THE WILD-CAT. 49 



THE WILD. CAT. 



THE wild-cat is now rare in this country. Although 

 I have spent a great part of my life in the most moun- 

 tainous districts of Scotland, where killing vermin formed 

 the gamekeeper's principal business, and often my own 

 recreation, I have never seen more than five or six genu- 

 ine wild-cats. Many, on reading this, will perhaps won- 

 der at my statement, and even give it a flat contradiction, 

 by alleging the numbers that have come under their own 

 notice. Nay, I was even gravely told by a gentleman 

 from the south of England, a keen observer and fond of 

 natural history, that there were wild-cats there,* and the 

 skin of a cat killed in one of the southern counties was 

 sent to me as a proof; this, I need hardly say, was the 

 large and sleek coat of an overgrown Tom, whose ances- 

 tors, no doubt, had purred upon the hearth-rug. 



I am far from meaning that there are no cats running 

 wild in England ; of course, wherever there are tame 

 cats, some of them, especially the very old ones, will 



* I have been frequently assured that wild-cats have been killed on 

 the Cumberland and Westmoreland hills ; but, never having seen any 

 specimens, I cannot speak from my own knowledge. There is no doubt 

 that martins exist in some of the most hilly and wooded districts of 

 England. 



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