The domestic cat (Felis catus or Felis silvestris catus) is a small, usually furry,domesticated, carnivorousmammal. It is often called the housecat,or simply the cat when there is no need to distinguish it from other felids and felines. Cats are valued by humans for companionship and ability to hunt vermin and household pests.
Cats are similar in anatomy to the other felids, with strong, flexible bodies, quick reflexes, sharp retractable claws, and teeth adapted to killing small prey. As crepuscular predators, cats use their acute hearing and ability to see in near darkness to locate prey. Not only can cats hear sounds too faint for human ears, they can also hear sounds higher in frequencythan humans can perceive. This is because the usual prey of cats (particularly rodents such as mice) make high frequency noises, so the hearing of the cat has evolved to pinpoint these faint high-pitched sounds. Cats also have a much better sense of smell than humans.
Cats have a rapid breeding rate. Under controlled breeding, they can be bred and shown asregistered pedigree pets, a hobby known as cat fancy. Failure to control the breeding of pet cats by spaying and neutering and the abandonment of former household pets has resulted in large numbers of feral cats worldwide, with a population of up to 60 million of these animals in the United States alone.
Since cats were cult animals in ancient Egypt, it was commonly believed to have been domesticated there,but there may have been instances of domestication as early as theNeolithic.A genetic study in 2007 revealed that all house cats are descended from as few as five female African Wildcats(Felis silvestris lybica) c. 8000 BCE, in the Middle East.Cats are currently the most popular pet in the world, now found almost everywhere in the world.
Doraemon (also known in some overseas markets as Doraemon: Gadget Cat from the Future) is a Japanese manga series created by Fujiko F. Fujio which later became an anime series and an Asian francise. The series is about an earless robotic cat named Doraemon, who travel back in time from the 22nd century to aid a schoolboy, Nobita Nobi.
Doraemon is sent back in time by Nobita Nobi's great-great grandson Sewashi to improve Nobita's circumstances so that his descendants may enjoy a better future. In the original time-line, Nobita experienced nothing but misery and misfortune manifested in the form of poor marks and grades, physical disasters, and bullying throughout his life. This culminates in the burning down of a future business he set up which leaves his family line beset with financial problems. In order to alter history and better the Nobi family's fortunes, Sewashi sent him a robot called Doraemon.
Doraemon has a pocket from which he produces many gadgets, medicines, and tools from the future. The pocket is called yōjigen-pocket (lit. fourth-dimensional pocket). Some of the gadgets (dōgu) are based on real Japanese household devices with fanciful twists, but most are completely science fiction (although some may be based on folklore or religious stories). Thousands of dōgu have been featured in Doraemon. The number of dōgu has been approximated at 4,500. It is this constant variety which makes Doraemon popular even among adult readers/viewers. In the series, the availability of dōgu depends sometimes on the money Doraemon has available, and he often says some dōgu are expensive in the future.
Film seven times, tying it with Walt Disney's Silly Symphonies as the theatrical animated series with the most Oscars. A longtime television staple, Tom and Jerry has a worldwide audience that consists of children, teenagers and adults, and has also been recognized as one of the most famous and longest-lived rivalries in American cinema. In 2000, TIME named the series one of the greatest television shows of all time.
Sylvester shows a lot of pride in himself, and never gives up. Perhaps because of his pride and persistence, Sylvester is, with rare exceptions, placed squarely on the "loser" side of the Looney Tunes winner/loser hierarchy. He shows a different character when paired with Porky Pig in explorations of spooky places, in which he doesn't speak, and behaves as a scaredy cat. He also appears in a handful of cartoons with Elmer Fudd, most notably in a series of cartoons underwritten by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation extolling the American economic system.
Sylvester, whom for the most part always played the antagonist role. A couple of cartoon features Sylvester playing the protagonist role while having to deal with the canine duo of Spike the Bulldog and Chester the Terrier after being chased around. In 1952's Tree for Two by Friz Freleng, Sylvester is cornered in the back alley and would result in Spike getting mauled by a black panther that escaped from a zoo. 1954 film Dr. Jerkyl's Hyde, Spike (here called "Alfie") is pummels the poor pooch. After Spike's ordeal, Sylvester would have the courage and confidence to confront Chester, only to be beaten and tossed away by Chester.
