258 THE DOMESTIC CAT. 



between two hundred and three hundred yards long, in Mr. 

 Kirke's nursery at Brompton, the fruit of which in all previous 

 seasons had been very much injured by birds, was, in 1831, 

 completely protected by a cat having voluntarily posted herself 

 sentry upon it. 



Most cats are fond of fish. Gray, in his Ode on the Death of 

 a favourite Cat, asks 



" What female heart can gold despise ? 

 What cat's averse to fish?" 



Some cats, indeed, will so far overcome their aversion to 

 wet their fur, as to catch fish for themselves. 



Dr. Darwin records an anecdote of a cat which was in the 

 constant habit of catching trouts by darting upon them in 

 their own element ; and the author of The Menageries (1829, 

 vol. i. p. 208), mentions a cat's seizing an eel out of a pail of 

 water. Indeed several pages might be filled with anecdotes 

 that have been published fully contradicting the old saying, 

 that the cat loves fish but dares not wet her feet. 



I have often observed cats capture numbers of flies, black- 

 beetles, cockchafers, and other insects, and eat them. 



Sometimes, but not often or naturally, cats will eat fruits 

 and the stalks of plants. Miss M. L. Beevor has recorded an 

 instance of a cat that delighted in raisins 5 and a kitten that 

 ate honey- suckles with avidity. Cats are generally fond of 

 the smell of odoriferous plants, such as marum, valerian, and 

 cat-mint (Nepeta Cataria). Ray says, that she not only likes 

 to lie upon, but to eat the full grown and old plants of cat-mint 

 when they are transplanted from the fields into the garden, 

 but those that are raised from seeds she does not touch : a 

 circumstance which gave rise to the rhyme : 



" If you set it, the cats will eat it : 

 If you sow it, the cats can't know it." 



Mr. Joseph Thomas, the publisher of this work, had a cat 

 which would eat pies, pickles, or any kind of food, except 

 seed-cake. 



The drink of the domestic cat is generally milk ; but when 



