So7ne Poets Cats. 349 



also, in Vedic metaphor, the cat is " the cleanser," the one 

 that washes its face, and also " the hunter ; " as the white 

 cat, the moon, it protects innocent animals; as a black cat, 

 the dark night, it persecutes them. " It is easy," says 

 Gubernatis, " to pass from the Latin mustela to the Sanskrit 

 mushikautakrit" But then Gubernatis can stretch farther 

 with a foot-rule than any other man, and to go from a stoat 

 to a cat because the names happen in Sanscrit and Latin to 

 begin with the same letter of the alphabet (which is all they 

 really do) is to him the most natural transition in the world. 

 Yet if there is one Grimalkin more puzzling than another it 

 is surely " the cat in the bag of proverbs." 



Our mousers, however, seem to have declined deplorably 

 from their old standards of diligence and dexterity. In 

 other respects the type has been immeasurably improved. 

 The size of some of these animals gives promise that before 

 long we shall have cats to rival that Brobdingnagian creature 

 that purred like a dozen stocking-weavers at work and 

 thought Gulliver too small an insect to run after, and carry- 

 ins: such a fleece as shall make the shearing of cats an 

 operation of commercial value. In beauty we have Grimal- 

 kins that would have driven Egypt mad with envy ; while 

 for downright wild-beastishness what can we have fiercer- 

 looking than the Russian lynx-Hke breed ? 



As a rule, people look upon cats as being without variety. 

 They know that these animals catch mice, have evil designs 

 upon cream-jugs and canaries, scratch Baby, and hold melan- 

 choly concerts in the back garden. But beyond these points, 

 common to all the species, the great majority of people have 

 no standards of distinction. It is true that the creatures 

 vary in colour, but somehow, as a rule, we lump them all 

 together into the common or garden cat, and regard them as 

 being of a monotonous sort. Yet there is just as much 

 variety in a Cat-show as among the pippins in a Chiswick 

 " Apple Congress," or the chrysanthemums at the Temple. 



