Beaumont and Fletcher in The Scornful Lady allude to the hunting of cats in the line,
"Bring out the cat-hounds, I'll make you take a tree."
But although large and ferocious, the wild cat was not considered a match for some of the lesser animals, for in Salmon's "English Physician," 1693, we read that "The weasel is an enemy to ravens, crows, and cats, and although cats may sometimes set upon them, yet they can scarcely overcome them."
Nevertheless, we find in Daniel's "Rural Sports," 1813, that "Wild cats formerly were an object of sport to huntsmen. Thus, Gerard Camvile, 6 John, had special licence to hunt the hare, fox, and wild cat, throughout all the King's forests; and 23 Henry III., Earl Warren, by giving Simon de Pierpont a goshawk, obtained leave to hunt the buck, doe, hart, hind, hare, fox, goat, cat, or any other wild beast, in certain lands of Simon's. But it was not for diversion alone that this animal was pursued; for the skin was much used by the nuns in their habits, as a fur."
Still it appears from Mr. Charles Darwin's "Voyage of the Beagle," that tastes vary. "Doctor Shaw was laughed at for stating the flesh of the lion is in great esteem, having no small affinity with veal, both in the colour, taste, and flavour. Such certainly is the case with the puma. The Guachos differ in their opinion whether the jaguar is good eating; but were unanimous in saying the cat is excellent."
It is also stated that the Chinese fatten and eat cats with considerable relish; but of this I can obtain no reliable information, some of my friends from China not having heard of the custom, if such it is.
Again referring to the skin of the cat, vide Strutt: "In the thirty-seventh year of the reign of Edward III., it was decreed, after enumerating the various kinds of cloth that were to be worn by the nobles, knights, dames, and others, that (Article 2) tradesmen, artificers, and men in office, called yeomen, their wives and children, shall wear no kind of furs excepting those of lambs, of rabbits, of cats, and of foxes." Further: "No man, unless he be possessed of the yearly value of forty shillings, shall wear any furs but black and white lambs' skins." Lambs' and cats' skins were equivalent in value and order.
In the twenty-second year of this monarch's reign, all the former statutes "against excess in apparel" were repealed.
My old friend Fairholt, in his useful work on costume, says of the Middle Ages: "The peasants wore cat skins, badger skins, etc."
One of the reasons why the skin of cats was used on cloaks and other garments for trimming, being that it showed humility in dress, and not by way of affectation or vanity, but for warmth and comfort, it being of the lowest value of any, with the exception of lambs' skin and badgers'; and adopted by some priests as well as nuns, when wishing to impress others with their deep sense of humility in all things, even to their wearing-apparel. The proof of which Strutt's "Habits of the Anglo-Normans," circâ twelfth century, fully illustrates: