hearing and seeing, be a good mouser, have the claws whole, 

 and be a good nurse ; but if it failed in any of these quahties 

 the seller was to forfeit to the buyer the third part of its value. 

 If any one stole or killed the cat that guarded the prince's 

 granary he was to forfeit a milch ewe, its fleece, and lamb ; or 

 as much wheat as when poured on the cat suspended by its 

 tail (the head touching the floor) would form a heap high 

 enough to cover the tip of the former. This last quotation is 

 not only curious, as being an evidence of the simplicity of 

 ancient manners, but it almost proves to a demonstration that 

 oats are not aborigines of these islands, or known to the earliest 

 inhabitants. The large prices set on them (if we consider the 

 high value of specie at that time) and the great care taken of 

 the improvement and breed of an animal that multiplies so 

 fast, are almost certain proofs of their being little known at 

 that period." 



It was the custom of Cardinal Wolsey to accommodate his 

 favourite cat with part of his regal seat, and this even when 

 he held audiences or received princely company. Petrarch, the 

 great Itahan poet, made a home pet of grimalkin, and after its 

 death paid it the questionable honour of embalming, and 

 placed it in a niche in hi"? studio. Godefroi Mind, the cele- 

 brated painter, and who was styled the " Baphael of Cats," 

 from his making them his almost constant study, maintained a 

 large staff of these animals, and it is related of him that when, 

 at one time, the hydrophobia was prevailing in Berne, so that 

 a vast number of the cats of the city were by order of the 

 magistrate put to death, poor Godefroi Mind was so deeply 

 affected that he was never afterwards completely consoled. 

 He contrived to hide his chief favourite until the panic was 

 passed, and he always worked at his easel talking to her, and 

 was generally found with h«r and her family, either on his 

 knees or on his chair, whenever his friends entered the room. 



Great, wise, sour Doctor Johnson kept a cat. The doctor's 

 cat once fell sick, and refused its diurnal cat's-meat. In the 

 midst of his distress on pussy's account, he discovered that the 

 dainty fehue appetite might be tempted by an oyster. Acting 

 on the hint, he went out and bought oysters for his cat, and 

 continued to visit the oyster-stall every day till the animal 

 grew well. 



The poet Gray had a cat that came to an untimely end. 

 She, however, was not allowed to go the way of other cat-flesh — 

 to be put into a hole and thought no more of. So much affeo- 



