Well, I think the most beautiful sight in the world is our little family on these chilly, east-windy nights as we gather in the sitting-room about bedtime.
First there is our dear mistress, Mrs. Darley. She is a widow with two adopted children—Billy and Margaret. After dinner they go to the study to learn their lessons, and Mrs. Darley sits for a little while with us before she goes to join them. We cats are allowed to run all over the house, but we usually prefer the sitting-room, because there is the broad window-seat for sunny mornings, and the cushions by the fire for dull weather.
Mrs. Darley always takes my mother on her lap, because she is the chief favorite, and because she has suffered so much. I am not ashamed to say that my mother was an ash-barrel cat before Mrs. Darley rescued her. That is, she was a poor cat who had to pick up her living in back yards. She is a grayish, wistful-looking creature with a quiet manner. Her name is Dust-and-Ashes. She knows a good deal, but she doesn't talk much.
My father, whose name is the Piebald Prince, is an Angora. He is very handsome, very aristocratic, very dignified, but not at all proud. He says he believes it is wrong to call any cat common or unclean. Persian cats, and Angora cats, and New Mexico cats, and Manx cats, and all kinds of cats should be treated in just the same way, and have an equal amount of respect shown them.
He always makes my mother take a front seat if there is company, and he treats her with as much consideration as if she, like himself, had come from the celebrated farm up in Maine, where only pure bred cats are raised, and where they cost great sums of money.
Many a cuff—a gentlemanly cuff—I have had from him for being disrespectful to my mother. He believes in keeping us young ones in order.
Besides myself there is my sister Serena, and my brother Jimmy Dory.
They are both much older than I am. Serena is a very clever little cat. She has beautiful manners, and purrs a good deal to herself about culture. She and Jimmy are both half Angora, and half common cat. So I am, too, for that matter, but they are much better looking than I am. My father is black and white, and we are black and white; but his black and white and Serena and Jimmy Dory's black and white are laid on prettily.