Perhaps Sylvester's most developed role is in a series of Robert McKimson-directed shorts, in which the character is a hapless mouse-catching instructor to his dubious son, Sylvester Junior, with the "mouse" being a powerful baby kangaroo which he constantly mistakes for a "king-size mouse". His alternately confident and bewildered episodes bring his son to shame, while Sylvester himself is reduced to nervous breakdowns.
Garfield is an orange, fuzzy, tabby cat born in the kitchen of an Italian restaurant and immediately ate all the pasta and lasagna of the sight, thus developing his love and obsession on lasagna. Gags in the strips commonly deal with Garfield's obesity and his hatred of exercise (or any form of work; he is known for saying breathing is exercise.) In addition to being portrayed as lazy and fat, Garfield is also pessimistic, sadistic, cynical, sarcastic, sardonic and a bit obnoxious. He enjoys destroying things, mauling the mailman, tormenting Odie, kicking Odie off the table; he also makes snide comments, usually about Jon's inability to get a date.
Though Garfield can be very cynical, he does have a soft side for his teddy bear, Pooky, food and sleep, but one Christmas he says "they say I have to get up early, be nice to people, skip breakfast, not play with mice...I wish it would never end.It has been wondered by many readers if Garfield can actually be understood by the non animal characters around him. Sometimes it seems like Jon can hear him. However, it is mentioned in more than one strip that Jon cannot understand Garfield.
Jon (Jonathan Q. Arbuckle) is Garfield's owner, usually depicted as an awkward clumsy geek who has trouble finding a date. Jon also had a crush on Liz (Garfield's veterinarian) and is now dating her. Jon loves (or occasionally hates) Garfield and all cats. Many gags focus on this; his inability to get a date is usually attributed to his lack of social skills, his poor taste in clothes (Garfield remarked in one strip after seeing his closet that "two hundred moths committed suicide", in another, the "geek police" ordered Jon to "throw out his tie"),and his eccentric interests which range from stamp collecting to measuring the growth of his toenails to watching movies with "polkaninjas". Other strips portray him as lacking intelligence (he is seen reading a pop-up book in one strip).Jon was born on a farm that apparently contained few amenities; in one strip, his father, upon seeing indoor plumbing, remarks, "Woo-ha! Ain't science something?"Jon occasionally visits his parents, brother and grandmother at their farm. It was implied that Jon is inspired by a drawing of Davis himself when he was first drawing the strip.
Puss-in-Boots is the well-known fairy-tale about the ingenious cat and his master.
The original tale – Le maistre chat, ou le chat botté – was written by Charles
Perrault and was first published in 1697. Charles Perrault (1628-1703) is thought to be
the author of many other well-known fairy tales
The tale begins with a poor man who is given a cat by his father. The talking cat
helps his master by gaining the king’s favour. First he catches a rabbit and takes it
to the king, saying that it is a gift from his master. Then, by cunning, he manages
to get some fine clothes for his master, and finally a castle. The king is convinced
that Puss-in-Boots’s master is worthy of his daughter’s hand, and the tale ends
with a wedding.
Once upon a time there was a miller who left no more riches to the three sons he had than his mill, his ass, and his cat. The division was soon made. Neither the lawyer nor the attorney was sent for. They would soon have eaten up all the poor property. The eldest had the mill, the second the ass, and the youngest nothing but the cat.
The youngest, as we can understand, was quite unhappy at having so poor a share.
"My brothers," said he, "may get their living handsomely enough by joining their stocks together; but, for my part, when I have eaten up my cat, and made me a muff of his skin, I must die of hunger."
The Cat, who heard all this, without appearing to take any notice, said to him with a grave and serious air:--
"Do not thus afflict yourself, my master; you have nothing else to do but to give me a bag, and get a pair of boots made for me, that I may scamper through the brambles, and you shall see that you have not so poor a portion in me as you think."
