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Modern Cats - The Atlantic

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“There is a prejudice against cats because dogs hate them. We defer overmuch to the opinion of the dog because he is ‘faithful.’” Let us examine the interior of the cat, and take an inventory of his moral and intellectual furniture. Webster, in an early edition of his dictionary, goes out of his way to abuse the creature, and even makes himself little less than slanderous. “The domestic cat,” he says, “is a deceitful animal, and when enraged extremely spiteful. It is kept in houses, chiefly for the purpose of catching rats and mice.” Would a dog have done worse? In all the sixty thousand words of the English language, which of course the great lexicographer knew by heart, could he not find a couple of dozen that would have been more applicable, or at least more charitable? If he had been born as weak as pussy, and had found it as hard to escape kicks and pick up a living, might he not have grown up a bit of a diplomatist? I should like to know, also, whether he was not himself subject

L ET US examine the interior of the cat, and take an inventory of his moral and intellectual furniture. Webster, in an early edition of his dictionary, goes out of his way to abuse the creature, and even makes himself little less than slanderous. “The domestic cat,” he says, “is a deceitful animal, and when enraged extremely spiteful. It is kept in houses, chiefly for the purpose of catching rats and mice.” Would a dog have done worse? In all the sixty thousand words of the English language, which of course the great lexicographer knew by heart, could he not find a couple of dozen that would h

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