Tobermory

"Tobermory," a short story by Hector Hugh Munro (pen name Saki), is a satirical tale that explores themes of communication and the nature of society. Set in a rural English household, the story revolves around an educated cat named Tobermory who unexpectedly gains the ability to speak. His newfound voice exposes the hidden truths and hypocrisies of the people around him, leading to chaos and revealing the absurdity of human pretenses. The narrative blends humor with social commentary, showcasing Saki's sharp wit and keen observations on human behavior.

• Short story

								
It was a chill, rain-washed afternoon of a late August day, that
indefinite season when partridges are still in security or cold
storage, and there is nothing to hunt--unless one is bounded on the
north by the Bristol Channel, in which case one may lawfully gallop
after fat red stags.  Lady Blemley's house-party was not bounded on the
north by the Bristol Channel, hence there was a full gathering of her
guests round the tea-table on this particular afternoon.  And, in spite
of the blankness of the season and the triteness of the occasion, there
was no trace in the company of that fatigued restlessness which means a
dread of the pianola and a subdued hankering for auction bridge.  The
undisguised openmouthed attention of the entire party was fixed on the
homely negative personality of Mr. Cornelius Appin.  Of all her guests,
he was the one who had come to Lady Blemley with the vaguest
reputation.  Some one had said he was "clever," and he had got his
invitation in the moderate expectation, on the part of his hostess,
that some portion at least of his cleverness would be contributed to
the general entertainment.  Until tea-time that day she had been unable
to discover in what direction, if any, his cleverness lay.  He was
neither a wit nor a croquet champion, a hypnotic force nor a begetter
of amateur theatricals.  Neither did his exterior suggest the sort of
man in whom women are willing to pardon a generous measure of mental
deficiency.  He had subsided into mere Mr. Appin, and the Cornelius
seemed a piece of transparent baptismal bluff.  And now he was claiming
to have launched on the world a discovery beside which the invention of
gunpowder, of the printing-press, and of steam locomotion were
inconsiderable trifles.  Science had made bewildering strides in many
directions during recent decades, but this thing seemed to belong to
the domain of miracle rather than to scientific achievement.

"And do you really ask us to believe," Sir Wilfrid was saying, "that
you have discovered a means for instructing animals in the art of human
speech, and that dear old Tobermory has proved your first successful
pupil?"

"It is a problem at which I have worked for the last seventeen years,"
said Mr. Appin, "but only during the last eight or nine months have I
been rewarded with glimmerings of success.  Of course I have
experimented with thousands of animals, but latterly only with cats,
those wonderful creatures which have assimilated themselves so
marvellously with our civilization while retaining all their highly
developed feral instincts.  Here and there among cats one comes across
an outstanding superior intellect, just as one does among the ruck of
human beings, and when I made the acquaintance of Tobermory a week ago
I saw at once that I was in contact with a 'Beyond-cat' of
extraordinary intelligence.  I had gone far along the road to success
in recent experiments; with Tobermory, as you call him, I have reached
the goal."

Mr. Appin concluded his remarkable statement in a voice which he strove
to divest of a triumphant inflection.  No one said "Rats," though
Clovis's lips moved in a monosyllabic contortion which probably invoked
those rodents of disbelief.

"And do you mean to say," asked Miss Resker, after a slight pause,
"that you have taught Tobermory to say and understand easy sentences of
one syllable?"

"My dear Miss Resker," said the wonderworker patiently, "one teaches
little children and savages and backward adults in that piecemeal
fashion; when one has once solved the problem of making a beginning
with an animal of highly developed intelligence one has no need for
those halting methods.  Tobermory can speak our language with perfect
correctness."

This time Clovis very distinctly said, "Beyond-rats!"  Sir Wilfrid was
more polite, but equally sceptical.

"Hadn't we better have the cat in and judge for ourselves?" suggested
Lady Blemley.

Sir Wilfrid went in search of the animal, and the company settled
themselves down to the languid expectation of witnessing some more or
less adroit drawing-room ventriloquism.

In a minute Sir Wilfrid was back in the room, his face white beneath
its tan and his eyes dilated with excitement.

"By Gad, it's true!"

His agitation was unmistakably genuine, and his hearers started forward
in a thrill of awakened interest.

Collapsing into an armchair he continued breathlessly: "I found him
dozing in the smoking-room, and called out to him to come for his tea.
He blinked at me in his usual way, and I said, 'Come on, Toby; don't
keep us waiting;' and, by Gad! he drawled out in a most horribly
natural voice that he'd come when he dashed well pleased! I nearly
jumped out of my skin!"

Appin had preached to absolutely incredulous hearers; Sir Wilfrid's
statement carried instant conviction.  A Babel-like chorus of startled
exclamation arose, amid which the scientist sat mutely enjoying the
first fruit of his stupendous discovery.

In the midst of the clamour Tobermory entered the room and made his way
with velvet tread and studied unconcern across to the group seated
round the tea-table.

A sudden hush of awkwardness and constraint fell on the company.
Somehow there seemed an element of embarrassment in addressing on equal
terms a domestic cat of acknowledged dental ability.

"Will you have some milk, Tobermory?" asked Lady Blemley in a rather
strained voice.

"I don't mind if I do," was the response, couched in a tone of even
indifference.  A shiver of suppressed excitement went through the
listeners, and Lady Blemley might be excused for pouring out the
saucerful of milk rather unsteadily.

"I'm afraid I've spilt a good deal of it," she said apologetically.

"After all, it's not my Axminster," was Tobermory's rejoinder.

Another silence fell on the group, and then Miss Resker, in her best
district-visitor manner, asked if the human language had been difficult
to learn.  Tobermory looked squarely at her for a moment and then fixed
his gaze serenely on the middle distance.  It was obvious that boring
questions lay outside his scheme of life.

"What do you think of human intelligence?" asked Mavis Pellington
lamely.

"Of whose intelligence in particular?" asked Tobermory coldly.

"Oh, well, mine for instance," said Mavis, with a feeble laugh.

"You put me in an embarrassing position," said Tobermory, whose tone
and attitude certainly did not suggest a shred of embarrassment.  "When
your inclusion in this house-party was suggested Sir Wilfrid protested
that you were the most brainless woman of his acquaintance, and that
there was a wide distinction between hospitality and the care of the
feeble-minded.  Lady Blemley replied that your lack of brain-power was
the precise quality which had earned you your invitation, as you were

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