W. R. S. Ralston

“ When the boy comes to man's estate the cat provides him with a dress composed of feathers borrowed from all manner of birds, for it has the power of calling together all the fowls of the air whenever it sounds its silver pipe, and also with a splendid feather mantle, which he offers as a present to the king. ”

“ But the modern introducers of folk-tales into polite society, the writers who, like Perrault, have made the fortune of the fairy-tale by rendering it neat and trim and fit to be received into drawing-rooms, have generally avoided subjects which might be looked upon with suspicion by stern moralists, and have selected as the heroes and heroines of their tiny dramas only such beings as regulate their lives in accordance with modern opinions about right and wrong. ”

“ The success of the youthful peasant whom these manœuvres convert into a king's son-in-law, and that of the intriguing cat itself, which becomes a grandee, and no longer chases mice except by way of relaxation, do not lend themselves to edification. The story, as it runs in Perrault's pages, teaches a distinctly immoral lesson. It was all very well for the author to tack on to it a moralité, to the effect that industry and tact are of more use to young people than a rich inheritance. ”

“ We can scarcely hope that any new evidence will be found in support of the Whittington legend. But it is very probable that fresh variants of the story of his cat will be discovered in Eastern lands, all tending to preach the same doctrine — that it is right to show kindness to animals, and that he who saves the life of even a cat shall not go unrewarded. The same lesson is taught also by the "Puss in Boots" tale, when it appears in its complete form, with the warning appended thereunto that of all animals man is the most ungrateful. ”

“ The variants of the story in which a fox figures instead of a cat have this advantage, that they have retained the proper opening of the narrative. Thus, in a Finnish variant [1] the assisting animal is a fox which had been trapped by a youth, who let it go when it asked him if he would like to get married. The rest of the story runs the usual course, and at the end the fox retires quietly into the forest. In another Finnish variant the proper opening has been as much forgotten as the close. A youth who has inherited nothing but a cow sells it to an unknown man. ”

“ Such stories as "Puss in Boots" might be taken as evidence of the favor with which the cat has been regarded by the people, were it not that the balance of testimony is against that animal's claims to be considered the guardian angel of the Marquis de Carabas and his brethren. For in the south and the east of Europe, as well as in Asia, the four-footed creature which plays that part is almost invariably a fox. There seems to be good reason for supposing that in all the stories of the "Booted Cat" cycle, there ought to be no cat and no boots. ”

“ Among ourselves the best-known story of the kind is that of Whittington's cat, which offers an interesting illustration of the manner in which fictitious events are connected with the career of a real person. According to the chap-book legend, young Whittington purchased a cat with the only penny he possessed in the world, not out of pity, but with the sensible view of keeping down the rats and mice by which he was annoyed in his garret. ”

“ The cat has never filled quite so high a position in Europe as it occupied in Egypt, but still it has never been entirely deprived of its supernatural reputation. In Sicily, says Professor A. de Gubernatis, "the cat is sacred to St. Martha and is respected in order that she may not be irritated. He who kills a cat will be unhappy for seven years." That there is something diabolical about a domestic cat is still a fixed idea in the popular European mind. A Russian proverb asserts that a black tom-cat, at the end of seven years, is bound to become a devil. ”

“ We have the authority of Herodotus for the fact that when a cat died in an Egyptian home the members of the bereaved family shaved off their eye-brows, and that of Diodorus for the touching statement that although Egyptians have been known to eat their fellow-creatures during famines, no instance of cat-eating was ever heard of. If an Egyptian happened to find a dead cat, says the Sicilian historian, he was careful not to approach it closely, for fear of being suspected of its murder. ”

“ Entreated to act as judge, the cat asks the suitors to draw near, on the ground that it is old and hard of hearing. When they have come within reach, it seizes one of them with its claws and the other with its teeth, and so puts a complete end to their dispute. A similarly hypocritical cat, mentioned in the "Mahābhārata," lives on the shores of the Ganges and feeds upon the mice in which its feigned austerities have inspired confidence. ”

“ Unable to decide for himself, the youth was at length instructed by an old man as to what he should ask for. "If riches are given to you, you will probably forget God," said the greybeard. "Better ask for a wise wife." ”

