Natural Htftory of the Ancients. 63 



meftic animal of the Greeks and Romans, for 

 which we now ufe the cat, was the white-breafted 

 marten. The word feles, it is true, is commonly 

 ufed for the weafel ; but, on the other hand, its 

 Greek fynonym aiXou/ooc, according to the beft 

 derivation by Buttemann, applies exactly to the 

 wavy motion of the tail fo peculiar to the cat 

 family. The Englim term " cat " probably comes 

 from the Latin cat us (cunning). In Anglo-Saxon 

 documents it is found with the fpelling " catt." 

 "When Julius Casfar landed here," fays Mivart 

 (utfup., p. 2), " our forefts were plentifully fup- 

 plied with cats, while probably not a (ingle moufer 

 exifted in any Britifh town or village." The wild 

 cat is at prefent reftricted to the extreme north 

 and north-weftern diftricts of Scotland, having 

 become extinct in England, and never feemingly 

 having exifted at all in Ireland. But in the 

 Middle Ages it was common in the wilder parts 

 of England, as its fur was commonly ufed to 

 trim dreiTes. John, Earl of Morton, in a charter 

 granting immunities to free tenants outfide 

 the Regard of the Foreft of Dartmoor, fays: 

 " Quod capiant capreolam, vulpem, caff urn, lupum, 

 leporem, lutrum ubicunque ilia invenerint extra 

 reguardum forefte mee," 1 as if the wild cat were 

 not uncommon at the end of the twelfth century. 

 Pope Gregory the Great had a tame cat, and cats 

 were often inmates of nunneries in the Middle 



1 Sec Rowe's " Perambulation of Dartmoor" (1848), p. 263. 

 The Charter is in the poffeflion of the Dean and Chapter of 

 Exeter. 



