The Poor Cat

An Englishman once had a cat which he loved very much. He ordered his cook to give it a pound of meat every day, but the cat grew thinner and thinner. One morning, the owner of the cat noticed that the poor animal was a shadow of its former self. He called the cook and asked, "Do you give the cat its pound of meat every day? Did you give it its meat this morning?"

"Of course, I did," the cook replied.

The cat’s owner refused to believe him. "You are lying," he said, "you put the money into your own pocket or you eat the meat yourself, you greedy dog. Bring me the scales and we shall see!"

The cat weighed just one pound.

"There!" said the cook, as he pointed to the cat on the scales, "you can see now with your own eyes that I gave him his pound of meat this morning."

"Well," was the reply, "if that is the pound of meat, where is the cat?"