128 THOSE OTHER ANIMALS. 



and it is notorious that where there are, not one cat in fifty 

 will trouble itself to catch them. The cat who can get 

 milk given it in a saucer is not going to trouble itself by 

 catching mice ; and the knowledge that it is expected to 

 pay for its board by keeping down mice troubles it not at 

 all. Even as a mouse-catcher the cat is a poor creature 

 taking half an hour over a job which a terrier of the same 

 size will perform in a second. 



It has been urged that without cats there could be no cat 

 shows, and this may be conceded frankly, but mankind 

 might get on without these exhibitions. Were cats unobjec- 

 tionable in their ways, the onus of proving why they should 

 be abolished would rest with those who do not keep them ; 

 but as they are most objectionable, owing to the torture of 

 nerves caused by their midnight assemblages, to say nothing 

 of their destructiveness to well-kept gardens, it is for those 

 who own them to prove that there is some compensation, 

 some good quality, some advantage arising from the keeping 

 of pets which are a pest and an annoyance to neighbours. 

 A man is not allowed to hire an organ or a German band to 

 play in front of his house, even in the day time, if a neigh- 

 bour object ; why, then, should he be allowed to keep a 

 creature which renders night hideous with its caterwaulings ? 

 The legislation which taxes man's faithful friend and com- 

 panion, the dog, allows his wife to keep two or three cats, 

 and to populate the whole of the district with their progeny, 

 if she choose to do so. Over and over again has the de- 

 sirability of placing a tax upon these animals been pressed 

 upon successive Chancellors of the Exchequer, but they 

 have hitherto turned deaf ears to the suggestion ; and the 

 reason is clear : Chancellors of the Exchequer are but 



