As Kittykin grew a little she developed a temper entirely out of proportion to her size; when she got mad, she got mad all over. If anything offended her she would suddenly back up into a corner, her tail would get about twice as large as usual, and she would spit like a little fury. However, she never fought her little mistress, and even in her worst moments she would allow Evelyn to take her and lay her on her back in the little cradle she had, or carry her by the neck, or the legs, or almost any way except by the tail. To pull her tail was a liberty she never would allow even Evelyn to take. If she was held by the tail her little pink claws flew out as quick as a wink and as sharp as needles. Evelyn was very kind to Kittykin, however, and was careful not to provoke her, for she had been told that getting angry and kicking on the floor, as she herself sometimes did when mammy wanted to comb her curly hair, would make an ugly little girl, and of course it would have the same effect on a kitten. Fierce, however, as Kittykin was, it soon appeared that she was the greatest little coward in the world. A worm in the walk or a little beetle running across the floor would set her to jumping as if she had a fit, and the first time she ever saw a mouse she was far more afraid of it than it was of her. If it had been a rat, I am sure that she would have died. One day Evelyn was sitting on the floor in her mother’s chamber sewing a little blue bag, which she said was her work-bag, when a tiny mouse ran, like a little gray shadow, across the hearth. Kittykin was at the moment busily engaged in rolling about a ball of yarn almost as white as herself, and the first thing Evelyn knew she gave a jump like a trap-ball, and slid up the side of the bureau like a little shaft of light, where she stood with all four feet close together, her small back roached up in an arch, her tail all fuzzed up over it, and her mouth wide open and spitting like a little demon. She looked so funny that Evelyn dropped her sewing, and the mouse, frightened half out of its little wits, took advantage of her consternation to make a rush back to its hole under the wainscoting, into which it dived like a little duck. After holding her lofty position for some time, Kittykin let her hairs fall and lowered her back, but every now and then she would raise them again at the bare thought of the awful animal which had so terrified her. At length she decided that she might go down; but how was she to do it? Smooth though the mahogany was, she had, under excitement, gone up like a streak of lightning; but now when she was cool she was afraid to jump down. It was so high that it made her head swim; so, after walking timidly around and peeping over at the floor, she began to cry for some one to take her down, just as Evelyn would have done under the same circumstances.