Page:The fireside sphinx.djvu/274

 244 Less difficult to believe, yet far removed from credence, are tales of Pussy's superhuman intelligence and craft. Some years ago the "Spectator" published, with enviable gravity, an account of a cat that hunted up and found articles lost about the house. He did not appear to have concealed these things, and then produced them for reward; but to have made painful search for scissors and spectacles, mislaid through the carelessness of the family. Enthusiasts are always telling us how their pets open closed doors, as though in training for burglary; and lay traps, like veteran hunters, for birds and squirrels. A Scotch gentleman assures me that his cat was in the habit of hiding in the shrubbery, and leaping out upon the poor little sparrows, that came every morning to breakfast on the crumbs thrown them from the dining-room window. One winter day these crumbs were quickly covered over by falling snow; whereupon the astute highwayman was seen to lay them bare again, brushing away the soft snow with his paws, lest, from lack of decoy, he should lose his prey. Indignant at such murderous purpose, the family determined to circumvent the cat by scattering no more bread. Pussy waited and wondered for two mornings; and then, realizing the nature of the conspiracy, baffled it by the simple process of taking a roll from the breakfast table, and carrying it