Catastrophe

In Europe, so many butchers sold cats as rabbits that many countries enacted laws requiring rabbits to be sold with their heads attached so customers would know they were buying rabbit meat, and not cat meat.

We always hear about the great white hunter who goes to Africa to get a leopardskin for his wife, a tigerskin for his mistress, and a lion head for the mantlepiece, but we never hear of anyone inviting their family and friends over to barbecue Cheetah steaks!

Cats were adored and deified by ancient Egyptians, feared as the "familiar" of witches, yet served as playmate to many a lonely child. Despite starving populations on every continent, Humane Societies around the world continue to provide "the final solution" to unwanted cats and kittens rather than feed "rabbit stew" to the hungry (the hungry wouldn't eat "cat stew").

Perhaps, like the fate of the Margay kitten, cats are destined to strut in the moonlight, and remain a mystery.

© 1997 Rico Leffanta