“ The conclusion at which an ordinary reader would arrive, if he were not dazzled by fairy-land glamor, would probably be that far better than either tact or industry on a master's part is the loyalty of an unscrupulous retainer of an imaginative turn of mind. ”

“ All that we know with certainty is that the animal which figures as the hero of the story wears, as a general rule, no boots and indeed is, in most instances, not only no booted cat, but no cat at all. In what seem to be the more archaic forms of the tale, the leading animal is usually a fox ”

“ The youth did so, and was made happy forever.
In this story we are carried far away from Sir Richard Whittington and the thrice-gained mayoralty of London town. The "natural" who spends a fortune on almsgiving and incense-burning is a very different being from the practical mercer of our own land; so impulsive and altogether untradesmanlike a speculator was much more likely to be indebted for the foundation of his fortune to a bartered cat than the practical Englishman whose real success has been associated by tradition with a probably fictitious feline friendship. ”

“ After a time the merchant comes to a land where rats and mice sadly vex the inhabitants, who are obliged to shut themselves up at night in chests, for fear of their ears being gnawed off, and where a ship-load of gold and silver is gladly given in exchange for the cat. ”

“ The domestic cat, so far as Europe is concerned, is generally supposed to be somewhat of an upstart. In Egypt its cultus had existed for ages before our ancestors dreamt of paying it that species of worship which at present appears to connect it with the tutelary genius of the hearth. ”

“ In the other Tartar story, which is in prose, an orphan named Salamya is brought up by a fox, which, when he is grown up, goes forth to seek him a wife. First it has recourse to the money-measuring trick, which proves highly successful. Then it avails itself of a remarkable artifice. It makes out of straw a ship, and equips it with soldiers who are literally men of straw. This ship it sends by water to the city where dwells the prince whose son-in-law the fox wishes the orphan to become. ”

“ The purchaser turns into a fox, and makes over the cow to fifty other foxes, which it afterwards presents, along with an equal number of wolves and bears, to a king whose son-in-law the youth becomes. ”

“ The thieving cat ... is now the morning twilight, now the moon who gives chase to the mice of the night." But the booted puss seems never to have been likened even to the smallest luminary of the night, not to speak of a morning or evening twilight. One of the greatest changes which have come over it, or its prototype the fox, is to be found in a South African variant of the story. Benfey has remarked that future investigations will some day show clearly that there are very few peoples to whom Indian tales have not made their way ”

“ The domestic cat very rarely deserts civilization in favor of savage freedom, its character offering in this respect a strong contrast to that of its fellow Oriental, the gipsy. How the tame cat made its way into Europe remains uncertain, although it is reported to have travelled from Egypt by the way of Cyprus. ”

“ The mango replied that men were accustomed to destroy trees after having derived benefit from their shade and fruit. The cow said that now it could be no longer of use to men, they had abandoned it to the beasts of prey. Fortunately for the Brahman, a fox came up which persuaded the crocodile to go back into the bag, whereupon it was killed by the man and eaten by the fox. ”

“ In the Russian variant, the man who has been rescued from death by the fox finally hit it over the head and beat it to death, saying the while, "Old kindness is forgotten." In many of the Indian stories of this kind, a warning against man's ingratitude is given in a very straightforward manner. A hunter, says one of them, took refuge from the wrath of a tiger in a tree, and was hospitably entertained by a monkey which had its home there. In the course of the night, while the man was asleep, the tiger came and asked the monkey to throw him down. ”

“ Virtue in them is, in the long run, almost always triumphant, and honest right seldom fails to overcome dishonest might. An exception must perhaps be made in the case of certain stories about thieves, in which the audacious ingenuity of the malefactor is called as a witness in his favor, and eventually procures for him not only an acquittal but a reward. ”

“ The fox was regaled with chickens, and stayed at Kosma's dwelling till they were all eaten up. In a third Russian variant (Khudyakof, No. 98) a fox of its own free will offers the hand of a princess to a youth, and obtains it for him in the usual way. The youth's want of retinue is accounted for by the explanation that all his attendants and baggage have been lost in a swamp. The proprietor who is dispossessed in favor of the youthful impostor is an ordinary landowner, a Barin (or Mr.) ”

“ Its comparatively commonplace character in this respect has prevented its being turned to account by the extreme section of the solar-myth school. Other cats of popular fiction have been found by such commentators to be sublimely mythical. ”