As the magpie rattled on, Effie felt more and more pleased, and became still more strongly convinced than before that the bird was a superior creature, who had well used her opportunities, and possessed opinions which were entitled to great weight.
Meantime the weasel, who was listening to the conversation from an old rat's hole in which he had hidden hard by, was fit to kill himself with laughter when he heard the flattery of his ally, and how the cat took it all in.
The latter now raised not only her head but her body, and sat up upon the window-ledge, looking with friendly glance at the old bird in the tree.
"Really," she said, in rather an affected tone, "really, you think too well of me—you do indeed—but now you speak of it, I have (so my friends say at least) something of a voice, and have often thought of cultivating it more than I have hitherto done. But all are not of the same opinion, and I know that my friend Rover the dog thinks differently."
Here the magpie quickly interposed.
"Oh the jealousy of this wicked world and of them dogs in particular! To hear that black, ugly, shaggy animal howl at the moon, or what not, of a night. I declare if it isn't enough to drive one crazy; and for such an animal as that to think anything but good of your lovely, sweet, tuneful, angelic notes! 'Tis really shocking to think he should do so—but envy and meanness, my dear creature, and malice and jealousy was ever in the hearts of dogs—forgive me that I should say so, knowing as how you live in the same house and bear with him as you do."
These words rather gave Effie a new idea of her situation, but as they were evidently intended to be complimentary to herself, though at her friend's expense, she listened to them with complacency.
"You must not blame my friend," she demurely answered, "because he has not such a voice as mine. Few have such, as I think I may say without being suspected of vanity, and I have no reason to think that he is either mean or envious. True, he does not evince the same pleasure in my notes as that which you so kindly express, but this is merely a matter of taste."
"Ah, you dear, kind, good, charitable creature," rejoined the magpie, "it is so like you to take the best and most pleasant view of whatever anybody else says or does. But never mind, if the dog don't like it, others do, and for my part, I should like to hear you play and sing all day and all night long."
"As for playing," returned the cat, "I do not pretend to do that; in fact I have never learned, and have always been accustomed to trust to my natural voice without any accompaniment."