The Greeks did not care for cats. They admired the horse and used it constantly in art and metaphor. The horse is an athlete, proud but serviceable. It accepts citizenship in a public system. The cat is a law unto itself. It has never lost its despotic air of Oriental luxury and indolence. It was too feminine for the male-loving Greeks. Aristocratic Egyptian women’s costume, an exquisite tunic of transparant pleated linen, must be called slinky, a word we still use for formfitting evening gowns. Slinkiness is the nocturnal stealth of cats. The sinuous craft of daemonic darkness, which the cat carries into day.