Twenty-Third Issue: Cats!

This issue is about cats. I want to get a cat. Cats are great. They have been on my mind lately. I was talking with my uncle the other day about cats – he’s very anti-pet in general, and since he is Muslim I was trying to change his mind by bringing up how cats are important in Islam. It didn’t quite work, but at least I got to look up some cool cat facts.

Apparently, the Prophet Muhammad had a cat called Muezza. He loved her a lot. One time, he was woken from a nap by the sound of the call to prayer and he was about to put on his clothes but he found out that Muezza was napping on a sleeve of the robe. He loved his cat so much that he cut the sleeve off the robe and put it on so that the cat could stay napping. When he came back from prayer, the cat bowed to him and he petted her three times. This is just a story and isn’t necessarily true, but it’s a nice story anyway. Cats are also admired for their cleanliness, and were loved in the middle east before Islam, but the Prophet Muhammad did not allow his followers to hurt or kill cats.

One of Prophet Muhammad’s friends’ was called Abu Hurairah which means Father of the Kitten because he loved cats so much. One time, one of Abu Hurairah’s cats saved the Prophet Muhammad from a snake so he stroked its back and head which blessed cats to always land on their feet. Cats roamed freely in many Middle Eastern countries. One American traveler, Bayard Taylor, found a Syrian hospital where cats roamed and were taken care of. Edward William Lane found a cat garden in Cairo in the 13^th century, at a time when Europeans were killing them and eating them because of their association with witchcraft. Wilfred Thesiger said that cats were allowed to roam around villages but dogs were driven out. Cats also were valued for their rodent-killing properties, and stayed in libraries and academies because they killed mice that destroyed books. They are thought to be ritually clean and are even allowed to enter mosques.

 

 

 Moving to another part of the world, you may already know that a lot of ships often had cats on board. Ship cats have their own page on Wikipedia! Chibbley was a ship’s cat who circumnavigated the world five times! She sailed over 180,000 miles and became a minor celebrity. Convoy was a ship cat during World War II. He got his own tiny hammock that he slept on. Sadly he was killed when his ship was sunk by a German submarine. Emmy was a ship’s cat just before World War I. She was an orange tabby cat and she wouldn’t go back on the ship one time, which was a bad omen. The ship sank and a thousand people died. Some say that Emmy knew it would happen and that’s why she wouldn’t get on.  Simon was a ship’s cat on a British ship in China. He was wounded but recovered and was appointed to the rank of “Able Seacat”. When he came back to Britain he became a celebrity and was awarded the Dickin Medal (the Dickin Medal is a British military award to animals that served in a military conflict, and if you ever want to kill time, reading about those animals is pretty enjoyable). Simon was buried with full naval honors when he died.

 

 

Speaking of ship cats, there was a cat who went in a different kind of ship – a space ship! In 1963, France was ready to send a cat named Felix to space. They wanted to put their hat in the space race between the American and the Soviets. But on the day they were ready to launch, Felix went missing! He was not into being an astronaut. Another cat, Félicette, took his place.

 

 

Nicknamed ‘Astrocat’, Félicette flew for fifteen minutes, 130 miles above the Sahara Desert in Algeria. When she came back, scientists studied her brainwaves. Unfortunately, even though French astronauts do go up into space, they do so with Russian or American space ships, instead of their own. So sending a cat up into space was cool, but didn’t really lead to much for France’s space program. We don’t even know what happened to Astrocat. I hope she lived a long happy life.
 
Honestly, France has a weird history with cats. I recently read a book called The Great Cat Massacre, which is about exactly what the title would make you think it is. It happened in the 18^th century, and basically it was a riot among the printers’ shops in Paris. The workers and apprentices were treated badly and their masters were treated well. The masters and mistresses loved cats and a lot of them kept cats as pets. The food that the workers were given was so gross that they couldn’t eat it, and when they gave it to the cats, even the cats refused it. There were also lots of alley cats that howled all night and wouldn’t let the workers sleep. One night one of the workers climbed up to the roof near the masters’ bedroom and howled like the cats so the master and mistress couldn’t sleep. They then told the workers to get rid of all the alley cats.
 
The workers did as they told but did not stop there. They went after the pet cats too. They whacked them all to death, gathered them in sacks, and dumped them in the courtyard. They took the mistress’s favorite gray cat and staged a trial with guards, judges, and an executioner. They strung up the gray cat from a noose and the mistress saw it and freaked out. The workers all laughed and were entertained by this whole scene. This sounds awful of course, but it makes sense when you think about the workers’ living and working conditions. They didn’t want to rebel against their masters, but killing their cats was kind of like a proxy rebellion. You can read more analysis of the event here.
 
On a happier note, you probably know who Florence Nightingale is. She basically started modern nursing, especially during the Crimean War. Well, what you might not know about her is that she loved cats! She owned sixty over her lifetime, and her favorite one was a Persian cat called Mr. Bismark. She said he was “the most sensitively affectionate of cats, very gentle…”. When she got back from the war, Florence was in poor health for a while, so she wrote books and papers. Her cats wandered around while she worked, and she said one would often be “tied in a knot around her neck”. They would knock down vases and step in her ink. You can still see imprints of their paws on a lot of her letters and papers today.
 
Florence’s cats were treated very well. They ate special food on plates in her room. Mr. Bismarck in particular ate “a little rice pudding with his 5 o’clock tea”. Their litter boxes had imported sand. When she was ready to give one of her cats, Mr. White, away, she wrote a letter of instructions to the new owner:
 

    Dear Mrs. Frost.

    1. Mr. White has never made dirt in his life: but has been brought up to go to a pan, with sand in it. You must have patience with him, please till he has been taught to go out-of-doors for his wants.

    2. He has always been shut up at night: (in a large pantry :) to prevent his being lost. And I believe he ought to always be shut up at night: for this reason…For fear he should run away & try to get back to me.

    3. He has always been used to having his meals by himself like a gentleman on a plate put upon a ‘tablecloth’ (an old newspaper) spread on the floor.

    He is not greedy: has never stolen anything: & never drags his bones off his newspaper. But I am sorry to say he always lived well: he has bones, & milk, in the morning: after 7 o’clock dinner he has any remains of fish not fish bones or chicken – or game bones: which he eats like a gentleman off a plate in my room, as I have described: & never asks for more – than a little broken meat & milk, when he is shut up at night & a large jar of fresh water (which he can’t upset) always on the floor for him.

    4. He is the most affectionate and intelligent cat I have ever had…& when his own little sister cat died, he refused food and almost broke his heart. He washes and dresses two little kits we have here (of his) himself. I never saw a Tom-cat do that before…He is now 10 months old.

    I have written a long letter about him: but in short I recommend him to your kind care: & am,
    Yours Faithfully,

    Florence Nightingale
 

At the time a lot of people thought her love and care for her cats was kind of annoying, but I think it’s kind of sweet. It reminds me of the city of Kuching in Borneo, Malaysia. I went there on a school trip and since Kuching means cat, the whole city is cat themed. Cats hang out in the shops and stores, there are sculptures and statues of cats everywhere. It’s pretty fun. Here are a few photos I found online (sadly the photos I took myself are lost so this will have to do).

 

 

 

Finally, to round out this cat issue, here's a fascinating news article I found about a cat causing an international incident through no fault of its own!