“MI-CAT inter omnes.”
Hor. Carm. Lib. i. Ode 12.
He brings his cat Dick from the Flood, and consequently through Rutterkin, a cat who was “cater-cousin to the great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandmother of Grimalkin, and first cat in the caterie of an old woman, who was tried for bewitching a daughter of the countess of Rutland in the beginning of the sixteenth century.” The monodist connects him with cats of great renown in the annals of witchcraft; a science whereto they have been allied as closely as poor old women, one of whom, it appears, on the authority of an old pamphlet entitled “Newes from Scotland,” &c. printed in the year 1591, “confessed that she took a cat and christened it, &c. and that in the night following, the said cat was conveyed into the middest of the sea by all these witches sayling in their Riddles, or Cives, and so left the said cat right before the towne of Leith in Scotland. This done, there did arise such a tempest at sea as a greater hath not been seen, &c. Againe it is confessed, that the said christened cat was the cause of the kinges majestie’s shippe, at his coming forthe of Denmarke, had a contrarie winde to the rest of the shippes then being in his companie, which thing was most straunge and true, as the kinges majestie acknowledgeth, for when the rest of the shippes had a fair and good winde, then was the winde contrarie, and altogether against his majestie,” &c.
All sorts of cats, according to Huddesford, lamented the death of his favourite, whom he calls “premier cat upon the catalogue,” and who, preferring sprats to all other fish,—
“Had swallow’d down a score without remorse,
And three fat mice slew for a second course,
But, while the third his grinders dyed with gore,
Sudden those grinders clos’d—to grind no more!
And, dire to tell! commissioned by Old Nick,
A catalepsy made an end of Dick.
“Calumnious cats who circulate faux pas,
And reputations maul with murd’rous claws;
Shrill cats whom fierce domestic brawls delight,
Cross cats who nothing want but teeth to bite,
Starch cats of puritanic aspect sad,
And learned cats who talk their husbands mad;
Confounded cats who cough, and croak, and cry,
And maudlin cats who drink eternally;
Fastidious cats who pine for costly cates,
And jealous cats who catechise their mates;
Cat-prudes who, when they’re ask’d the question, squall,
And ne’er give answer categorical;
Uncleanly cats, who never pare their nails,
Cat-gossips full of Canterbury tales,
Cat-grandams vex’d with asthmas and catarrhs,
And superstitious cats who curse their stars;
Cats of each class, craft, calling, and degree
Mourn Dick’s calamitous catastrophe!
“Yet, while I chant the cause of Richard’s end,
Ye sympathizing cats, your tears suspend!
Then shed enough to float a dozen whales,
And use, for pocket-handkerchiefs, your tails!—
“Ah! tho’ thy bust adorn no sculptur’d shrine,
No vase thy relics rare to fame consign,
No rev’rend characters thy rank express,
Nor hail thee, Dick! D.D. nor F.R.S.
Tho’ no funereal cypress shade thy tomb
For thee the wreaths of Paradise shall bloom.
There, while Grimalkin’s mew her Richard greets,
A thousand cats shall purr on purple seats:
E’en now I see, descending from his throne,
Thy venerable cat, O Whittington!
The kindred excellence of Richard hail,
And wave with joy his gratulating tail!
There shall the worthies of the whisker’d race
Elysian mice o’er floors of sapphire chase,
Midst beds of aromatic marum stray,
Or raptur’d rove beside the Milky Way.
Kittens, than eastern houris fairer seen,
Whose bright eyes glisten with immortal green,
Shall smooth for tabby swains their yielding fur,
And to their amorous mews assenting purr.—
There, like Alcmena’s, shall Grimalkin’s Son
In bliss repose,—his mousing labours done,
Fate, envy, curs, time, tide, and traps defy,
And caterwaul to all eternity.”
Huddesford.
Cats neither like to be put out of their way, nor to be kept out of their food:—