128 COMMON BETTISH ANIMALS 



The whole story is too long to quote, but is well 

 Avortli readiug. It begins : 



" With that ran ther a route . of ratones at ones 

 And smale mees myd him . mo than a thousand 

 And comen to a counseil . for here cumune profit ; 

 For a cat of a courte . cam when hym liked. 

 And overlepe hem lighliche . laughte hem at his wille. 

 And pleyde with hem perilouslych . and possed hem aboute." 



The story of " belling the cat ^^ will also be found 

 among the fables of La Fontaine. 



Mr. Millais refers to an interesting notice of black 

 rats given in ^ The Universal Directory for taking 

 alive and destroying Eats, etc./ by Robert Smith, 

 Ratcatcher to the Princess Amelia (1768). This 

 gentleman, in the course of his profession, had to 

 contend both with the black and broAvn rats, and he 

 describes the animosity of the newcomer, which he 

 calls the Norway rat : 



" The black ones do not burrow and run into 

 shores as the others do, but chiefly lie in the ceilings 

 and wainscoats, in behind the rafters, and run about 

 the side plates; but their numbers are greatly dimi- 

 nished to what they were formerly, not many of them 

 being left, for the Norway rats always drive them 

 out and kill them whenever they can come at them ; 

 as a proof of which I was once exercising my em- 

 ployment at a gentleman's, and when the night came 

 that I appointed to catch, I set all my traps going, 

 and in the lower part of the house in the cellars I 

 caught the Norway rats, but in the upper part of the 

 house I took nothing but the black rats. I then 



