Sally liked to keep them young as long as possible and she was glad that it was to be a late spring, for now, at the beginning of March, there was snow on the ground, and Elvira said to Miss Harvey, ‘It will be some time before we can let the kittens out-of-doors.’ So at present they were safe from the peril of meeting intruding cats or being chased by that villain Spot. Meanwhile Sally raced around the kitchen with her children and scampered up and down the stairs that led to the sewing-room as if she were their age and not a sober cat. ‘I am having my youth now,’ she said to Oxford, who was watching the three with his slightly superior air, as he looked up from his last mouthful of haddock. He was a little too lazy to join in the race, and he preferred to take his exercise out-of-doors. ‘Sally, you have learned to brace up,’ he said. This tale is ended, yet, not so, The kittens’ tails, they grow and grow. A tiger tail that’s tipped with white, A black one, Sally’s chief delight. When the Spring comes, with joyous purr, In coats of black, and tiger fur, They’ll hasten through the open door, The earth’s great wonders to explore. THE END TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_. Perceived typographical errors have been corrected. Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized. Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.