Feline security for the Hermitage

By Vladimir Radyuhin

ST.PETERSBURG, JAN. 2. They are a very special kind of museum guards, who never complain about low wages or long working hours and take apprehended intruders as their prize. About 50 of them live in the extensive basement of the Hermitage museum in St. Petersburg and guard its rich art collections against rodents and mice.

``We could probably use rat poison, but cats are more ecologically sound,'' says Ms. Maria Khaltunen, who works as assistant to the director of the Hermitage, and is one of three museum workers who regularly look after about 50 cats living in the museum.

The Hermitage has always had plenty of cats - Catherine the Great, who started gathering the museum collection in her famous Winter Palace residence back in the 18th century, had a select breed of Persian cats brought in to chase away the mice and rats. Today's Hermitage guards are a mixed bunch - from strays to domestic cats who have either run away from home or been abandoned and rescued from biting winter frosts by museum workers. There are also some who are directly descended from cats who made the museum their home many generations ago. Each and every cat has its own name. There is, for example, one called Van Dyck who earned his name after getting stuck in a ventilation duct in the Van Dyck hall. It was an extraordinary incident, as museum halls are normally off bounds to the animals.

The cat food is paid for by museum workers who on payday drop a few roubles into a special box put up under a big picture of a cat. Also, the children of the Hermitage workers hold an exhibition every year in which their works are displayed and bought mostly by the parents themselves. All proceeds go towards feeding the cats and paying vet doctors who cater to the pets.

The cats also feast on leftovers at the museum canteen and, of course, rely on what they would catch. Fortunately for them, the Hermitage, like all old buildings in the center of St. Petersburg, is not short on rodents prowling in the basement. Even so the museum does not really need such a large army of cats, and the staff are trying to find homes for some of them, which is not an easy task in crisis-hit Russia.

In recognition of the cats' services to the Hermitage, its lawyers are currently busy drafting a ``Declaration of the Cats' Rights'' which will grant the museum cats an official status. Meanwhile, carpenters have built wooden shelters for the cats in the opulent museum courtyard, a more sturdy alternative to cardboard boxes or nestlings between installation pipes.

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