PERFORMING CATS. 211 



PERFORMING CATS. 



Cats, unlike dogs, are not amused by, nor do they in any 

 way take an interest in what are termed "tricks." Performing 

 dogs will sit about their master watching anxiously for their 

 turn, and they have been known on more than one occasion 

 to slip before the dog that has next jump through the hoop 

 or over a stick, barking merrily, exulting in having excelled 

 the other ; generally they await with intense eagerness the 

 agility of the others and strenuously try to surpass them. 

 Possibly this is so from the long time the dog has been 

 under the dominion of man, and taught by him how to be 

 of service, either in /ni?tti?ig, sporti?ig^ shej>he?-ding^ watching; 

 in a sense his friend, though more his bond or slave, even 

 to dragging carts, waggons, and sleighs, to fetch and carry, 

 even to smuggle. Lo7ig teachijig, persistent teaching frojn time 

 iminemorial has undoubtedly had its due effect, and in some 

 instances, if not all, has been trans?nitted, such as in the 

 pointer and setter, which particular sections have been 

 known to require little or no present training, taking to their 

 duties naturally, receiving but little guidance as to how much, 

 when, and where such instinctive qualities are required. 



With the cat it is widely different. Beyond being the 

 " necessary " cat, the pet cat or kitten, it never has been an 

 object of interest, beyond that of keeping from increase 

 those veritable plagues, rats and mice ; the enormous use 

 it has thus been to man has had but scant acknowledgment, 

 never thoroughly appreciated, vastly underrated, with but 

 httle attention not only to its beauty, nor in modifying its 

 nature to the actual requirements of civilisation. The cat 

 through long ages has had, as it were, to shift for itself; 

 with ihQ/e7u approved, with the many not only neglected, but 

 in bygone days, and with some even in the present, it has 



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