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| Mademoiselle This animal was affectionate and winning, but maniacal and wily. She would not permit any vagaries, any deviation, she intended that one should go to bed and et up at the same time. When she was discontented, she expressed in the darkness of her look nuances of irritation that her master never mistook. If he returned before eleven o'clock at night, she was waiting for him at the door, in the entrance-hall, scratching the wood, meowing before he had entered the room. Then she would toll her languorous puplis of green gold, rub herself against his breeches, jump on the furniture, stand herself upright to look like a small horse rearing, and when he came near her, still arching her back give him, in frindship, great blows with her head. If it were after eleven o'clock she did not go up to him, but restricted herself to giving up only when he came near her, still arching her back but not cressing him. If it were later still. she would not move and she would complain grumblingly. J. R. Huysmans |
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| The Mustical Cat No other animal has managed to get itself tantled up in as much legend, myth, symbolism, religon, history and human affairs as the cat. Fom the time it first appeared upon the scene some four Thousand years ago, it has played the part in almost every age. And indeed, one of the cheif and yet unsolved mysteries connected with this animal is that before the earliest Egyptian dynasties and wall decorations, there is no record of this animal at all, neither in cave art or kitchen middens. It is as though it suddenly apeared on earth, neatly packaged and with all its qualities, practically as we know it today Are we, as its devotees, hoping that someof this marvel and mystery will rub off on us by cultivating it and thus elevate us a cut above the rest of the herd? Black magic, white magic, good luch and bac, a hundred superstitions covering every aspect of human life and condition, are ascrived to the cat. It became the familiar of witches, the companion of the devil and , of course, a god in its own right. Paul Gallico |
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