The Press., 1891-03-05

uxR, Out Ad0 uCVCK SCOA eshy' AAO oceASS which the Maltese cat had told about her experiences with the favorite weed before she left her kittenhood home in Maine had been handed around among the other cats of Colorado as quaint legends. All the other cats had heard tell of the subtle glories of catnip, but none had ever beheld or even whiffed the grateful herb.
 "Wherei" asked twenty young cats in chorus
 ''Ohl don't know" replied the old Mall tese cat, t'but can smell it, and m going to follow up the trail until find it."
 With these portentous words the old Maltese cat whisked her tail, gave wild "Wee-ow," and started on run for Den yer, 300 miles away.
 "Wee-ow-owv' cried the other cats-and the kittens too-and off they started for Denver, giving the old Maltese a hot race over hill and valley, peak and plain, mead and wold.
 The word passed around, and the cry went up here and there like wildfre, Cat nipi catnip! catnipl We're going to get some catnipp' The tidings reached Alamo sa, and ran along the whole of the mountain range of Colorado. The excitement was intense-cats hurried from every house, cabin, barn, stable. shed and mine, and joined the vast procession. Every city, H. serted by its cat population. Such yowl- ing had never before been heard, such seething army of cats had never been seen. The miner in his lonely hut, hearing the awful rush, sprang from his cot and cried: 1.-The snow slidel the snow slidel Run for your livesr' But it was only the cats on the gallop to Denveri Oh it was pro- digious spectacle, and the old Maltese cat led the vani
 Judge Toll was dreaming pleasant dreams that night, when he was awak- ened therefrom by din which threw him into cold sweat. He crawled out of his bed, slipped anxieusly into rhis trousers, seized his faithful shotgun and stole softly to the window The strange noise seemed to come from the front yard-yes, from the rows of catnip bushes.
 Then the judge peered out of the win dow, and what do you think he saw?
 Myriads of cats-billows of cats! Cats of every size, weight, color, sex, condition and description. Black cats, white cats, tabbie cats, Maltese cats, tortoise shell cats, brindle cats, spotted cats, striped cats, brown cats, yellow cats, mauve cats, gamboge cats, long cats, short cats, tall cats, fat cats, lean cats, stump tailed cats, one cared cats, wall eyed cats, three legged cats, mamma cats, papa cats. and kittens Ou, yCSs AAtOCAS OA OSOAy AAA0 anu "AoAO0e number! And there they were in Judge Tolls front yard, among and on the rows of catnip bushes-purring, sprawling, yowl- ing like so many demons.
 "Pur-r-r," said the old, wayback Maltese cat, all the way from Del lNorte-"purr-r-rl ohI isn't this lovely? It's the first catnip I've had in going on twenty-five years purr-r-rl thank heaven that have lived to see this grateful fruit introduced into the Rocky mountain region"
 And then all the other cats-there must have been million of them-purred in chorus so loud that it sounded like an awful, lingering peal of thunder. But this was not all Oh, mol By the bright moon light Judge Toll could see myriads and myriads of other.cats surging down from the mountain ranges and through the val leys and over the plains-from George town, Salida, Idaho, Golden, Boulder, Crested Butte, Tmcup, San Juan, Pueblo, Chucharas, Buena Vista, Conejos, Duran go, Manitou, Leadville, Ouray, Huerfano, Kokoma, Monument, Rosita, Saguache and Trinidad-the foothills were alive with cats, the mountain peaks swarmed with cats, and cats, cats, cats swept along like swirling torrent toward one focal point, Judge Tolls catnip bedl
 And, lol the cats were coming from other Ul1CCL1U0S, tOO-1tUIu tU0 StIko pAtakuS Ol Kansas and from Deer Trail, from Monot- ony Water Tank and from the dreary con. fines of Nebraska The breeze blowing from the north brought the noise. vast armies of eats on their way from Laramie and Cheyennef 1
 The cats already in the judges front yard-how they purred and writhed and yowled, and how the sparks of electricity shot from their furry backs as they rubbed affectionately up against the rows of cat nipl It was in fact carnival-a cat sat urnaliai
 The judge said to himself, "I will shoot in among all these trespassers and drive them away. What right have they todev astate my beauteous exotics?"
 But then camethe second better thought Would it not be cruel to deprive thest creatures of the long denied pleasure they were now enjoying in the catnip bedi Nons of them, save the old Maltese, had ever be fore seen or tasted the precious herb; they knew of it only from the legendary lort with which the old way-back Maltese cal had regaled them, their fathers, theil mothers, their granfnnothers, their grand fathers, and so on ad infnitum.
 And the more Judge Toll thought il over the more he became satisfied that h, ought, in all humanity, to let the cats stay and enjoy the catnip. So at last he went back to his bed and renewed his slumbel as best he could. When he got up next morning and looked into his front yard not a cat was to be seen nor yet vestige of the catnip either. Th' turf was widely rent and torn up, anG every leaf, twig, sprig and root of catnil had disappeared. It was eonjectured tha' the cats took it all awxy with them. The! must have had terrible battle over thu remnants of the feast, for here and ther' on the despoiled turf lay eyes and ears ane bits of tails and tufts of fur-silent bu eloquent evidences of the last tragic seem of all.-Eugene Field.
 HEED THE WARN1Na.-It is not infrequentl the case that itching pimples and irritatin 'cat boils'' are the forerunner of larger boilt or the more serious carbuncles. Invariabl Nature nuta out her danoar siona1s and the