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CATS: Their Points and Characteristics.




[Illustration: "SHIPMATES."]




  "CATS:"

  THEIR POINTS AND CHARACTERISTICS,
  WITH CURIOSITIES OF CAT LIFE,
  AND A CHAPTER ON FELINE AILMENTS.


  BY _W. GORDON STABLES, M.D., C.M., R.N._,
  AUTHOR OF
  "MEDICAL LIFE IN THE NAVY," "WILD ADVENTURES IN THE FAR NORTH,"
  THE "NEWFOUNDLAND AND WATCH DOG," IN WEBB'S BOOK ON DOGS,
  ETC. ETC.


  LONDON: DEAN & SON,
  ST. DUNSTAN'S BUILDINGS, 160A, FLEET STREET, E.C.




CONTENTS.


  VOL. I.

  CHAPTER.                                                PAGE

      I. APOLOGETIC                                          1

     II. PUSSY ON HER NATIVE HEARTH                          3

    III. PUSSY'S LOVE OF CHILDREN                           26

     IV. PUSSY "POLL"                                       36

      V. SAGACITY OF CATS                                   44

     VI. A CAT THAT KEEPS THE SABBATH                       61

    VII. HONEST CATS                                        64

   VIII. THE PLOUGHMAN'S "MYSIE"                            70

     IX. TENACITY OF LIFE IN CATS                           74

      X. NOMADISM IN CATS                                   87

     XI. "IS CATS TO BE TRUSTED?"                           94

    XII. PUSSY AS A MOTHER                                 109

   XIII. HOME TIES AND AFFECTIONS                          125

    XIV. FISHING EXPLOITS                                  141

     XV. THE ADVENTURES OF BLINKS                          151

    XVI. HUNTING EXPLOITS                                  190

   XVII. COCK-JOCK AND THE CAT                             200

  XVIII. NURSING VAGARIES                                  209

    XIX. PUSSY'S PLAYMATES                                 221

     XX. PUSSY AND THE HARE                                230

    XXI. THE MILLER'S FRIEND. A TALE                       235

  ADDENDA. CONTAINING THE NAMES AND ADDRESSES OF THE
           VOUCHERS FOR THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE
           ANECDOTES                                       267


  VOL. II.

  CHAPTER.                                                PAGE

     I. ORIGIN AND ANTIQUITY OF THE DOMESTIC CAT           278

    II. CLASSIFICATION AND POINTS                          285

   III. PUSSY'S PATIENCE AND CLEANLINESS                   307

    IV. TRICKS AND TRAINING                                319

     V. CRUELTY TO CATS                                    329

    VI. PARLIAMENTARY PROTECTION FOR THE DOMESTIC CAT      356

   VII. FELINE AILMENTS                                    366

  VIII. ODDS AND ENDS                                      387

    IX. THE TWO "MUFFIES." A TALE                          410

     X. BLACK TOM, THE SKIPPER'S IMP. A TALE               440

  ADDENDA. CONTAINING THE NAMES AND ADDRESSES OF THE
           VOUCHERS FOR THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE
           ANECDOTES                                       479




SPRATT'S PATENT

CAT FOOD.

[Illustration: TRADE MARK.]

It has long been considered that the food given to that useful domestic
favourite, the CAT, is the sole cause of all the diseases it suffers from;
nearly all Cats in towns are fed on boiled horseflesh, in many cases
diseased and conveying disease.

This Food is introduced to entirely supersede the present unwholesome
practice; it is made from pure fresh beef and other sound materials, not
from horseflesh or other deleterious substances. It will be found the
cheapest food to preserve the health and invigorate the constitution,
prolong the existence, and extend the usefulness, gentleness, and
cleanliness of the Cat.

_Sold in 1d. Packets only. Each Packet contains sufficient to feed a Cat
for two days. The wrapper of every Packet is the same in colour, and bears
the Trade Mark as above, and the name of the Patentee, and no other Packet
is genuine._


DIRECTIONS FOR USE.

Mix the food with a little milk or water, making it crumbly moist, not
sloppy.

SPRATT'S PATENT MEAT FIBRINE DOG CAKES, 22_s._ per cwt., Carriage Paid.

SPRATT'S PATENT POULTRY FOOD, 22_s._ per cwt., Carriage Paid.

SPRATT'S PATENT GRANULATED PRAIRIE MEAT CRISSEL, 28_s._ per cwt., Carriage
Paid.

