IV.
THE CAT WHICH COULD NOT BE KILLED.
THERE were once a dog and a cat, who were always quarrelling. The dog used to beat the cat, but he never could hurt her. She would only dance about and cry, "You never hurt me, you never hurt me! I had a pain in my shoulder, but now it is all gone away." So the dog went to a maíná[1] and said, "What shall I do to hurt this cat? I beat her and I bite her, and yet I can't hurt her, I am such a big dog and she is rather a big cat, yet if I beat her I don't hurt her, but if she beats me she hurts me so much." The maíná said, "Bite her mouth very, very hard, and then you'll hurt her." "Oh, no," said the cat, who had just come up, laughing; "you won't hurt me at all." The dog bit her mouth as hard as he could. "Oh, you don't hurt me," said the cat, dancing about. So the dog went again to the maíná and said, "What shall I do?" "Bite her ears," said the maíná. So the dog bit the cat's ears, but she danced about and said, "Oh, you did not hurt me; now I can put earrings in my ears." So she put in earrings.
The dog went to the elephant. "Can you kill this cat? she worries me so every day." "Oh, yes," said the elephant, "of course I can kill her. She is so little and I am so big." Then the elephant came and took her up with his trunk, and threw her a long way. Up she jumped at once and danced
- ↑ A kind of starling.
