The Tobermory Cat

A long time ago, before you were born, the little Hebridean island of Mull was home to hundreds of cats.

Cats of all colours and clans could be found roaming its highlands and lowlands, and it seemed that every village had its very own, special kind of cat.

The people of Loch Ba were proud to tell visitors that there was
nothing
on earth as soft as the woolly cats of Loch Ba.

The Staffa boatman swore he’d never heard a sweeter sound than the song of the cats of Staffa.

The villagers of Salen boasted that there hadn‘t been a beastie born more sullen than the sulky cats of Salen, and the Fishnish sailors said that there wasn’t a creature alive, alive-o could hook a haddock like the sea-faring cats of Fishnish.

The people of Loch Ba, Staffa, Salen and Fishnish were only too delighted to show visitors round their villages and sell them their cat postcards and cat t-shirts and cat soap and cat chocolates.

Everyone agreed that cats were a very good thing to bring in the visitors.

However, the little Hebridean fishing village of Tobermory on the island of Mull was
also
home to several cats.

None of these was especially woolly or musical or sulky, and all of them, without exception,
hated
the sea.

The Tobermory cats liked nothing better than catching mice, eating fish, watching clouds, and sleeping.

The Tobermory cats were very
ordinary
cats, and, sadly, nobody wanted to visit Tobermory to see them.

In fact, what with the famously woolly Ba-Ba Cats, the Singing Cat Choir of Staffa, the Snotty Cats of Salen and the Fishing Felines of Fishnish, hardly
anybody
bothered to visit Tobermory anymore.

This was a great shame, because it meant nobody visited its fish cafe

or its bookshop

or its beautiful launderette