_Address--SPRATT'S PATENT_,

HENRY STREET, BERMONDSEY STREET, TOOLEY STREET, S.E.




  TO
  LADY MILDRED BERESFORD-HOPE,
  AND
  LADY DOROTHY NEVILL,
  THIS WORK
  Is dedicated
  With feelings of regard and esteem,
  BY
  THE AUTHOR.




  CAT MEDICINE CHEST,

  _Beautifully fitted up with everything necessary
  to keep Pussy in Health, or to Cure her when Ill._

  The Medicines are done up in a new form, now
  introduced for the first time, are easy to
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  A NICELY FINISHED ARTICLE,

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  LONDON: DEAN & SON,
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  Valentine, Birthday, Christmas, and Easter Card
  Manufacturers,

  ST. DUNSTAN'S BUILDINGS, 160A, FLEET STREET.




CATS.




CHAPTER I.

[_See Note A, Addenda._]

APOLOGETIC.


"If ye mane to write a preface to your book, sure you must put it in the
end entoirely."

Such was the advice an Irish friend gave me, when I talked of an
introductory chapter to the present work on cats. I think it was a good
one. Whether it be owing to our style of living now-a-days, which tends
more to the development of brain than muscle; or whether it be, as Darwin
says, that we really are descended from the ape, and, as the years roll
on, are losing that essentially animal virtue--patience; certainly it is
true that we cannot tolerate prefaces, preludes, and long graces before
meat, as our grandfathers did. A preface, like Curacoa--and--B, before
dinner, ought to be short and sweet: something merely to give an edge to
appetite, or it had as well be put in the "end entoirely," or better
still, in the fire.

I presume, then, the reader is fond of the domestic cat; if only for the
simple reason that God made it. Yes; God made it, and man mars it. Pussy
is an ill-used, much persecuted, little understood, and greatly slandered
animal. It is with the view, therefore, of gaining for our little fireside
friend a greater meed of justice than she has hitherto obtained, of
removing the ban under which she mostly lives, and making her life a more
pleasant and happy one, that the following pages are written; and I shall
deem it a blessing if I am _in any way_ successful. I have tried to paint
pussy just as she is, without the aid of "putty and varnish;" and I have
been at no small pains to prove the authenticity of the various anecdotes,
and can assure the reader that they are all _strictly true_.




CHAPTER II.

[_See Note B, Addenda._]

PUSSY ON HER NATIVE HEARTH.


"It wouldn't have surprised me a bit, doctor," said my gallant captain to
me, on the quarter-deck of the saucy _Pen-gun_,--"It wouldn't have
surprised me a bit, if they had sent you on board, minus the head. A nice
thing that would have been, with so many hands sick."

"And rather unconvenient for me," I added, stroking my neck.

I had been explaining to the gentleman, that my reason for not being off
the night before, was my finding myself on the desert side of the gates of
Aden after sun-down. A strange motley cut-throat band I had found myself
among, too. Wild Somalis, half-caste Indian Jews, Bedouin Arabs, and burly
Persian merchants, all armed with sword and spear and shield, and long
rifles that, judging by their build, seemed made to shoot round corners.
Strings of camels lay on the ground; and round each camp-fire squatted
these swarthy sons of the desert, engaged in talking, eating, smoking, or
quarrelling, as the case might be. Unless at Falkirk tryst, I had never
been among such a parcel of rogues in my life. I myself was armed to the
teeth: that is, I had nothing but my tongue wherewith to defend myself. I
could not help a feeling of insecurity taking possession of me; there
seemed to be a screw that wanted tightening somewhere about my neck. Yet I
do not now repent having spent that night in the desert, as it has
afforded me the opportunity of settling that long-disputed question--the
origin of the domestic cat.

Some have searched Egyptian annals for the origin of their pet, some
Persian, and some assert they can trace its descent from the days of Noah.
I can go a long way beyond that. It is difficult to get over the flood,
though; but I suppose my typical cat belonged to some one of the McPherson
clan. McPhlail was telling McPherson, that he could trace his genealogy
from the days of Noah.

"And mine," said the rival clansman, "from nine hundred years before
that."

"But the flood, you know?" hinted the McPhlail.

"And did you ever hear of a Phairson that hadn't a boat of his own?" was
the indignant retort.

