BLATTIDiE — COCKROACHES. 81 



Sometimes, when they have used more than their custom- 

 ary quantity, we have asked, casually, how it was and to 

 what kind of business people they disposed of it, and we 

 have always met with an evasive sort of answer. You see 

 tradesmen don't like to divul^re too much ; for it must be a 

 poor kind of profession or calling that there are no secrets 

 in ; and, again, they fancy we want to know what descrip- 

 tion of trades use the most of our composition, so that we 

 might supply them direct from ourselves. From this cause 

 we have made a rule not to inquire curiously into the mat- 

 ters of our customers. We are quite content to dispose of 

 the quantity we do, for we employ six travelers to call on 

 chemists and oilmen for tlie town trade, and four for the 

 country. 



'' The other day an elderly lady from High Street, Cam- 

 den Town, called upon us : she stated that she was over- 

 run with black beetles, and wished to buy some of our 

 paste from ourselves, for she said she always found things 

 better if you purchased them of the maker, as you were 

 sure to get them stronger, and by that means avoided the 

 adulteration of the shopkeepers. But as we have said we 

 would not supply a single box to any one, not wishing to 

 give our agents any cause for complaint, we were obliged 

 to refuse to sell to the old lady. 



" We don't care to say how many boxes we sell in the 

 year; but we can tell you, sir, that we sell more for beetle 

 poisoning in the summer than in the winter, as a matter of 

 course. When we find that a particular district uses almost 

 an equal quantity all the year round, we make sure that 

 that is a rat district ; for where there is not the heat of 

 summer to breed beetles, it must follow that the people 

 wish to get rid of rats. 



"Brixton, Hackney, Ball's Pond, and Lower Road, Is- 

 lington, are the places that use most of our paste, those 

 districts lying low, and being consequently damp. Camden 

 Town, though it is in a high situation, is very much infested 

 with beetles; it is a clayey soil, you understand, which re- 

 tains moisture, and will not allow it to filter through like 

 gravel. This is why in some very low districts, where the 

 houses are built on gravel, we sell scarcely any of our 

 paste. 



"As the farmers say, a good fruit year is a good fly 



