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by Mary Evelyn Smith

Source: The Avonlea Traditions Chronicle, No. 28, Summer 1999.

The recent addition of a cat to our family has resulted in much reflection on what an important part of L. M. Montgomery's life her "pussyfolk" were-they were often her only source of comfort and companionship. Of course, L. M. Montgomery's love of cats is almost as well-known as her love of Prince Edward Island. There is hardly an L. M. Montgomery novel, except strangely enough the early Anne books, that doesn't have an abundance of cats liberally sprinkled throughout.

Although L. M. Montgomery always adamantly claimed no real people ever appeared in her books (with the exception of Peg Bowen in The Story Girl and Miss Brownlee in Emily of New Moon), she often used her beloved cats' names and descriptions. L. M. Montgomery thought so much of one of her cats that she even dedicated Jane of Lantern Hill to "the memory of Lucky, the charming affectionate comrade of fourteen years."

Pussywillow, L. M. Montgomery's first kitten, was sadly, her first experience with death. In Volume I of The Selected Journals of L. M. Montgomery is a full description on this cat's death by poison. The passage is moving, as L. M. Montgomery describes her first realization that someone she loved could actually die, and it was made harder by having no loving mother to sympathize and understand. Grandmother Macneill, who did not at that time share or comprehend L. M. Montgomery's love of cats, unfeelingly told the little girl, "You'll have something to cry for some day." Later on, L. M. Montgomery's grandmother became quite fond of their cat, Daffy.

In 1910, L. M. Montgomery again wrote of Pussywillow's death, stating, "It is twenty-five years since that day and the scar of that hurt is still on my soul."

Pussywillow died in 1883, and L. M. Montgomery used the name in her final book, Anne of Ingleside, published in 1939:

"The Shrimp basked in the glow, and Nan's kitten, Pussywillow, which always suggested some dainty exquisite little lady in black and silver, climbed everyone's legs impartially."

Although Pussywillow was L. M. Montgomery's first cat, she certainly was not her last. L. M. Montgomery mentions at least twenty cats by name in her journals, as well as countless unnamed barn cats and kittens. She kept tufts of fur from each of her beloved cats, and wrote in 1905:

"Firefly's fur-Firefly of old Prince Albert days. Any more cats? Bless you, yes-Coco's, Carissima's, Max's, Mephistopheles', Tom's, Lady Katherine's, Topsy's-a whole host of dead and gone pussies of whom only these scraps of fur remain."

L. M. Montgomery's love of her cats was very real, and she grieved over their deaths as much as she grieved for her human companions. When she lost her beloved Good Luck (Lucky), whose name she used in The Blue Castle, she wrote her pen pal George MacMillan on February 23, 1938: "Nothing in my life, except the loss of one dear friend, has caused me more grief and loneliness. Even today, more than a year later, I cannot bear to think of it... Never was there an animal more full of the 'joy of living.' He loved to be petted, praised, caressed. He could not bear to be ignored or neglected... He was one of those vital creatures of whom when they die, we feel it is impossible to believe they are dead... How could that beauty, grace, charm and affection pass into nothingness."

After the loss of each cat, L. M. Montgomery often quoted: "He was a cat-take him for all in all, We shall not look on his like again."

Not only are L. M. Montgomery's journals filled with delightful tales of feline antics, but her books are as well. Nowhere are cats mentioned more frequently than in the Silver Bush books. Judy's Gentleman Tom, Bold-and-Bad, Squedunk, Popka, and Pepper are all so much a part of Silver Bush, it is unthinkable to imagine it without them. On my very first visit to the real Silver Bush in PEI, on leaving by the back door, I smiled to myself at the sight of three or four cats curled up asleep on the sunny sandstone step. How very fitting, I thought.

L. M. Montgomery's admiration for cats is evident throughout her novels, as in the following excerpt from The Story Girl: "He was a lordly animal with a silver-gray coat beautifully marked with darker stripes. With such colouring most cats would have had white or silver feet, but he had four black paws and a black nose. Such points gave him an air of distinction, and marked him out as quite different from the common or garden variety of cats. He seemed to be a cat with a tolerably good opinion of himself, and his response to our advances was slightly tinged with condescension."

Even L. M. Montgomery's poetry reflected her love of cats. When Frederica Campbell's cat Maggie died, L. M. Montgomery wrote the following poem:

In Memory of "Maggie"

A pussy cat who was the household pet for seventeen years

Naught but a little cat, you say;
Yet we remember her,
A creature loving, loyal, kind,
With merry, mellow purr;
The faithful friend of many years,
Shall we not give her meed of tears

L. M. MONTGOMERY often wrote in her journals and letters, as well as in several of her books: "I wonder if all the spirits of all the pussy folk I have loved will meet me with purrs of gladness at the pearly gates?"

This must have been something she really wished for-I truly hope they did.

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