In the midst of a group of young Arabs, was one that attracted my special
attention. He was an old man who looked, with his snow-white beard, his
turban and robes, as venerable as one of Dore's patriarchs. In sonorous
tones, in his own noble language, he was reading from a book in his lap,
while one arm was coiled lovingly round a beautiful long-haired cat.
Beside this man I threw myself down. The fierceness of his first glance,
which seemed to resent my intrusion, melted into a smile as sweet as a
woman's, when I began to stroke and admire his cat. Just the same story
all the world over,--praise a man's pet and he'll do anything for you;
fight for you, or even lend you money. That Arab shared his supper with
me.

"Ah! my son," he said, "more than my goods, more than my horse, I love my
cat. She comforts me. More than the smoke she soothes me. Allah is great
and good; when our first mother and father went out into the mighty desert
alone, He gave them two friends to defend and comfort them--the dog and
the cat. In the body of the cat He placed the spirit of a gentle woman; in
the dog the soul of a brave man. It is true, my son; the book hath it."

After this I remained for some time speculatively silent.

The old man's story may be taken--according to taste--with or without a
grain of salt; but we must admit it is as good a way of accounting for
domestic pussy's origin as any other.

There really is, moreover, a great deal of the woman's nature in the cat.
Like a woman, pussy prefers a settled home to leading a roving life. Like
a true woman, she is fond of fireside comforts. Then she is so gentle in
all her ways, so kind, so loving, and so forgiving. On your return from
business, the very look of her honest face, as she sits purring on the
hearth-rug, with the pleasant adjuncts of a bright fire and hissing
tea-urn, tends to make you forget all the cares of the day. When you are
dull and lonely, how often does her "punky humour," her mirth-provoking
attitudes and capers banish ennui. And if you are ill, how carefully she
will watch by your bedside and keep you company. How her low song will
lull you, her soft caresses soothe you, giving you more real consolation
from the looks of concern exhibited on her loving little face, than any
language could convey.

On the other hand, like a woman, she is prying and curious. A locked
cupboard is often a greater source of care and thought to pussy, than the
secret chamber was to the wife of Blue Beard. I'm sure it is only because
she cannot read that she refrains from opening your letters of a morning,
and only because she cannot speak that she keeps a secret. Like a woman,
too, she dearly loves a gossip, and will have it too, even if it be by
night on the tiles, at the risk of keeping the neighbours awake. Oh! I'm
far from sure that the Arab isn't right, after all.

Pussy, from the very day she opens her wondering eyes and stares vacantly
around her, becomes an object worthy of study and observation. Indeed,
kittens, even before their eyes are opened, will know your voice or hand,
and spit at a stranger's. The first year of pussy's existence is certainly
the happiest. No creature in the world is so fond of fun and mischief as a
kitten. Everything that moves or is movable, from its mother's tail to the
table-cloth, must minister to its craze for a romp; but what pen could
describe its intense joy, its pride and self-satisfaction, when, for the
first time it has caught a real live mouse? This is as much an episode in
the life of a kitten, as her first ball is to a young lady just out. Nor
do well-trained and properly-fed cats ever lose this innate sense of fun,
and love of the ridiculous. They lose their teeth first. I have seen
demure old cats, of respectable matronly aspect,--cats that ought to have
known better,--leave their kittens when only a day old, and gambol
round the room after a cork till tired and giddy.

[Illustration: BLACK and WHITE.

First Prize--Owned by J. BRADDEN, ESQ.]

[Illustration: WILD CAT (Half-Bred).

First Prize--Owned by A. H. SEAGER, ESQ.]

Cats of the right sort never fail to bring their kittens up in the way
they should go, and soon succeed in teaching them all they know
themselves. They will bring in living mice for them, and always take more
pride in the best warrior-kitten than in the others. They will also
inculcate the doctrine of cleanliness in their kits, so that the carpet
shall never be wet. I have often been amused at seeing my own cat bringing
kitten after kitten to the sand-box, and showing it how to use it, in
action explaining to them what it was there for. When a little older, she
entices them out to the garden.

Cats can easily be taught to be polite and well-mannered. It depends upon
yourself, whether you allow your favourite to sit either on your shoulder
or on the table at meal-times, or to wait demurely on the hearth till you
have finished. In any case, her appetite should never get the better of
her good manners.

