Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/257

 J2 S. I. MAR. 25, 1916.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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and a half years before, the vacancy thereby caused not having been filled in the interim), and Richard Edgcumbe, disabled by the House of Commons for Royalism. For these vacancies " Sir Philip Percivall, Knt.," and Nicholas Leach were chosen. What puzzled me before, and puzzles me still, is why Perceval was selected, and this despite the explanation (ibid., p. 372) of that highest of ^11 authorities on such a point, MB. W. D. PINK, who showed that, though Perceval had been a strong Royalist during the opening period of the Civil War, he later quitted the King's side and threw in his lot with the moderate Presbyterians. But Perceval's chief public service had been rendered as " Commissary- General of Pro- visions in his Majesty's army in Ireland " and " provider for the Horse " there from March, 1641/2, to July, 1647, during which period, in 1644, he was Commissioner for the King at Oxford to treat with the Irish confederates. Perceval was of Tykenham and Burton, Somerset, and Duhallow, Ireland ; and I can trace no Cornish con- nexion of any kind to account for his choice for a Cornish borough. He came in, however, when an Edgcumbe (and that Edgcumbe a brother of the younger Piers and a nephew of Lady Benny of Tralee) went out. Is it possible that this supplies the link of connexion hitherto missing ? ALFBED F. ROBBINS.

CAT FOLK-LORE.

ill S. xii. 183, 244, 286, 330, 369, 389, 428, 468; 12 S. i. 15.)

PROBABLY MB. QUABBELL will find his ques- tion (11 S. xii. 369) solved in G. J. Romanes's ' Animal Intelligence,' 1881, wherein, if my memory deceives me not, the author has assayed to ascribe to her excessive maternal affection the cat's devouring her little ones sometimes when they happen to be too frequently handled by on-lookers.

Out of MB. ACKEBMANN'S five queries I can answer the following four :

1. In this part it is a common belief that as soon as a young cat is taken in' its new master's dwelling, it would invariably dis- appear thence and return to its native house. The best way of preventing this is to convey it in a sack via a bridge after turning round with it three times thereon, which is said to throw its sense of direction into irrecoverable confusion.

3. The Japanese say nothing about the cat's eating flies, whereas some of them

opine they would be much invigorated by eating ants, which sometimes crowd upon their food.

4. In ' The Encyclopaedia Britannica,' llth ed., vol. v. p. 489, we are told :

" In one direction the tabby shows a tendency to melanism .... while in the other direction there is an equally marked tendency to albinism. ....A third colour-phase, the ' erythristic ' or red, is represented by the sandy cat, the female of which takes the form of the ' tortoise-shell,' characterized, curiously enough, by the colour being a blend of black, white, and sandy. ..."

Thus far the European tortoiseshell cats would seem all to be females. But in Japan the males of this colour are said to exist, though exceedingly seldom. Formerly, tra- ditions say, all wealthy sea-captains vied with one another to procure one, even from one to three thousand ryos of gold being offered for it. So exorbitant a price did it fetch because its ascent of its own accord to the main mast's top was believed to portend a stormy weather unerringly. The great nove- list Saikwaku, in his ' Shin Kashoki,' 1688, torn. iii. ch. iii., tells how a lord of Echigo incurred a serious expenditure and general clamour by adopting an idle boon com- panion's counsel and compelling his subjects to search for a tortoiseshell torn throughout the region :

" It proved bootless, all people were exceedingly distressed, and consequently the search was stopped, its original projector being prohibited from approaching the lord. Thus everybody was convincing himself that there existed no male tortoiseshell cat, when suddenly a man found one and presented it to the lord."

5. If I remember aright, Charles Darwin, in his * Origin of Species ' or ' Descent of Man,' adduced as a very inexplicable example of the contingent associations of animal traits the fact of all white cats with blue eyes being deaf. Whether recorded by others or not, during my eight years' stay in England (1892-1900) I repeatedly observed another such association in a peculiar breed of cat, which was not rare in London, but does not occur in Japan. It was dull grey, closely spotted with rather indistinct dark livid marks, had its chin somewhat protruded and its lower teeth grown a little before the upper, and uttered a very characteristic murmur whenever called from its slumber. I am desirous of being told what English name is applied to this breed.

That the Japanese since olden times con- sidered the cat as a very peculiar animal is borne out in the following passages :

" The cat differs from all other mammals in these nine points. First, it cleanses its face when it feels contentedly. Secondly, it purrs to express