Have you noticed the family cat being a bit off lately? It may well be, of course, that the Christmas scraps have been too rich for one accustomed to a more mundane food regime, but perhaps the lively weather we have had has also played a part.
Members of the feline family, and domesticated felis catus in particular, are well known to be most sensitive to the elements and, watched carefully, can be seen to be very shrewd forecasters.
Unlikely as it may seem, this feline faculty has been a topic of serious research. Some years ago a Swiss pharmaceutical company, for reasons best known no doubt to its board members, subjected the predictive talents of a group of cats to statistical evaluation.
It was concluded that cats tend to sleep more during warm, anti-cyclonic weather than at other times; that they become more restless as the weather changes; and that they are at their most active when it is cool and humid. But our ancestors - - and, of course their cats - were more specific.
In olden times cats were proactive about future weather. When the ship's cat was seen chasing its tail or playing with a dangling rope, it was a sure sign to sailors it was stirring up the wind. Many a poor puss, therefore, innocently taking a frisky break from its predatory chores, was heaved overboard lest its continuing presence should bring disaster on the superstitious mariners.
But now our cats confine themselves to anticipating, rather than causing, storms. If your cat rubs itself against a wall, or scratches against a post, for example, it is its version of a severe gale warning. Moreover, in very cold weather, we are told, cats wash their faces before a thaw, and sit with their backs to the fire before a bout of snow.
These, of course, are very easy traits to spot, but when it comes to rain, cat-casting is no pursuit for the careless dilettante, and the signs must be watched very closely. One sign of rain is when, as the old rhyme puts it:
Puss on the hearth with velvet paws,
Sits wiping o'er her whiskered jaws.
But if the cat puts her paws above her ears during this operation, it augurs something quite different. As another sage has described it, one whose powers of observation, one hopes, were significantly better than his ability to turn out a rhyming couplet:
If the cat washes her face o'er the ear,
'Tis a sign the weather will be fine and clear.