Letters from a Cat

As soon as he saw me, he set the lamp down on the cellar bottom, and laughed so that he could hardly move. I thought this was the most cruel thing I ever heard of. If I had not been, as it were, at death's door, I should have laughed at him, too, for even with my eyes full of that dreadful stuff, I could see that he looked very funny in his red night-cap, and without his teeth. He called out to Mary, and your mother, who stood at the head of the stairs, "Come down, come down; here's the cat in the soft-soap barrel!" and then he laughed again, and they both came down the stairs laughing, even your dear kind mother, who I never could have believed would laugh at any one in such trouble. They did not seem to know what to do at first; nobody wanted to touch me; and I began to be afraid I should drown while they stood looking at me, for I knew much better than they could how weak I was from holding on to the edge of the barrel so long. At last your grandfather swore that oath of his,--you know the one I mean, the one he always swears when he is very sorry for anybody,--and lifted me out by the nape of my neck, holding me as far off from him as he could, for the soft soap ran off my legs and tail in streams. He carried me up into the kitchen, and put me down in the middle of the floor, and then they all stood round me, and laughed again, so loud that they waked up the cook, who came running out of her bedroom with her tin candlestick and a chair in her hand, thinking that robbers were breaking in. At last your dear mother said, "Poor pussy, it is too bad to laugh at you, when you are in such pain" (I had been thinking so for some time). "Mary, bring the small washtub. The only thing we can do is to wash her."