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Washington, United States
loves: you win if you guessed "pets" and "museums". Also books, art history, travel, British punk, Korean kimchi, bindis, martinis, and other things TBD. I will always make it very clear if a post is sponsored in any way. Drop me a line at thepetmuseum AT gmail.com !

Thursday, August 02, 2007

"i like pigs. . ."

. . . said Winston Churchill, one of the most quotable Prime Ministers and all around good guys ever:
". . . Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals."

He must not have minded cats patronizing him too much, because he kept marmalade (orange tabby) ones at his country house, Chartwell. In his memory there are still orange cats kept there. Orange cats are the best. I knew Churchill was a great man. So here's a news story about orange cats at Chartwell. And here is what winstonchurchill.org has to say about the names of those cats:
We know of three. "Cat" (see Grace Hamblin, Churchill Proceedings 1987) once ran
away after Churchill had shouted at him. WSC asked Miss Hamblin to put a sign in
the window: "Cat, come home, all is forgiven." Cat returned, and was plied with
luxury food parcels. "Nelson," a black feline, lived at Number Ten during WW2.
Churchill said he made a contribution to the war effort "by serving as a prime
ministerial hot water bottle." "Jock," given to WSC by private secretary Jock
Colville, was on Churchill's bed when he died in 1965 and remained at Chartwell
until his death in 1974. He has since been succeeded by identical marmalade
toms: Jock II; and Jock III, the present Lord Warden of the Cinque Mouseholes.
The Cinque Mouseholes -- don't you love it?

Churchill is an endless source of swell quips. My personal favorite? On the British Navy: "Don't talk to me about naval tradition. It's nothing but rum, sodomy and the lash." Hey Jeremy, how ya doin?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

As a ginger tom, I must say your taste in cats is quite gratifying, as well as your taste in Churchill quotes. Here's my favorite:

George Bernard Shaw: I invite you to come to my play and bring a friend ... if you have one.

Winston Churchill: Impossible to be present for the first performance. Will attend the second ... if there is one.