Gnaiving of Water and Gas Pipes hy Hats and Mice. 151 



lead pipes used for conveying clean water, under circum- 

 stances where they liad more ready access to water of a less 

 pure kind. The first piece of a rat-gnawed pipe which I 

 ever saw was given to the Edinburgh Industrial Museum, in 

 the year 1855, by Messrs Hay & Addis, then in extensive 

 business as plumbers in Edinburgh, along with some other 

 pieces of lead pipe corroded into holes by the chemical action 

 of something in the soil by which they had been covered. 

 They had previously kept the gnawed pipe for six years as 

 a curiosity in their shop. Noticing with respect to these, 

 and to some other similar examples, that the corroded and 

 the bitten pipes bore, at a superficial glance, some resemblance 

 to each other, it struck me that rats might more frequently 

 be the cause of leakage in water-pipes than is commonly 

 suspected. It is easy to make out the difference if the marks 

 of the rats' teeth are well preserved, but not quite so easy if 

 the gnawed surface has from any cause become partially 

 worn away. Since then I have occasionally asked plumbers 

 and other persons likely to be informed on the subject, if 

 they ever met with examples of lead piping into which holes 

 had been bitten by rats ; and from their answers I would 

 infer that, although not a rare, neither is it a thing of very 

 frequent, occurrence about Edinburgh. It appears, however, 

 to be far more common about Glasgow, Dundee, and some 

 other places. Only last week a curious rat case was tried in 

 the Dundee Sheriff Court. Eats had on six different occa- 

 sions gnawed a water-pipe in a hotel, and flooded a barber's 

 shop immediately below it. Counsel for the pursuer argued 

 that rats, like exceptional snow-storms, must be provided 

 against by house proprietors, and the Sheriff gave judgment 

 for £6 for damage and loss of business, with £1 of expenses. 



It is curious that in an essay on Eats, extending to nearly a 

 hundred pages, by the late Mr Frank Buckland, and published 

 in 1862, he takes no notice of these animals exercising their 

 teeth on metal pipes, although both he and some other 

 writers on natural history, who likewise omit all mention of 

 this fact, give many instances of their gnawing ivory, hard- 

 wood, nuts, leather, and other substances. Indeed, I do not 

 remember having seen much in print about the gnawing of 