"We always teach our cats," writes a lady to me, "to wait patiently while
the family are at their meals, after which they are served. Although we
never keep a dish for them standing in a corner, as some people do, yet we
never had a cat-thief. Our Tom and Topsy used to sit on a chair beside my
brother, near the table, with only their heads under the level of it. They
would peep up occasionally to see if the meal were nearly over; but on
being reminded that their time had not come, they would immediately close
their eyes and feign to be asleep.

"Poor old Tom knew the time my brother came in from business, and if five
or ten minutes past his time, he would go to the door and listen, then
come back to the fireside showing every symptom of impatience and anxiety.
He knew the footsteps of every member of the family, and would start up,
before the human ear could detect a sound, and hasten to the door to
welcome the comer. He knew the knock of people who were frequent visitors,
and would greet the knock of a stranger with an angry growl.

"Tom would never eat a mouse until he had shown it to some member of the
family, and been requested to eat it; and although brought up in a country
village, made himself perfectly at home in Glasgow, although living on the
third floor. But poor faithful fellow, after sticking to us through all
the varied changes of fourteen years, one wintry morning--he had been out
all night--when I drew up the window to call him, he answered me with such
a plaintive voice, that I at once hastened down to see what was the
matter. He was lying helpless and bleeding among the snow, with one leg
broken. He died."

Cats will often attach themselves to some one member of a family in
preference to all others. They are as a rule more fond of children than
grown-up people, and usually lavish more affection on a woman than a man.
They have particular tastes too, as regards some portions of the house in
which they reside, often selecting some room or corner of a room which
they make their "sanctum sanctorum."

Talking of her cats, a lady correspondent says:--"Toby's successor was a
black and white kitten we called Jenny. Jenny was considered my father's
cat, as she followed him and no one else. Our house and that of an aunt
were near to each other, and on Sabbath mornings it was my father's
invariable custom to walk in the garden, closely followed by Jenny,
afterwards going in to visit his sister before going to church. Jenny
enjoyed those visits amazingly; every one was so fond of her, and she was
so much admired, that she began to pay them visits of her own accord upon
weekdays. I am sorry to say that Jenny eventually abused the hospitality
thus held out to her. For, as time wore on, pussy had, unknown to us, been
making her own private arrangements for an event of great interest which
was to occur before very long. And this is how it was discovered when it
did come off. Some ladies had been paying my aunt a visit, and the
conversation not unnaturally turned on dress.

"'Oh! but,' said my aunt, 'you must have a sight of my new velvet
bonnet,--so handsome,--one pound fifteen shillings,--and came from
London. I do trust it won't rain on Sunday. Eliza, go for the box under
the dressing-table in the spare bedroom.'

"Although the door of this room was kept constantly shut, the window was
opened by day to admit the fresh air. It admitted more,--it admitted
Jenny,--and Jenny did not hesitate to avail herself of the convenience of
having her kittens in that room.

"Eliza had not been gone five minutes, when she returned screaming,--'Oh,
murther! murther!' that is all she said. She just ran back again,
screaming the same words, and my aunt and friends hastened after her. The
sight that met their gaze was in no way alarming: it was only Jenny cosily
ensconced in the box--the bonnet altered in shape to suit
circumstances--looking the picture of innocence and joy as she sung to six
blind kittens.

"Summary and condign was the punishment that fell on the unlucky Jenny.
The kittens were ordered to be instantly drowned,--we managed to save just
one,--and pussy sentenced to be executed as soon as the gardener came in
the morning. This sentence was afterwards commuted to transportation for
life from my aunt's house; and it was remarkable, that although Jenny took
her Sabbath morning walks as usual with my father, she never entered my
aunt's dwelling, but waited patiently until my father came out." Jenny's
master died.

"Jenny seemed to miss my father greatly. She used to go to the garden on a
Sunday, as usual, but walked up and down disconsolate and sad; and on her
return would take up her old position outside my aunt's door, and wait and
wait, always thinking he would surely come. This constant waiting and
watching for him that would come again no more, was the first thing that
softened my aunt's heart to poor Jenny; and she was freely forgiven for
the destruction of the velvet bonnet, and took up her abode for life with
my aunt, on whom she bestowed all the affection she had previously
lavished on my father."

