192 UECOLLECTIONS OF THE CAT. 



This reverie was abruptly broken off, by the piteous mewing of a poor 

 Cat, and on going to the outer door there stood "Tommy," drenched to the 

 skin, who, I presumed, had just returned from some little affair of honour or 

 ^^clapper-clawing" forage, and was now in good trim for enjoying the comforts 

 of my lonely fireside. He soon made himself most indolently cozy, for the 

 crickets came frisking under his very nose with bold impunity; what cared 

 he about them, he too was musing, and 



"Purring, purring, purring, with a soothing dreamy sound."* 



I had taken up Washington Irving's delightful ^'^Abbotsford and Newstead," 

 and rather singularly happened to hit on the very page where this graphic 

 writer has given us a pleasing anecdote connected with Sir Walter Scott and 

 his favourite Cat, I shall only spoil the story by omitting the extract, so 

 here it is. ^^Ah!" said he "these Cats are a very mysterious kind of folk. 

 There is always more passing in their minds than we are aware of. It comes, 

 no doubt, from their being so familiar with witches and warlocks." An idea 

 which always tickled the fancy of the amiable ^'author of Waverley," whose 

 vast mind has woven the thin gossamer of a fast fading lore into such fabrics 

 as will ever charm both old and young. One of his pleasing characteristics 

 was an attachment to dumb animals, and in point of kindness towards them 

 he was particularly sensitive ;f which tempts one to wish that there were 

 more Sir Walters in the world at present. 



At what period the Cat formed such alliance with his satanic majesty's 

 emissaries we are at a loss to determine; but there is scarcely any nursery 

 story, of an old date, introducing its wrinkled hag without a companion in 

 the shape of some enormous Cat, whose presence seems fully requisite for 

 carrying out some diabolic incantation. There are legends still extant in the 

 "north countrie" which beat hollow the wondrous deeds of ^'Puss in Boots," 

 the '^Cat and Fiddle," and all the revised editions of ^'Dick Whittington" 

 the press has vomited forth, to the genuine delight and edification of its 

 juvenile supporters. Hence we find a certain amount of superstition still 

 cherished by many vulgar minds towards the Cat, which has led it into 

 more scrapes than enough. But a good deal of this is fast dwindling away 

 before that march of common sense which has well-nigh extirpated the whole 

 tribe of witches, wizards, brownies, and spunkics, which had so long existed 

 to the terror of our great — very great grandfathers and grandmothers. 



Why the Cat should have been accused of participation in these deeds of 

 darkness, in preference to other animals, I cannot clearly determine, unless 

 it arose from ^^poor puss" being often the only solitary friend, left those 

 miserable wretches, generally old women, who were so far unlucky as to incur 

 the least suspicion of being concerned in witchcraft; who, shunned by all 

 humanity, were now doomed to run the gauntlet of those fearful times^ when 



* "MoncriefTs Home Mythology" — "Illustrated London News, December 20th., 1851." 

 ■j- vide "Memoirs of the Life of Scott, by Lockhart." 



