For example, supposing he felt rainy weather approaching, he would walk about shaking himself, dragging his tail, and mewing continuously. Then he would seek out a good hiding-place where he could lie in warmth and shelter when the rain came.
But when fine weather was to be expected, he would appear with tail at the perpendicular, purring and humming with satisfaction.
In reality he was not only a professor of weather, he was more: he was a regular little meteorological observatory! Possibly the terrible treatment once meted out to him in his earlier days by his brutal father accounted for his weak, supersensitive nerves.
Brother Black—the fighter—whose frequent mad expeditions he followed at a distance in order to be at hand at the right time to beg his livelihood, soon learned to utilize his small brother’s eccentricity.
Black preferred hunting at nightfall; but if, during the day, when crouching at his gate-post stropping his claws, he observed Tiny walking about miauling and crying, he knew at once he must get away as early as possible: it would rain that night.
Black could never resist Tiny’s cadging. His admiring looks and respectful mien were too much for the fierce warrior.
In addition, the little fellow suffered seriously from vomiting. The excess of feathers and the insufficiency of meat comprising his diet soon ruined his digestion; he had to go out and chew harsh, bitter cock’s-foot grass the moment he awoke.
In spite of this, he was the sole humorist of the family—thanks to his unusually long tail, the vigour of which was so extraordinary that it gave the impression of being a separate personality. He would wipe his paws on it, or twist it right round his neck; it was a constant source of amusement; he could even play “postman’s knock” with it.
But on the whole, his abilities and characteristics were much below the average, and he might safely be expected to turn out a failure.
When, by chance or design, he did go out on his own, he succeeded occasionally in making a catch of some sort by means of his abnormally acute powers of observation.