140 Short Commwiications : — 



Rushen, and not very far from the Calf, I was informed that 

 a vessel from Prussia, or some port in the Baltic, was wrecked 

 many years ago on the rocky shore between Castle Rushen 

 and the Calf, and that, on her driving close in to the land, two 

 or three cats without tails made their escape from the bowsprit, 

 and were taken by the wreckers ; and that these were the first 

 of the kind ever seen in the island. I do not say that this is 

 the truth, but I was told so ; and, if it be the truth, the original 

 breed is not of Manx extraction, but must be sought out in 

 the north of Europe. I do not agree, though, in the emend- 

 ation of Mancuniensis, who recommends (V. 717.) reading 

 " Isle of Man" for " Isle of Wight;" for Dr. Leach's cat 

 might have been wrecked there, or imported thither, as well 

 as its contemporaries to the Isle of Man. 



Whilst on the subject, I will allude to a tale which was told 

 me when a boy, of an extraordinary instance of the powers of 

 abstinence of the cat. I forget the minutiae of the story, but 

 it ran thus : — A cat, which belonged to a vessel from the 

 port of Mistley, in Essex (a place about four miles from East 

 Bergholt), was missing when the vessel sailed from some har- 

 bour in America, and no one could tell what had become of it. 

 But on arriving in a part of the Channel where it was neces- 

 sary to unfurl a sail that had not been employed till then 

 during the voyage, the cat was discovered, in a sadly ema- 

 ciated condition, in the folds of the sail, and, notwithstanding 

 her long imprisonment, still alive. My informant was the 

 late Mr. Dunthorne of London Street (a young self-taught 

 artist, of rising and deserved celebrity, whose industry, taste, 

 and acquirements, in spite of difficulties and want of " ap- 

 pliances and means to boot," made him an extraordinary 

 instance of the power of genius and talent, and would have 

 wrought out for him a distinguished place in English bio- 

 graphy, had not a too early death taken him away from us*) ; 

 but I cannot now, in consequence of his having recently paid 

 the debt of nature, appeal to him for further information. If, 

 however, there be any feline Sadducees amongst your readers, 

 I would venture to assert that this story may have been true, 

 judging from an instance which I can fully attest by the evi- 

 cence of self-experience, and the testimony (if required) of 

 two or three friends. The Dutch commenced the siege of 

 Brussels, in the revolution of 1830, in the month of Septem- 

 ber. On the 24th of that month, they took possession of the 

 house of my friend. Dr. Verstraeten, rue de Namur; and, after 



* He deserved this paragraph, and many more less parenthetical. He 

 was born at East Bergholt, April, 1798, and buried in November, 1832. 



