Hungry cats and pigeons under the snow

Small street scene at the end of the day, in the almost falling night, under a thick snow, one winter in Riga.

This lady with basket entered this alley onto which gave the back of a restaurant and its trash cans.
Immediately a cat appeared, then two, then three, to wait for a sustenance found in the rests thrown in trash cans.

... And once the satisfied cats, the pigeons wait for their tour.

What we said in 1690 in the dictionary of Furetiere :

CAT, Small anima! domestic meowing,, and who is enemy mice, rats. Dogs, eagles, snakes, and grass which we call the rue. The cat has legs, teeth, eyes and tongue similar to the lion. These animals have so much conformity together, as the Turks are persuaded that there is some foundation in what says Alcoran, that the cat was born in the Arc of the sneeze of the lion. By the laws of Arragon we punished the thieves, by whipping them with a cat attached to the neck. Ambroise Paré supports that the cat is a venomous animal which infects by its hair, by its breath, and by its brains.
Its hair is dangerous to swallow by tops all the others, as we see in the example of this Romain, who died to have swallowed one in some milk. Its breath infects of a rabies poison which gives the consumption, several examples of which Matthiole reports; and if we eat some brains of cat, it causes a big pain of head, and makes sometimes insane, or cause of continual dizzinesses. He adds that their breath and their look is manifestly contagious; and he tells to have seen people who to have slept always with a cat, became phtisiques and hurt, and finally died from it. We consider strong in France the cats of Spain. Henri III. King of France had so much aversion for cats, which he changed color and fainted, when he saw it. Prade. Hist. of F.

In terms of Hunting, we call barots cats, the wildcats which are removed in wood and rabbit warrens, and make a big damage of rabbits.
There is a species of cat in West Indies, which have a pocket in their side where they put their youngs, where they always carry with them, without it prevents them from running and from jumping, and without we notice that they have other thing than their body. There are wildcats in India which fly by means of a very wide membrane, which extends along the highly-rated of the hind leg at the foot of front. It is wrinkled and tucked up when they walk, and unfolds when they fly. We brought it skins in Europe which are a good proof. Mr Boile wrote that in year 1684, in London a big rat it was coupled with a cat which made youngs which hold of the cat and the rat, and that we put one in the park of the animals which King of England makes be nourishing.

Of Riga, in these mini-series of photos of the week, see also :

• Winter fishing under the ice
• Workers in the cold and the snow
• Sun as one i on a bridge
• Child of sand sleeping on the sand of Riga
• Collection of dead leaves and the competitiveness
• Discreet tracks on fine sand
• Floral wreaths in the feast of St John
• Magic colored with some Baltic tissues