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 22 The nuns were not so badly off who were permitted to keep a cat.

No one knows the date, and no one knows the route of Pussy's westward voyage, a voyage fraught with peril and disaster. From Cyprus she came,—so say most authorities,—and there is an ancient tradition of a Christian monastery near Paphos, where the Greek monks kept a little colony of highly trained and valorous cats, whose duty it was to destroy the serpents that infested the island. These cats hunted their prey daily "with admirable zeal and address,"—I quote from Moncrif,—and to the great benefit of the neighbourhood. But when the Turks snatched Cyprus, they burned the monastery, and turned the homeless pussies, not to speak of the homeless monks, adrift upon the world;—a strange piece of ill-doing for Moslems, who, however contemptuous of cloisters, have always cherished cats with exceeding tenderness. The love which Mohammed bore for his fair white cat, Muezza, has thrown a veil of sanctity over the whole feline race; and no good Ottoman ever forgets that when Muezza slept one day upon her master's flowing sleeve, the Prophet—being summoned to the Council—cut off his sleeve, rather than disturb her slumber.

Proud then, and justly proud, was that true believer upon whom was conferred the title—at once magnificent and tender—of "Father of Cats."