Cats have been familiar to the human household from all antiquity, but
they were probably first domesticated in Egypt, where, so far back
as two thousand years ago, a temple was dedicated to the goddess of
cats—Bubastis Pasht—represented with a cat’s head. The Greeks had this
feline pet of the house from Egypt, and from Greece the cat race, such
as we have it now, was disseminated over Europe. It was a familiar
element in Greek household life, and if anything was broken, according
to Aristophanes, the phrase went then as now, “The cat did it.” But
cats were never venerated in Greece with religious adoration as in
Egypt, the only country that gave them Divine honour, and where, if
a cat died, the whole family shaved off their eyebrows in token of
mourning.
The Irish have always looked on cats as evil and mysteriously connected
with some demoniacal influence. On entering a house the usual
salutation is, “God save all here, except the cat.” Even the cake on
the griddle may be blessed, but no one says, “God bless the cat.”
It is believed that the devil often assumes the form of these animals.
The familiar of a witch is always a black cat; and it is supposed that
black cats have powers and faculties quite different from all other
of the feline tribe. They are endowed with reason, can understand
conversations, and are quite able to talk if they considered it
advisable and judicious to join in the conversation. Their temperament
is exceedingly unamiable, they are artful, malignant, and skilled in
deception, and people should be very cautious in caressing them, for
they have the venomous heart and the evil eye, and are ever ready to
do an injury. Yet the liver of a black cat has the singular power to
excite love when properly administered. If ground to powder and infused
into potion, the recipient is fated to love passionately the person who
offers it and has worked the charm.
An instance of this is narrated as having happened not very long ago.
A farmer’s daughter, a pretty coquette, attracted the attention of
the young squire of the place. But though he was willing to carry on
a flirtation, the young gentleman had no idea of debasing his proud
lineage by an alliance. Yet a marriage was exactly what the girl
desired, and which she was determined to accomplish. So she and a
friend, an accomplice, searched the village till they found a black
cat, black as night, with only three white hairs on the breast. Him
they seized, and having tied up the animal in a bag, they proceeded to
throw him from one to the other over a low wall, till the poor beast
was quite dead. Then at midnight they began their unholy work. The
liver and heart were extracted in the name of the Evil One, and then
boiled down until they became so dry that they could easily be reduced
to a powder, which was kept for use when opportunity offered. This
soon came; the young squire arrived one evening as usual, to pay a
visit to the pretty Nora, and began to make love to the girl with the
ordinary amount of audacity and hypocrisy. But Nora had other views,
so she made the tea by her little fire in a _black_ teapot, for this
was indispensable, and induced her lover to stay and partake of it with
her, along with a fresh griddle cake. Then cunningly she infused the
powder into his cup and watched him as he drank the tea with feverish
anxiety. The result was even beyond her hopes. A violent and ardent
passion seemed suddenly to have seized the young man, and he not only
made earnest love to the pretty Nora, but offered her his hand in
marriage, vowing that he would kill himself if she refused to become
his lawful bride. To avoid such a catastrophe, Nora gently yielded to
his request, and from that evening they were engaged. Daily visits
followed from the young squire, and each time that he came Nora took
care to repeat the charm of the love powder, so that the love was kept
at fever heat, and finally the wedding day was fixed.
The family of the young squire were, however, not quite contented,
especially as rumours of witchcraft and devil’s dealings were bruited
about the neighbourhood. And on the very eve of the marriage, just
as the young man was pouring forth his vows of eternal love to the
bride expectant, the door was burst open, and a body of men entered,
headed by the nearest relations of the squire, who proceeded at once to
belabour the young bridegroom with hazel sticks in the most vigorous
manner. In vain the bride tried to interpose. She only drew the blows
on herself, and finally the young man was carried away half stunned,
lifted into the carriage and driven straight home, where he was locked
up in his own room, and not allowed to hold any communication with the
bride elect.
The daily doses of the powder having thus ceased, he began to recover
from the love madness, and finally the fever passed away. And he looked
back with wonder and horror on the fatal step he had so nearly taken.
Now he saw there was really witchcraft in it, which the power of the
hazel twigs had completely broken. And the accomplice having confessed
the sorcery practised on him by Nora and herself, he hated the girl
henceforth as much as he had once loved her.
And after a little he went away on foreign travel, and remained abroad
for three years. When he returned, he found that Nora had degenerated
into a withered little witch-faced creature, who was shunned by every
one, and jeered at for the failure of her wicked spells, which had
all come to nothing, though she had the Evil One himself to aid her;
for such is the fate of all who deal in sorcery and devil’s magic,
especially with the help of Satan’s chief instrument of witchcraft—the
black cat.
* * * * *
But there is a certain herb of more power even than the cat’s liver to
produce love. Though what this herb is, only the adept knows and can
reveal. The influence it exercises lasts, it is said, for twenty-one
years, and then ceases and cannot be renewed.
A gentleman, now living, once ate of this herb, which was given to
him by his wife’s serving-maid, and in consequence he was fated to
love the girl for the specified time. Not being then able to endure
his wife’s presence, he sent her away from the house, and devoted
himself exclusively to the servant. Nineteen years have now passed
by, and the poor lady is still waiting patiently to the end of the
twenty-one years, believing that the witch-spell will then cease, and
that her husband’s love will be hers once more. For already he has been
inquiring after her and his children, and has been heard lamenting
the madness that forced him to drive them from the house for the sake
of the menial, who usurped his wife’s place by means of some wicked
sorcery which he had no power to resist.