90 



OUR DOMESTIC ANIMALS 



however, is apt to weaken the animal, and a 

 watch should be kept for this. 



Cutaneous affections are very disagreeable 

 for persons who live in the house with cats 

 thus troubled ; they are contagious to other 

 animals, dogs especially. It is therefore well 

 to examine even healthy cats once a week, and 

 if the slightest suspicious spot appears, to 

 wash the animal with a solution of borax in 

 water. It will be found on examination that 

 the healthiest and finest cats are seldom free 

 from \-ermin. If red spots, or pustules, appear 

 on the skin, an ointment of lard, sulphur dust, 

 Peruvian balsam, and creosote should be 

 applied ; but it must never be forgotten that 

 all cats are perpetually licking themselves 

 with their tongues. The mite of a cat, a tiny 

 spider which harbors especially 

 in the ear, gives rise to a species 

 of mange, which can be cured by 

 petroleum or any of the mange 

 remedies that are advertised. 

 The insect or flesh worm of the 

 mange is sometimes cf)mmuni- 

 cated to persons. Cats are also 

 tormented at times with worms, 

 the germs of which they get from 

 the rats and mice they swallow. 

 Any vermifuge will remedy this trouble, but 

 the cat should be kej^t in the house, so as to 

 observe the effects of it. The madness of cats 

 is e\'en more dangerous than that of dogs, for 

 they bite with greater violence. Yet we ne\'er 

 hear of muzzles for cats. 



IX. Superstitions. Historical Notes 



We ha\'e already spoken of phantom cats, 

 and of the ]oart they play in popular supersti- 

 tions and in mythology. A study of the origin 

 f)f legends and fairy tales would shed much 

 light into the still obscure lives of the peoples 

 of past ages. Nearly all animals appear in the 

 fabulous events and poetic legends that have 

 come down to us ; but the cat, in its character 

 of domestic animal, jilays the chief role. In 

 the old popular beliefs it was part and parcel 

 of the dwelling. A new cat was made to walk 

 three times across the hearth with solemn 



Young Tricolor Cat 



ceremony. Marriages were celebrated, if possi- 

 ble, on Friday, the day dedicated to Freya, and 

 if the sun shone during the ceremony, it was 

 said that the bride had taken good care of the 

 cat and had fed her well. Young girls in 

 Norway who caress cats are sure of a hand- 

 some husband ; but if one of those animals 

 lies at the church door just as the marriage is 

 about to be celebrated, the union of the two 

 young people will be unhappy. According to 

 an old legend of eastern Prussia, it is very 

 dangerous for a married pair if two cats with 

 their tails tied together run along the road in 

 front of the wedding procession. In all the 

 mythologies cats play a part. 



The popular tale of Puss in Boots is known 

 everywhere, but what is not so well known is 

 that the skull of a "booted cat " 

 is preserved in the osteological 

 museum at Amsterdam. Evi- 

 dently this cannot be a joke in 

 so grave an institution ; conse- 

 cjuently it is worth while to 

 search the works of natural his- 

 tory and find, if we can, a de- 

 scription of the species of cat 

 called " booted." In the great 

 osteographical history of De 

 Blainville (among others) we find mention of 

 a group of " booted cats," which have much 

 in common with our domestic animal, as far as 

 their skeleton is concerned. To this group 

 belong the Nubian cats Fclis Dianicnlata and 

 Fclis caligata (from which probably came the 

 skull preserved in the Amsterdam museum) : 

 also Fills Bubastis, the cat of ancient Eg}pt. 

 The name of "booted cat" was first given to 

 it, according to Cuvier, by Bruce, the Egyptian 

 traveler, on account of its legs, which are black 

 or white at the bottom like boots. Temminck, 

 who baptized the species in his Monograph of 

 illatiiuiifcrs with the name Fc/is od/inita, gives 

 identically the same description of it. In the 

 zoological garden at Amsterdam there is now 

 a living specimen of these original wild cats of 

 Egypt ; it has reddish-brown ears with little 

 tufts at the points of them, and answers pre- 

 cisely to the descriptions and drawings given of 



Digitized by IVIicrosoft® 



