Dear mother!—I remember how she took off my dripping clothes, and made me some warm drink, and put me snugly to bed, and laughed and cried, as she listened to my adventures, and kissed me and comforted me till I fell asleep. Nor was Kitty forgotten, but was fed and put as cosily to bed as her poor mistress.
The next morning I awoke with a dreadful headache, and when I tried to rise I found I could not stand. I do not remember much more, except that my father, who was a physician, came and felt my pulse, and said I had a high fever, brought on by the fright and exposure of the night previous. I was very sick indeed for three or four weeks, and all that time my faithful Kitty stayed by the side of my bed. She could be kept out of the room but a few moments during the day, and mewed piteously when they put her in her little house at night. My friends said that it was really very affecting to see her love and devotion; but I knew very little about it, as I was out of my head, or in a stupor, most of the time. Yet I remember how the good creature frolicked about me the first time I was placed in an arm-chair, and wheeled out into the dining-room to take breakfast with the family; and when, about a week later, my brother Charles took me in his strong arms and carried me out into the garden, how she ran up and down the walks, half crazy with delight, and danced along sideways, and jumped out at us from behind currant-bushes, in a most cunning and startling manner.
I remember now how strange the garden looked,—how changed from what I had last seen it. The roses were all, all gone, and the China-asters and marigolds were in bloom. When my brother passed with me through the corn and beans, I wondered he did not get lost, they were grown so thick and high.
It was in the autumn after this sickness, that one afternoon I was sitting under the shade of a favorite apple-tree, reading Mrs. Sherwood’s sweet story of “Little Henry and his Bearer.” I remember how I cried over it, grieving for poor Henry and his dear teacher. Ah, I little thought how soon my tears must flow for myself and my Kitty! It was then that my sister came to me, looking sadly troubled, to tell me the news. Our brother William, who was a little mischievous, had been amusing himself by throwing Kitty from a high window, and seeing her turn somersets in the air, and alight on her feet unhurt. But at last, becoming tired or dizzy, she had fallen on her back and broken the spine, just below her shoulders. I ran at once to where she lay on the turf, moaning in her pain. I sat down beside her, and cried as though my heart would break. There I stayed till evening, when my mother had Kitty taken up very gently, carried into the house, and laid on a soft cushion. Then my father carefully examined her hurt. He shook his head, said she could not possibly get well, and that she should be put out of her misery at once. But I begged that she might be allowed to live till the next day. I did not eat much supper that night, or breakfast in the morning, but grieved incessantly for her who had been to me a fast friend in sickness as in health.
About nine o’clock of a pleasant September morning, my brothers came and held a council round poor Kitty, who was lying on a cushion in my lap, moaning with every breath; and they decided that, out of pity for her suffering, they must put her to death. The next question was, how this was to be done. “Cut her head off with the axe!” said my brother Charles, trying to look very manly and stern, with his lip quivering all the while. But my brother William, who had just been reading a history of the French Revolution, and how they took off the heads of people with a machine called the guillotine, suggested that the straw-cutter in the barn would do the work as well, and not be so painful for the executioner. This was agreed to by all present.
Weeping harder than ever, I then took a last leave of my dear pet, my good and loving and beautiful Kitty. They took her to the guillotine, while I ran and shut myself up in a dark closet, and stopped my ears till they came and told me that all was over.
The next time I saw my poor pet, she was lying in a cigar-box, ready for burial. They had bound her head on very cleverly with bandages, and washed all the blood off from her white breast; clover-blossoms were scattered over her, and a green sprig of catnip was placed between her paws. My youngest brother, Albert, drew her on his little wagon to the grave, which was dug under a large elm-tree, in a corner of the yard. The next day I planted over her a shrub called the “pussy-willow.”
After that I had many pet kittens, but none that ever quite filled the place of poor Keturah. Yet I still have a great partiality for the feline race. I like nothing better than to sit, on a summer afternoon or in a winter evening, and watch the graceful gambols and mischievous frolics of a playful kitten.
For some weeks past we have had with us on the sea-shore a beautiful little Virginian girl,—one of the loveliest creatures alive,—who has a remarkable fondness for a pretty black and white kitten, belonging to the house. All day long she will have her pet in her arms, talking to her when she thinks nobody is near,—telling her every thing,—charging her to keep some story to herself, as it is a very great secret,—sometimes reproving her for faults, or praising her for being good. Her last thought on going to sleep, and the first on waking, is this kitten. She loves her so fondly, that her father has promised that she shall take her all the way to Virginia. We shall miss the frolicsome kitten much, but the dear child far more.
O, we’ll be so sad and lonely