"The cat, with eyne of burning coal,
Now couches 'fore the mouse's hole."
How keenly descriptive of the struggle we have all of us witnessed between Pussy's caution and cupidity, is Lady Macbeth's scornful jibe:—
"Letting I dare not wait upon I would,
Like the poor cat i' the adage."
Yet in all this there is no touch of kindness; and when we go further, we fare worse.
"Every cat and dog.
And little mouse, every unworthy thing,"
moans Romeo, who ought to have been ashamed of such a speech, even in the extremity of his anguish.
"Creatures vile, as cats and dogs,
Of no esteem;"
says Cornelius in "Cymbeline."
"Hang off, thou cat, thou burr: vile thing, let loose!"
cries Lysander to poor Hermia; and Bertram, in "All's Well that Ends Well," must needs air his unwelcome views.
"I could endure anything before but a cat, and now he's a cat to me:"
is the angry word he flings at Parolles; and, as his resentment flames hotter and hotter, he can apparently find no more stinging reproach:—
"He is more and more a cat."
"He's a cat still."
