102 



The trail should be taken at daylight while it is still fresh. On 

 the first light snow of winter, the hunter does not need dogs, but 

 starting early in the morning he follows the trail afoot, and kills 

 every woods cat that he trails. In this way a tract of woodland 

 may be speedily cleared of wild or half-wild cats, but the next 

 winter others may be tracked and killed there. In the village 

 or city a person whose personality attracts cats can pick them 

 up rapidly. A kind word from such a person or a little attrac- 

 tive food will entice many a wandering and starving cat. On 

 the other hand, when cats have been persecuted they are like 

 the wicked that "flee when no man pursueth," and then one 

 must resort to the gun or trap. Any man who can trap the fox 

 or even the wary, experienced rat, can take any cat that lives. 

 Recently a pet cat taken in a trap was drenched with water and 

 liberated, but was caught again in the same trap within twenty- 

 four hours. 



LEGAL RIGHTS OF THE CAT. 



During the past century cat lovers have made many attempts 

 to prove that their pets are entitled to some rights under the law, 

 but English law seems to find little merit in their claims. An 

 articled clerk, writing to the "London Standard," says: — 



It is clearly laid do-mi in "Addison on Torts" that a person is not justified 

 in killing his neighbor's cat or dog which he finds on his land, unless the animal 

 is in the act of doing some injurious act which can be prevented by its slaugh- 

 ter. If a person sets on his land a trap for foxes, and baits it with such strong- 

 smelling meat as to attract his neighbor's dog or cat on to his land to the trap, 

 and such animal is injured or killed, he is liable for the cat, though he had no 

 such intention and though the animal ought not to have been on his land. 



The French courts have given the cat owner no damages in 

 such or similar cases. The local magistrate of Fontainebleau heard 

 a case in which a man, annoyed by neighboring cats, kept traps 

 in his garden and caught fifteen. The neighbors combined to 

 bring him to justice. The judge decided in favor of the neigh- 

 bors, but in a higher correctional tribunal the decision was re- 

 versed.^ In some European countries cats are outside the law 

 the moment they leave their owner's premises, or as soon as 

 they have passed beyond a certain radius from a building. In 

 certain German cities cats are licensed also, but have no rights 

 when they have passed certain limits. Herr Friedrich Schwabe, 

 head of the von Berlepsch School of Bird Protection at Seebach, 



■ The Cat, Post and Preecnt, translated from the French of M. Cbampflcury, nitb notes by Mrs. 

 Cashel Hoey, 1S85, pp. 65, 66. 



