THE CAT 241 



in the niches of a sepulchral chamber excavated to a 

 great depth in the solid rock. 



"In some of these chambers, with decorations as 

 fresh as if made yesterday, we find to-day, after the 

 lapse of three and four thousand years, a pro- 

 digious number of bodies of cats and other ani- 

 mals, sufficiently preserved to be recognized, thanks 

 to the aromatic bitumen with which they were 

 impregnated. Well, the examination of these old 

 relics conveys information on one point of great in- 

 terest: it shows us that the domestic animals of 

 those remote times did not differ from those of our 

 own day. As were the ox, dog, cat, four thousand 

 years ago, such they are to-day. 



"The cat since it is the cat I am going to tell 

 you about to-day the cat in particular is like ours 

 in every way. The rat-hunter of forty centuries 

 ago differs in nothing from our tom-cat. But 

 where did it come from, so long, long ago, in the 

 houses of the Egyptians? Of what country was it a 

 native 1 



"To the south of Egypt lies Abyssinia, where we 

 have already found the wild dog, from which proba- 

 bly came our greyhound. There, too, is still found, 

 sometimes wild in the heart of the forest, sometimes 

 domesticated, a kind of cat, called the gloved cat, 

 that presents a striking resemblance to our domestic 

 variety. It is generally agreed that this is the par- 

 ent stock of our cats, though perhaps only in part, 

 since there is reason to believe that a second species, 

 Asiatic according to all appearance, has a place in 