Kittens, like the young of most animals--mankind included--are sometimes
rather selfish towards their parents. A large kitten that I knew, used to
be regularly fed with mice which its mother caught and brought to it from
a stack-yard. Instead of appearing grateful, he used to seize the mouse
and, running growling to a corner, devour the whole of it. His mother must
have thought this rather unfair, for after standing it three or four
times, she brought in the mouse, and slapped him if he dared to touch it
until she had eaten her share--the hind quarters; then he had to be
content with the rest.

I knew of a cat that, in order to avoid the punishment which she thought
she merited on committing an offence, adopted the curious expedient of
having two homes. Her failing was fish. If there had been no fish in the
world, she would have been a strictly honest cat. She warred against the
temptation, but it was of no use; the spirit was willing but the flesh
weak, and the smell of fish not to be resisted. As long as she could steal
without being found out, it was all right, things went on smoothly; but
whenever she was caught tripping, she bade good-bye for a time to that
home, and took up her quarters at the other, distant about half a mile.
Here she would reside for a month or more, as the case might be, until the
theft of another haddock or whiting caused her to return to the other
house. And so on; this cat kept up the habit of fluctuating backwards and
forwards, between her two homes, as long as she lived. She was never
thrashed, and, I think, did not deserve to be.

It is a common thing for a she-cat, if her kittens are all drowned, to
take to suckling a former kitten--even a grown-up son has sometimes to
resume the office and duties of baby to a bereaved mother, and is in
general no ways loath to do so. There is a horrid cat in a village in
Yorkshire, who, every time his mother has kittens, steals them, taking
them one by one to the cellar, and eating them. When there are no more to
eat, filial piety constrains him to suckle his dam, until she deems it fit
that he should be weaned. He has been weaned already four times, to my
knowledge.

If a kitten has been given away, and for some reason or other returns
again to its mother's home, the first thing that mother does is to give
him a sound hiding, afterwards she receives him into favour, and gives him
her tail to play with by way of _solatium_. Mothers will sometimes correct
their very young kittens; for instance, if it squeals when she wants to
get away for a short time, two or three smart pats with a mittened paw
generally make it go fast asleep.

The cat's love of fun is perhaps one of the most endearing traits in her
character. Who has not laughed to see the antics performed by some pet
cat, whom its mistress wished to bring into the house for the night. Pussy
has been walking with her mistress in the garden; but the night is fair
and moonlit, and she hasn't the slightest intention of coming in, for at
least half-an-hour yet. So round the walks she flies, romping and
rollicking, with tail in the air, and eyes crimson and green with the
mischief that is in them; always popping out when least expected, and
sometimes brushing the lady's very skirts. Now she walks demurely up to
her mistress, as if soliciting capture, and just as she is being picked
up,--"Ah! you thought you had me, did you?" and off she scampers to the
other end of the garden. Anon, she is up a tree, and grinning like an elf
from the topmost branches; and no amount of pet names, blarney, or coaxing
will entice her down or into the house until, as they say in the north,
her ain de'il bids her. Pussy's fondness for frolic has led to strange
results sometimes, as the following will testify:--

In an old-fashioned house, in an old-fashioned parish, in the county of
Aberdeenshire, there lived, not many years ago, a farmer of the name of
D----. His family consisted of his wife, two marriageable daughters, and a
beautiful tabby cat. This cat was well fed and cared for, and being so,
was an excellent mouser. Indeed, it was averred by the farmer that no rat
would live within a mile of her. The house stood by itself some distance
off the road, but, though surrounded by lofty pine-trees, it had by no
means the appearance of a place, which a ghost of average intellect and
any claim to respectability would select, as the scene of its midnight
peregrinations. Besides, there was no story attached to the house. No one
had ever been murdered there, so far as was known. No old miser had ever
resided within its walls; and though several members of the family had
died in the old box-bed, they had all passed away in the most legitimate
manner. Old granny was the only one at all likely to come back; but what
could she have forgotten? The old lady was sensible to the last, and
behaved like a brick. She told them candidly she was "wearin' awa';" sat
up in bed and in a sadly quavering voice sang the Old Hundred; then handed
over the key of the tea-caddy, where she kept her "trifle siller," with
the remark that they would find among the rest two old pennies, which she
had kept especially to be placed in her eyes when her "candle went out."

In spite of this, however, the honest farmer and his family were all
awakened one night by hearing the parlour bell rung, and rung too with
great force. They couldn't all have been dreaming. Besides, while they
were yet doubting and deliberating, lo! the bell rung a second time. John
and his wife shook in their shoes