THE KITTEN. Joanna Baillie Alexander Huber Editor Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford
Broad Street Oxford OX1 3BG UK
Eighteenth-Century Poetry Archive
Taylor Institution Library St Giles' Oxford OX1 3NA UK info@eighteenthcenturypoetry.org https://www.eighteenthcenturypoetry.org/
Oxford This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Baillie, Joanna, 1762-1851. Fugitive Verses. By Joanna Baillie, author of “Dramas on the Passions,“ etc. London Edward Moxon, Dover Street. MDCCCXL. 1840 pp. 194-200.

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THE KITTEN . WANTON droll , whose harmless play Beguiles the rustic's closing day , When , drawn the evening fire about , Sit aged crone and thoughtless lout , And child upon his three-foot stool , Waiting till his supper cool , And maid , whose cheek outblooms the rose , As bright the blazing faggot glows , Who , bending to the friendly light , Plies her task with busy slight ; Come , shew thy tricks and sportive graces , Thus circled round with merry faces . Backward coiled and crouching low , With glaring eyeballs watch thy foe , The housewife's spindle whirling round , Or thread or straw that on the ground Its shadow throws , by urchin sly Held out to lure thy roving eye ; Then stealing onward , fiercely spring Upon the tempting faithless thing . Now , wheeling round with bootless skill , Thy bo-peep tail provokes thee still , As still beyond thy curving side Its jetty tip is seen to glide ; Till from thy centre starting far , Thou sidelong veer'st with rump in air Erected stiff , and gait awry , Like madam in her tantrums high ; Though ne'er a madam of them all , Whose silken kirtle sweeps the hall , More varied trick and whim displays To catch the admiring stranger's gaze . Doth power in measured verses dwell , All thy vagaries wild to tell ? Ah no ! — the start , the jet , the bound , The giddy scamper round and round , With leap and toss and high curvet , And many a whirling somerset , ( Permitted by the modern muse Expression technical to use ) These mock the deftest rhymester's skill , But poor in art though rich in will . The featest tumbler , stage bedight , To thee is but a clumsy wight , Who every limb and sinew strains To do what costs thee little pains ; For which , I trow , the gaping crowd Requite him oft with plaudits loud . But , stopped the while thy wanton play , Applauses too thy pains repay : For then , beneath some urchin's hand With modest pride thou takest thy stand , While many a stroke of kindness glides Along thy back and tabby sides . Dilated swells thy glossy fur , And loudly croons thy busy pur , As , timing well the equal sound , Thy clutching feet bepat the ground , And all their harmless claws disclose Like prickles of an early rose , While softly from thy whiskered cheek Thy half-closed eyes peer , mild and meek . But not alone by cottage fire Do rustics rude thy feats admire . The learned sage , whose thoughts explore The widest range of human lore , Or with unfettered fancy fly Through airy heights of poesy , Pausing smiles with altered air To see thee climb his elbow-chair , Or , struggling on the mat below , Hold warfare with his slippered toe . The widowed dame or lonely maid , Who , in the still but cheerless shade Of home unsocial , spends her age And rarely turns a lettered page , Upon her hearth for thee lets fall The rounded cork or paper ball , Nor chides thee on thy wicked watch , The ends of ravelled skein to catch , But lets thee have thy wayward will , Perplexing oft her better skill . Even he , whose mind of gloomy bent , In lonely tower or prison pent , Reviews the coil of former days , And loathes the world and all its ways , What time the lamp's unsteady gleam Hath roused him from his moody dream , Feels , as thou gambol'st round his seat , His heart of pride less fiercely beat , And smiles , a link in thee to find , That joins it still to living kind . Whence hast thou then , thou witless puss ! The magic power to charm us thus ? Is it that in thy glaring eye And rapid movements , we descry — Whilst we at ease , secure from ill , The chimney corner snugly fill — A lion darting on his prey , A tiger at his ruthless play ? Or is it that in thee we trace With all thy varied wanton grace , An emblem , viewed with kindred eye , Of tricky , restless infancy ? Ah ! many a lightly sportive child , Who hath like thee our wits beguiled , To dull and sober manhood grown , With strange recoil our hearts disown . And so , poor kit ! must thou endure , When thou becomest a cat demure , Full many a cuff and angry word , Chased roughly from the tempting board . But yet , for that thou hast , I ween , So oft our favoured play-mate been , Soft be the change which thou shalt prove ! When time hath spoiled thee of our love , Still be thou deemed by housewife fat A comely , careful , mousing cat , Whose dish is , for the public good , Replenished oft with savoury food . Nor , when thy span of life is past , Be thou to pond or dung-hill cast , But , gently borne on goodman's spade , Beneath the decent sod be laid ; And children shew with glistening eyes The place where poor old pussy lies .