of our punctuality.  What she detests are noise, confusion, people who bustle in and out of rooms, and the unpardonable intrusions of the housemaid.  On those unhappy days when I am driven from my desk by the iron determination of this maid to “clean up,” my cat is as comfortless as I am.  Companions in exile, we wander aimlessly to and fro, lamenting our lost hours.  I cannot explain to Lux that the fault is none of mine, and I am sure that she holds me to blame.

There is something indescribably sweet in the quiet, self-respecting friendliness of my cat, in her marked predilection for my society.  The absence of exuberance on her part, and the restraint I put upon myself, lend an element of dignity to our intercourse.  Assured that I will not presume too far on her good nature, that I will not indulge in any of those gross familiarities, those boisterous gambols which delight the heart of a dog, Lux yields herself more and more passively to my persuasions.  She will permit an occasional caress, and acknowledge it with a perfunctory purr.  She will manifest a patronizing interest in my work, stepping sedately among my papers, and now and then putting her paw with infinite deliberation on the page I am writing, as though the smear thus contributed spelt, “Lux, her mark,” and was a reward of merit.  But she never curls herself upon my desk, never usurps the place sacred to the memory of a far dearer cat.  Some invisible influence restrains her.  When her tour of inspection is ended, she returns to her chair by my side, stretching herself luxuriously on her cushions, and watching with steady, sombre stare the inhibited spot, and the little grey phantom which haunts my lonely hours by right of my inalienable love.

Lux is a lazy cat, wedded to a contemplative life.  She cares little for play, and nothing for work,—­the appointed work of cats.  The notion that she has a duty to perform, that she owes service to the home which shelters her, that only those who toil are worthy of their keep, has never entered her head.  She is content to drink the cream of idleness, and she does this in a spirit of condescension, wonderful to behold.  The dignified distaste with which she surveys a dinner not wholly to her liking, carries confusion to the hearts of her servitors.  It is as though Lucullus, having ordered Neapolitan peacock, finds himself put off with nightingales’ tongues.

For my own part, I like to think that my beautiful and urbane companion is not a midnight assassin.  Her profound and soulless indifference to mice pleases me better than it pleases my household.  From an economic point of view, Lux is not worth her salt.  Huxley’s cat, be it remembered, was never known to attack anything larger and fiercer than a butterfly.  “I doubt whether he has the heart to kill a mouse,” wrote the proud possessor of this prodigy; “but I saw him catch and eat the first butterfly of the season, and I trust that the germ of courage thus manifested may develop with years into efficient mousing.”