NELLY'S KITTEN.
Nelly's kitten was the handsomest kitten that ever was. So her little mistress thought. Nelly made a great pet of her, and brought her up with great care; and, when she had become a well-grown cat, Nelly gave her the name of "Pussy Gray."
One morning while Nelly was being dressed, her sister told her there was something nice down stairs, and asked her to guess what it was. "I guess it's pickled limes," said Nelly; for she dearly loved pickled limes. But her sister said "No."—"Then I guess it's kittens," said Nelly; and so it was.
Out in the back-room, in a barrel of shavings, were two little bunches of fur; and, when Nelly took them out and put them on the floor, they looked as though they were all legs and mouths. Their eyes were shut tight, and their little pink mouths were wide open.
But, in a week or two, the eyes came open, and the little kitties saw their feet and tails for the first time. Then they stood upon their feet, and played with their tails till they found their mother had one that was bigger and longer; and then they played with their mother's tail whenever she forgot to tuck it away and put her paw on it.
The kittens were always in somebody's way. When Nelly's mamma sat down in the big rocking-chair for a little rest, the first time she rocked back, "Mew, mew, mew!" would be heard, and away would scamper a little kit.
When Nelly's sister walked across the room in the dark, she was sure to hit her foot against a little soft ball, and "Oh, dear! there's one of the kittens," she would say.
If mamma went out to work in the kitchen, there would be a scampering from under her feet; and the kittens would be right before her. If she went to the closet to get any thing, she was sure to knock one of the kits over as she came out. When she was making pies, something would come up her dress; and, before she could stop it, there would be a kitten on her shoulder ready to fall into the pie.
One day, after mamma had stepped on kittens, and fallen over kittens, till her patience was all gone, she said she believed she must have the kittens drowned, they were so much in the way. Pussy Gray, their mother, was in the room, and heard what was said. She at once went out of the door, calling the kittens after her.
That night they didn't come back, nor the next day, nor the next; and, now that they were really gone, mamma began to feel badly. So she searched all through the garden, calling "Kitty, kitty;" but though she looked down the cellar-stairs, and under the back-doorsteps, and everywhere she could think of, no kitten came.
Mattie.
