166 ON THE ORIGINAL SOURCE OF THE DOMESTIC CAT. 



dicious naturalists have had doubts respecting the source to 

 which our cats have generally been referred. The opinion 

 which has been received and adopted by the greatest number 

 is, that the wild cat of the forests of Europe and Asia ought 

 to be considered as the original stock of all the races of do- 

 mestic cats. But the consideration of this point gives rise to a 

 doubt, which a comparison between our house cat and this, 

 its supposed wild type, tends to strengthen. 



" When we attempt to trace the domestication of the cat up 

 to its commencement, our thoughts are naturally directed to- 

 wards those countries in which the earliest marks of civiliza- 

 tion appeared. It was from the walls of the Temples of Isis, 

 and under the dominion of the Pharaohs, that the first rays of 

 knowledge burst forth, which, after being so successfully 

 cultivated by the Greeks in later times, was gradually trans- 

 mitted from them to the countries which we now inhabit. 

 Egypt, which beheld the beginning of this civilization, with- 

 out doubt furnished its inhabitants with this useful animal. 

 The ancient Egyptians would value the good qualities of the 

 cat more than any other agricultural people. If, then, they 

 were acquainted with it, (and everything leads us to the be- 

 lief that they were,) it is evident that a wild species peculiar 

 to those countries has supplied the first domestic race. 



" In fact, the Egyptian cat, which we have described in this 

 work under the name of Felts gautd (Felis maniculata) , has 

 a much greater resemblance to our house cat than the latter 

 has to the wild cat of the woods ; the height and the figures 

 are perfectly similar, the tail is of the same length, and is 

 thinner in both at the extremity than at the root. Our do- 

 mestic cats of the largest kind are always smaller than the 

 wild species, and there is also a permanent difference in the 

 form of the tail. We know by experience that a long-con- 

 tinued state of domestication affects the size and the whole 

 physical system of an animal. A superabundance of nourish- 

 ment and constant attention assist the development of all 

 their organs, and increase their size. All our animals removed 

 from a wild state, and domesticated, furnish us with proofs of 

 this. The domestic cat, upon the supposition that it is a de- 

 scendant of the wild cat of the woods, would furnish a proof 

 of the degeneration of its race, a constant forerunner of the 

 entire destruction of it. 



" When we compare the exterior form of the domestic cat 

 with that of the wild species, we invariably find that the 

 former is smaller ; that its tail is longer, and terminated in a 

 point ; while the tail of the wild cat is much shorter in pro- 

 portion to the size of the animal, and seems as if the end had 

 been cut off, being of the same size at both extremities. 



