Picture Dictionary and Books Logo
I had been looking steadily at the top of this hogshead for some minutes, and what now caused me surprise was the fact that I had not sooner perceived the object thereupon. Voice Reading
I approached it, and touched it with my hand. Voice Reading
It was a black cat-a very large one-fully as large as Pluto, and closely resembling him in every respect but one. Voice Reading
Pluto had not a white hair upon any portion of his body; but this cat had a large, although indefinite, splotch of white, covering nearly the whole region of the breast. Voice Reading
Upon my touching him, he immediately arose, purred loudly, rubbed against my hand, and appeared delighted with my notice. Voice Reading
This, then, was the very creature of which I was in search. Voice Reading
I at once offered to purchase it of the landlord; but this person made no claim to it-knew nothing of it-had never seen it before. Voice Reading
I continued my caresses, and when I prepared to go home, the animal evinced a disposition to accompany me. I permitted it to do so; occasionally stooping and patting it as I proceeded. When it reached the house it domesticated itself at once, and became immediately a great favorite with my wife. Voice Reading
For my own part, I soon found a dislike to it arising within me. Voice Reading
This was just the reverse of what I had anticipated; but-I know not how or why it was-its evident fondness for myself rather disgusted and annoyed me. Voice Reading
By slow degrees, these feelings of disgust and annoyance rose into the bitterness of hatred. Voice Reading
I avoided the creature; a certain sense of shame, and the remembrance of my former deed of cruelty, preventing me from physically abusing it. Voice Reading
I did not, for some weeks, strike, or otherwise violently ill-use it; but gradually-very gradually-I came to look upon it with unutterable loathing, and to flee silently from its odious presence, as from the breath of a pestilence. Voice Reading
What added, no doubt, to my hatred of the beast, was the discovery, on the morning after I brought it home, that, like Pluto, it also had been deprived of one of its eyes. Voice Reading
This circumstance, however, only endeared it to my wife, who, as I have already said, possessed, in a high degree, that humanity of feeling which had once been my distinguishing trait, and the source of many of my simplest and purest pleasures. Voice Reading
With my aversion to this cat, however, its partiality for myself seemed to increase. Voice Reading
It followed my footsteps with a pertinacity which it would be difficult to make the reader comprehend. Voice Reading
Whenever I sat, it would crouch beneath my chair, or spring upon my knees, covering me with its loathsome caresses. Voice Reading
If I arose to walk, it would get between my feet, and thus nearly throw me down, or, fastening its long and sharp claws in my dress, clamber, in this manner, to my breast. Voice Reading
At such times, although I longed to destroy it with a blow, I was yet withheld from so doing, partly by a memory of my former crime, but chiefly-let me confess it at once-by absolute dread of the beast. Voice Reading
This dread was not exactly a dread of physical evil-and yet I should be at a loss how otherwise to define it. Voice Reading
I am almost ashamed to own-yes, even in this felon's cell, I am almost ashamed to own-that the terror and horror with which the animal inspired me, had been heightened by one of the merest chimeras it would be possible to conceive. Voice Reading
My wife had called my attention, more than once, to the character of the mark of white hair, of which I have spoken, and which constituted the sole visible difference between the strange beast and the one I had destroyed. Voice Reading
The reader will remember that this mark, although large, had been originally very indefinite; but, by slow degrees-degrees nearly imperceptible, and which for a long time my reason struggled to reject as fanciful-it had, at length, assumed a rigorous distinctness of outline. Voice Reading
It was now the representation of an object that I shudder to name-and for this, above all, I loathed, and dreaded, and would have rid myself of the monster had I dared-it was now, I say, the image of a hideous-of a ghastly thing-of the Gallows!-oh, mournful and terrible engine of horror and of crime-of agony and of death! Voice Reading

Table of Contents