had not been for Johnny and Rosy Chapman, there would never have been this nice story to tell about Mammy Tittleback: for Phil and Fred are big boys, and do not care very much about cats; they like to see them around, and to make them comfortable; but Johnny and Rosy are quite different. Johnny is only eight and Rosy six, and they love cats and kittens better than anything else in the world; and when they went to spend this last summer at their Uncle Frank Wellington's, and found Mammy Tittleback with six little kittens, just born, they thought such a piece of luck never had happened before to two children.

Juniper and Mousiewary had been born the year before. Phil named these. Juniper was a splendid great fellow, nearly all white. At first he was called "Junior," but they changed it afterward to "Juniper," because, as Phil said, they didn't know what his father's name was, and there wasn't any sense in calling him "Junior," and, besides, "Juniper" sounded better.

Mousiewary was white, with a black and yellow head. Phil called her "Mousiewary" because she would lie still so long watching for a mouse. She was a year and a half old when Johnny and Rosy went to their Uncle Frank's for this visit, and she had two little kittens of her own that could just run about. They were wild little things, and very fierce, so Phil had called them the Imps. But Johnny and Rosy soon got them so tame that this name did not suit them any longer, and then they named them over again "Beauty" and "Clover."

Mammy Tittleback's second family of kittens were born in the barn, on the hay. After a while she moved them into an old wagon that was not used. This was very clever of her, because they could not get out of the wagon and run away. But pretty soon she moved them again, to a place which the children did not approve of at all; it was a sort of hollow in the ground, under a great pile of fence rails that were lying near the cowshed.

"After a while she moved them into an old wagon that was not used."—Page 14.

This did not seem a nice place, and the children could not imagine why she moved them there. I think, myself, she moved them to try and hide them away from the children. I don't believe she thought it was good for the kittens to be picked up so many times a day, and handled, and kissed, and talked to. I dare say she thought they'd never have a chance to grow if she couldn't hide them away from Johnny and Rosy for a few weeks. You see, Johnny and Rosy never left them alone for half a day. They were always carrying them about. When people came to the house to see their Aunt Mary, the children would cry, "Don't you want to see our six kittens? We'll bring them in to you." Then they would run out to the barn, take a basket, fill it half full of hay, and very gently lay all the kittens in it, and Johnny would take one handle and Rosy the other, and bring it to the house. They always put Mammy Tittleback in too; but before they had carried her far, she generally jumped out, and walked the rest of the way by their side. She would never leave them a minute till they had carried the kittens safe back again to their nest. She did not try to prevent their taking them, for she knew that neither Johnny nor Rosy would hurt one of them any more than she would; but I have no doubt in her heart she disliked to have the kittens touched.

"Johnny would take one handle, and Rosy the other, and bring it to the house."—Page 16.

The children worried a great deal about this last place that Mammy Tittleback had selected for her nursery. They thought it was damp; and they were afraid the rails would fall down some day and crush the poor little kittens to death; and what was worst of all, very often when they went there to look at them, they could not get any good sight of them at all, they would be so far in among the rails.

At last a bright idea struck Johnny. He said he would build a nice house for them.

"You can't," said Rosy.

"I can too," said Johnny. "'Twon't be a house such as folks live in, but it'll do for cats."

"Will it be as nice as a dog's house, Johnny?" asked Rosy.

"Nicer," said Johnny; "that is, it'll be prettier. 'Twon't be so close. Cats don't need it so close; but it'll be prettier. It's going to have flags on it."

"Flags! O Johnny!" exclaimed Rosy. "That'll be splendid; but we haven't got any flags."

"I know where I can get as many as I want," said Johnny,—"down to the club-room. They give flags to boys there."

"What for, Johnny?" asked Rosy.

"Oh, just to carry," replied Johnny proudly. "They like to have boys carrying their flags round."

"Do you suppose they'll like to have them on a cat's house?" asked Rosy.

"Why not?" said Johnny; and Rosy did not know what to say.

Very hard Johnny worked on the house; and it was a queer-looking house when it was done, but it was the only one I ever heard of that was built on purpose for cats. It was about eight feet square; the central support of it was an old saw-horse turned up endwise, with a mason's trestle on top; the roof was made of old rails, and had two slopes to it, like real houses' roofs; the sides were uneven, because on one side the rails rested on an old pig-trough, and on the other on a wooden trestle which was higher than the trough. This unevenness troubled Johnny, but it really made the house prettier. The space under this roof was divided by rows of small stakes into three compartments,—one large one for Mammy Tittleback and her six youngest kittens; Mousiewary and her two kittens in another smaller room; and the adopted kittens and Juniper in a third. I haven't told you yet about the adopted kittens, but I will presently. These three rooms had each a tin pan set in the middle, and fixed firm in its place by small stakes driven into the ground around it. Johnny was determined to teach the cats to keep in their own rooms, and that each family must eat by itself. It wasn't so hard to bring this about as you would have supposed, because Johnny and Rosy spent nearly all their time with the cats, and every time any cat or kitten stepped over the little wall of stakes into the apartment of another family, it was very gently lifted up and put back again into its own room, and stroked and told in gentle voice,—

"Stay in your own room, kitty."

And at meal-times there was very little trouble, after the first few days, with anybody but Juniper. All the