in reply to HTML Table Question

If all you're opposed to is the literal use of 'cat', you can achieve the same effect with something like the following:
#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use diagnostics;

my $data = <<EHEAD;
<HTML>
<HEAD><TITLE>My Title</TITLE></HEAD>
<BODY BGCOLOR="#AAACCC">
<H1>Headers are fun</H1>
EHEAD

local $/;
open(HTABLE, "my_html_table") || die "Could not open table: $!\n";
$data .= <HTABLE>;
close(HTABLE);

$data .= <<EFOOT;
<HR>
That's all, folks!
</BODY></HTML>

EFOOT

print $data;
If you want something else, we'll need more info on what you want before we can help.