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 268 "The cats of the army," confesses this report, "are very slow to accustom themselves to the diet prescribed by the government circular;" and, with lamentable lack of patriotism, they desert their posts in favour of more liberal accommodation. Vienna has its official cats, supported in affluence by the municipality. When too old for service, they are placed on the retired list, and honourably pensioned, as becomes a city which leads the world in the wisdom and humanity of its laws, drawing a sharp line of distinction between the idle vagabond and the aged poor whose day for work is over.

The Midland Railway in England has eight cats among its employees. Their headquarters are at Trent, and they have under their care the cornsacks—some four hundred thousand in number—which hold the grain carried by the road to its markets. Other railways are as well provided; and the pussies that work in the London dock-yards seem to be among the most useful members of a busy community. It is even said that they assume airs of ridiculous importance, swaggering around the docks in off hours, and giving idlers to understand that the shipping industries of London depend largely upon their intelligence and activity. They are a closely organized body, and no one who knows them would feel surprised at hearing any day of a strike among the dock-yard cats. The same