terrible murmur.

Before, in cruel centuries, cats were not treated that way. Who threw it from the bell tower, who threw it into the fire. Who tried to get the philosopher's stone on the basis of the cat. Can you imagine how many kittens for these purposes were ruined by alchemists and home-grown owners of the third eye?

In the Middle Ages, cats were often walled up in the foundation to protect the house from the influence of evil spirits. They also made miraculous medicines. For example, dried cat liver was used to treat urolithiasis, an ointment based on cat blood and barley flour was made for allergies and skin rashes, even cat eyes were crushed to improve vision! And so that no illness crosses the threshold of the house, under the porch buried dried cat's tail. Yes, the customs were cruel then!

Our Russian warlocks most often used kittens for love potions. Open any collection of folk conspiracies, you will find there special recipes for extracting a magic fork from a black kitten: if you touch the object of sighing with it, you will immediately reciprocate, and you get bored - you touch it again, only with the other end, and stop loving. A convenient thing, however, the manufacturing process is disgusting and time consuming, because the black cat had to be boiled for this. Not a good process and is not connected with the love of animals. Although, of course, maybe the ultimate goal was worth it. That was a long time ago. And not everyone used magical bones. The population more often used cats for other purposes.

A cat in many nations is considered a barometer of income. In Japan, trading in a shop promises to be brisk if a cat rubs its left ear with its paw. If a cat suddenly reaches out to a person, he will soon receive unexpected money or make a profitable purchase. And in China, they believed that even a wealthy family could go bankrupt if a completely alien cat suddenly came to the hearth.

That is, the cats were tested for both financial well-being and climate change. Even the time was calculated by the cat.

In the Japanese town of Hagoshima, the Temple of Cats was erected. In 1600, seven cats were taken to war as…watches. The Japanese determined the time by observing the expansion and contraction of the cat's pupils.

And not only the ancient Japanese, by the way. Even our not so distant ancestors, grandfathers and great-grandfathers still used the cat with might and main.

When photography was discovered in the 19th century, exposure had to be chosen "by eye", more precisely - by a cat's eye. Instead of a non-existent then exposure meter, photographers took ordinary cats with them. Focusing on the width of the pupil, they determined the exposure time necessary for correct shooting!

In those imperialist times, a cat in the house was rarely taken only for comfort. She had a purely economic purpose, mainly a mouse-catcher. Since the 19th century, of course, a lot of time has flown by. Rarely do we choose a cat for hunting performance. More often - according to the degree of comfort. A tattered fighting cat, of course, delivers a minimum of comfort. And imposing and well-groomed - the maximum. And the majority of citizens prefer not to accept an adult cat into their home, but small. Counts. which is better: grow what you want. Oh, often, what is better does not grow in any way, grows what was not expected. Why?

Yes, because first of all you need to know where to get a cat that is pleasant in all respects.

Where do you buy kittens
“I want a kitten,” the potential owner says. Great! A commendable wish!

But “getting a kitten” is an abstract problem. What kitten? Small or older? Courageous or calm? With pedigree or without pedigree? Pedigree or outbred? For money or for a nominal fee?

In fact, finding that kitten that seems to be born for you is not an easy problem. All kittens look adorable. Only then it suddenly turns out that not the cat that he dreamed of grows out of him.

“Kittens, excellent kittens, there are only two left, a cat and a cat,” the seller persuades.

“Ah, just two,” the customer thinks, “if I decide to look at another kitten, can they buy this one?” What to do, ah, what to do? It seems that these kittens are not so pleasant, but what if others will be even worse?

- I take, I take, that smoky one over there!

And at home, having examined the purchaser more closely, the hostess suddenly sees that she did not want such a kitten, she did not dream about him. Probably, it was necessary to wait, see other contenders! Too late, the train has left. Kittens can't be returned like worn-out shoes to a store. You can not change "to a different size."

It happens otherwise. A person is looking for a cat with the given parameters, looking for a month, looking for a second one, visits all the places where the right kitten can suddenly appear, and still does not find anyone. One seems to like it, but his ears are not like that. The other is also okay, but the tail is not like that. After six months of constant tossing in search of a kitten, a person puts in a frame a photograph of an ideal cat and sometimes, glancing at her, says to his friends: here, I would like the same beauty. Yes, apparently, not fate.

Or he is looking for a beautiful cat, but he meets a filthy kitten on his way, and here he is - the long-awaited ideal! And no show-class beast is needed anymore! There is a cross-eyed pet.

Sometimes cats have strange deviations in the anatomical structure. An amazing winged cat lives in the town of Asheville. In 1996, this kitty came to the nursing home of the Kloara couple from a local shelter. The cat then was a kitten, and people noticed only that her back seemed to be damaged, because there they saw some kind of leathery fold. Deciding that someone had beaten the kitten, they began to nurse him. The cat grew up, but the fold on the back not only did not disappear, but even began to increase. Having once probed this formation, the couple came to the conclusion that it was ... wings. In a leathery fold, thin bones and tendons, characteristic of this design, clearly grew. The kitten was named Muff. The clutch, of course, does not fly, she prefers to keep her wings pressed to the back.

How many cats are there in the world? Nobody knows! Kittens are born and born. You can't stop nature! And many find their owners. Where do kittens get into our homes? From a variety of sources. Sometimes of those that it would be better not to have at all.

Kitten from the market
Where to buy a kitten? Of course, in the market. In a market where they sell animals. This is such an amazing place where you can meet both a normal owner who dreams of building a brood of grown kittens, and resellers who have only one thought - to cut down more money. In the "bird" market, most of all are dealers.

- Siamese kittens! The purest breed! With royal tails! From an award-winning father! - the aunt beckons to the cage where five or six tired kittens are sitting, huddled together. If it is winter, they shiver from the cold; if it is hot, they suffer from the heat.

— Persians and semi-Persians from the father-champion! - echoes another woman with fluffy kittens, - The best gift for a child!

Dealers are crooks. They themselves do not keep cats, they buy kittens for cheap from real owners, who are embarrassed to trade their animals, and there is no time. Quite often, kittens of different ages and colors sit in the same cage. They are all from different cats. Didn't sell today, will sell later. Dealers, although they are actively inviting people, rarely bring down the price. They want to get the maximum amount for the kittens. Sometimes they even supply pedigreed-looking kittens with "real" pedigrees. In fact, such pedigrees are filkin's letter. They are not recognized in any cat club. Other resellers even show photos of "dad" and "mum". But what is photography? In the age of technological progress, it is not difficult to present a photograph. The buyer will not demand that the kitten's parents be introduced to him personally? Will not be. Does the kitten look like them in color? That means parents.

Usually resellers trade only "thoroughbred goods". If fluffy kittens - then Persians, half Persians or Siberians. White fluffy - all cleaned up angora. With short hair and thick muzzles - the British. With masks or just light and skinny - Siamese. And the more "unconventional" the kitten looks, the more "pedigreed" it is.

In the 14th century, the Japanese had a strange belief that an evil spirit lives in the mountains - a giant Nekomata cat, whose tail is bifurcated. It was believed that Nekomata causes trouble and brings death. Since the Japanese were afraid that a kitten with a forked tail might appear in the litter of a domestic cat, they began to dock the tails of blind kittens immediately after birth. And the first cat breeders tried to bring out a special tailless breed. Today it is the most common cat breed in Japan.

Resellers do not have outbred kittens. They are traded by grannies who dream of getting rid of the offspring of their outbred cats as soon as