Could Hardly Lift Me.
“Many at this famous party have spoken of what they have suffered from cruel boys and from dogs, but nobody as yet has spoken of a baby. Tongue cannot tell what I suffered from that baby. A baby will step on any part of a cat. A baby will sit on a cat. A baby does not mind what part of a cat it lifts up a cat by, whether by the tail or by a leg, or by the head. A baby will pull your ears, will stick its finger in your eyes, will even meddle with your smellers, and you must keep from touching it, because it is a baby.
“I never did touch that baby to hurt it. I loved that baby. I kept my claws way in out of sight, and if I ever squealed it was sometimes when he sat down on me hard, and squelched the squeal out of me before I knew it.
“I come now to something painful to speak of. You will be surprised to learn that I ran away from that dear Nellie mistress. This will now be explained.
“Unhappily for me, I had great skill in charming birds, and I was as fond of birds as my mother Pussy Gray was of butterflies. I mean I was fond of them as food, not as friends. There was no cat anywhere around that could charm a bird as well as I could. I used to stay under a tree and when a bird came and sat on a bough I would look straight up at him, and then he could not fly away. He would cry, and flutter his wings, but he could not fly away. He would have to drop.
I Dropped the Bird.
“I used to carry the birds to my dear mistress, for I wanted to please her, and birds were the best things I could get. But she was not pleased; she scolded me. I could not understand why she praised me for catching a mouse and scolded me for catching a bird. A bird is better than a mouse. Pretty soon she began to do something besides to scold. I was punished in the way cats are punished. I need not tell. All at this famous party know. After I had been punished a great deal I kept away from trees. But one day I was in a window-seat, asleep. The window was swung open, and I lay there to enjoy the sunshine and fell asleep. The noise of a bird woke me. I stretched myself out flat and looked up. The bird was on a high window above. When I had looked at it a little while it began to cry, and then it flew down to the top of the window that was swung open. It flew lower and lower, and I made a spring and caught it. My mistress came in and I dropped the bird on the window-seat, and jumped down and crept away. I felt so ashamed I did not know what to do.
“I was not whipped, but I was punished. I punished myself. I left that pleasant home and my dear mistress. You will understand why when I explain.