in 1926, brooke wrote in "cat gossip" that for many years continental cat shows had offered prizes for the drop-eared chinese cat. on each occasion, the cat failed to materialise and brooke considered it to be mythical. other writers suggested the folded or crumpled ears were the result of damage or hematomas. brooke wrote that although no one ever saw the cat itself, one always met "someone who knows someone whose friend has often seen them". brooke himself had been assured by a chinese gentleman he had met only once that "he knew them well".