There was one objection to their evidence, which, inasmuch as it is patriotic, is honourable--they were foreigners, and therefore not to be believed.----Now, touching the justice of this sweeping decision much may be said; and it is by no means unpleasing to see that even in these days there is still a national prejudice against foreign habits and manners; the looseness of conduct, and general want of delicacy of the continental nations, are at variance with the pure and better regulated habits of our countrymen and countrywomen; and in Whittington's days it clearly appears that morality had so firmly established itself in England, that a foreigner was not to be credited on oath. In the instance of this nondescript lady, this feeling certainly had not so much weight as it might have had in many others, nor was the expression of it over-gallant, considering that she herself was a foreigner and educated, if St. Cas and other authors are to be believed, in one of the most licentious schools of continental incontinence. One strong argument against the credibility of these persons was the general venality of all the natives of the country they came from, which was so flagrant that a man might be bought for five shillings to swear any thing. The witnesses which the Cat lady intended, it appears, to produce in her defence, were all from the same nation--this objection, unfortunately for her, tells both ways. Be that as it may, it appears pretty evident, that at the period to which I am now alluding Whittington, whether voluntarily or not I cannot pretend to determine, was separated from the object of all his hopes and fears;--indeed, how the separation between them was brought about has puzzled all who have hitherto considered the subject: some writers suppose that she never had any superior or supernatural powers, but that she was altogether an impostor, others positively maintain (particularly one) that she was a person of prudence, wisdom, delicacy, and virtue.[45] Those who deny her existence at _any time_ in human shape are by no means few; amongst their number is, as we have seen, my excellent friend Doctor Snodgrass: these aver with every appearance of truth, that she was neither more nor less than a domestic cat, but that she was stolen from Whittington by the monks of the monastery "_Sancti Stephani apud Westmonasteriensis_," for the purpose of catching certain great rats which infested their chapel and the adjoining house, and that the poor Alderman cut a very ridiculous figure when deprived of his favourite raree-show. Some, on the other hand, incline to believe that Mr. Whittington got sick of his bargain, and assert that what with caterwauling and bringing crowds of followers into the gutters of his residence, she turned out to be so troublesome an inmate, that he got rid of her as soon as he could, and prevailed on an old maid in the neighbourhood to take care of her.[46]