Polydactyl Cat

Gentle and obliging soul that I am, sucker that I am, I have been feeding cats, including some strays that show up hungry and abused.  I won't say how many, but the number is far in excess to what the law allows.

Few months ago a little black long haired cat showed up.  Very shy, wouldn't let me approach much less touch it.  I'd throw it food and it would run, being used to having objects other than food thrown at it.  No clue as to gender.  As far as age it has grown a bit since it has taken up residence here.

Anyway, I finally got close enough while it was eating to see there was something unusual about its front paws.   It's polydactyl, with a furry thumb on each front paw.  Which I am very happy about because it means I can probably place the cat.   Just took pictures though it is so shy I don't have good images of those front paws.  When I start to focus the cat looks up and thinks I am planning harm and runs, though I have actually gotten close enough at feedings that I can brush its fur before it runs.

Polydactyl cats may have originated at Boston, Massachusetts.   In any case they appear to have been spread from Boston via ships that took them on as ship's cats.   But before sailors got the idea polydactyls were lucky at sea or more skilled at climbing the rigging or latching rats, landsmen in Massachusetts descended from Puritans killed polydactyls believing they were the work of the devil. 

I posted in an earlier blog that I appear to be descended from William Towne, a 1637 immigrant to Massachusetts three of whose daughters were accused of witchcraft in 1692, one of them an infirm lady in her 70s who was removed to prison from her sickbed and tried and hanged along with one of her sisters.

It is well to remember that our Puritan forbears were more superstitious and foolish than even the sailors who cherished polydactyl cats instead of killing them, and that even Cotton Mather, touted as one of the most highly educated men of his time, was little more than a superstitious fool.