CHAPTER VII 



BRITISH GNAWING MAMMALS {continued) 



2. Rats — Real and Unreal 



While year succeeds year, scientific and sanitary ex- 

 perts issue tirades against Rats as being the medium 

 of spreading disease throughout our islands. In ^this 

 connection the Rat specially referred to is none other 

 than Mus decumanus^ alias the Brown, Grey, or House 

 Rat. This animal is the common scavenger of the 

 sewers and drains, where it devours much of the 

 garbage that might otherwise become offensive and 

 dangerous as disease-hatching material. Feeding, as 

 the Rat does, on decomposing and other matter, in 

 such underground quarters, the animal, while in a sense 

 ridding the sewers of what in itself would undoubtedly 

 prove dangerous to man, may at the same time carry 

 infection from one quarter to another. The question, 

 however, arises whether the Rat really does more 

 harm than good in this way, and as yet some doubt 

 exists whether the animal is such a menace to public 

 health as some investigators seem to make out. 



In a general sense, however, Rats have to be written 

 down as the vilest of vermin. Rural dwellers hate 

 them, and city folk abhor them. In the country the 

 outcry against the animal is very pronounced, more 



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