To make a lucky recovery from potential disaster. The term alludes to the cat, which has a remarkable ability to land on its paws after falling or being tossed from a height. The analogy was made long ago, appearing in John Ray’s proverb collection of 1678 (“He’s like a cat; fling him which way you will he’ll light on ’s legs”) and was certainly a cliché by the time William Roughead wrote (Malice Domestic, 1929), “That lady had indeed, as the phrase is, fallen on her feet.”