Though the Cat's master did not think much of what he said, he had seen him play such cunning tricks to catch rats and mice--hanging himself by the heels, or hiding himself in the meal, to make believe he was dead--that he did not altogether despair of his helping him in his misery. When the Cat had what he asked for, he booted himself very gallantly, and putting his bag about his neck, he held the strings of it in his two forepaws, and went into a warren where was a great number of rabbits. He put bran and sow-thistle into his bag, and, stretching out at length, as if he were dead, he waited for some young rabbits, not yet acquainted with the deceits of the world, to come and rummage his bag for what he had put into it.
Scarcely was he settled but he had what he wanted. A rash and foolish young rabbit jumped into his bag, and Monsieur Puss, immediately drawing close the strings, took him and killed him at once. Proud of his prey, he went with it to the palace, and asked to speak with the King. He was shown upstairs into his Majesty's apartment, and, making a low bow to the King, he said:--
"I have brought you, sire, a rabbit which my noble Lord, the Master of Carabas" (for that was the title which Puss was pleased to give his master) "has commanded me to present to your Majesty from him."
"Tell thy master," said the King, "that I thank him, and that I am pleased with his gift."
Another time he went and hid himself among some standing corn, still holding his bag open; and when a brace of partridges ran into it, he drew the strings, and so caught them both. He then went and made a present of these to the King, as he had done before of the rabbit which he took in the warren. The King, in like manner, received the partridges with great pleasure, and ordered his servants to reward him.
The Cat continued for two or three months thus to carry his Majesty, from time to time, some of his master's game. One day when he knew that the King was to take the air along the riverside, with his daughter, the most beautiful princess in the world, he said to his master:--
"If you will follow my advice, your fortune is made. You have nothing else to do but go and bathe in the river, just at the spot I shall show you, and leave the rest to me."
The Master Cat, who went always before, said the same thing to all he met, and the King was astonished at the vast estates of my Lord Marquis of Carabas.
Monsieur Puss came at last to a stately castle, the master of which was an Ogre, the richest ever known; for all the lands which the King had then passed through belonged to this castle. The Cat, who had taken care to inform himself who this Ogre was and what he could do, asked to speak with him, saying he could not pass so near his castle without having the honor of paying his respects to him.
The Ogre received him as civilly as an Ogre could do, and made him sit down.
"I have been assured," said the Cat, "that you have the gift of being able to change yourself into all sorts of creatures you have a mind to; that you can, for example, transform yourself into a lion, or elephant, and the like."
"That is true," answered the Ogre, roughly; "and to convince you, you shall see me now become a lion."
Puss was so terrified at the sight of a lion so near him that he immediately climbed into the gutter, not without much trouble and danger, because of his boots, which were of no use at all to him for walking upon the tiles. A little while after, when Puss saw that the Ogre had resumed his natural form, he came down, and owned he had been very much frightened.
"I have, moreover, been informed," said the Cat, "but I know not how to believe it, that; you have also the power to take on you the shape of the smallest animals; for example, to change yourself into a rat or a mouse, but I must own to you I take this to be impossible."
"Impossible!" cried the Ogre; "you shall see." And at the same time he changed himself into a mouse, and began to run about the floor. Puss no sooner perceived this than he fell upon him and ate him up.
Meanwhile, the King, who saw, as he passed, this fine castle of the Ogre's, had a mind to go into it. Puss, who heard the noise of his Majesty's coach coming over the drawbridge, ran out, and said to the King, "Your Majesty is welcome to this castle of my Lord Marquis of Carabas."
"What! my Lord Marquis," cried the King, "and does this castle also belong to you? There can be nothing finer than this courtyard and all the stately buildings which surround it; let us see the interior, if you please."
The Marquis gave his hand to the young Princess, and followed the King, who went first. They passed into the great hall, where they found a magnificent collation, which the Ogre had prepared for his friends, who were that very day to visit him, but dared not to enter, knowing the King was there. His Majesty, charmed with the good qualities of my Lord of Carabas, as was also his daughter, who had fallen violently in love with him, and seeing the vast estate he possessed, said to him:--
"It will be owing to yourself only, my Lord Marquis, if you are not my son-in-law."
The Marquis, with low bows, accepted the honor which his Majesty conferred upon him, and forthwith that very same day married the Princess.
Puss became a great lord, and never ran after mice any more except for his diversion.
