander of cats" is as brave as he is merciless,—cowardice has never been a cattish trait,—but he is as false and malicious as he is brave. He sows the seeds of dissension between other animals, and laughs in his sleeve at their stupidity. He refuses pity to the mouseling in these terrible words, "Cats know not how to pardon." He is a prince of hypocrites, and, like the hermit of the Ganges, affects piety, and the spirit of universal brotherhood. When the foolish young rabbit quarrels with the weasel, she consents to abide by the just decision of Raminagrobis, a saintly puss of ascetic habits and incorruptible morals; a "chatemite," who, sighing that he is old and deaf,