His remarkable hair, and the rarity of guinea-pigs, combined to make him an acquisition to the circus company. ‘Choose something bright and fanciful; I will shape it and sew it. And pray remember hairpins!’ said the Dormouse Xarifa, who was clever with her needle. So Sandy in the course of his shopping paid a visit to the milliner’s.

The Misses Matilda and Louisa Pussycat kept shop in a tiny steep three-storied house, with an overhanging upper floor. Each floor came forward over the story below; it made the shop rather dark for matching ribbons.

In the attic Matilda Pussycat, leaning out of the window, could talk to Tabby Whitefoot across the way, at the staircase window of the post office opposite. The street door opened down a step into the house. On the right-hand side of the passage was a tiny parlour, containing a polished mahogany table and three chairs with horse-hair seats. On a side table were the tea tray and the best tea service, and some shells and coral under a bell glass. By the fireplace were two wicker chairs with pink cushions. Some black silhouette portraits of cat ancestors hung on the wall; and on the mantelpiece stood a pot snuffbox figure, shaped like an owl. Its head took off, and the box body contained pins and buttons; not snuff. The muslin curtains were spotlessly white.

On the other side of the passage was the milliner’s shop, and a dark little kitchen behind it. The Misses Pussycats lived principally in the kitchen. It was well supplied with the usual assortment of pots and pans, shelves, milk jugs, crooks for hanging things, a deal table, stools, and a corner cupboard. The only unusual feature in the kitchen was a small window under the plate rail. This window did not look out of doors like other windows; it looked into the shop. If a customer came in, Miss Louisa Pussycat applied her eye to the window, to see who it was. Once when she looked through, she saw a duck who had come into the shop without quacking.

Sandy came in from the street and lifted the latch of the shop door; it had a tinkling bell – ‘Bow, wow! Shop there! Bow wow!’ barked Sandy, rapping on the counter. Miss Louisa Pussycat’s eye appeared at the little window. She put on a clean apron and came in behind the counter. ‘Good morning, Mr. Alexander! I hope I see you well? What can I have the pleasure of showing you?’ ‘First rate, Miss Louisa! And how’s yourself and Miss Matilda this cold weather?’ ‘I am very well, I thank you, Mr. Sandy; but I regret to say that my sister, Miss Matilda Pussycat, has neuralgia. A fishbone, Mr. Sandy, a fishbone embedded between her wisdom teeth; it has caused a gumboil or abscess, accompanied by swelling. She has eaten nothing but slops for a fortnight.’ ‘That would disagree with me,’ said Sandy. ‘Indeed, my poor sister Matilda is becoming as “thin as a cat’s lug”, as the saying is. But the spring fashions are a great divertissement and alleviation, Mr. Sandy. See here what a sweet thing in collars, Mr.