266 AN EAST COAST NATURALIST 



were beyond manipulation. A young taxidermist 

 managed to skin and cure eight of them, and then 

 desisted. 



I obtained two half-grown examples of Mus rattus 

 alive in a wire trap, and despatched them to the 

 Zoological Gardens. They were returned promptly 

 the next day with hardly a suggestion of thanks, and 

 with the information that " they had already more 

 than they wanted." I supplied several museums with 

 specimens, including Cromwell Road. 



In July 1901 a tradesman, living on the quay, was 

 greatly annoyed by the misdoings of the Black Rats 

 on his premises. He set a steel fall, and found in it 

 next day the tail of a victim that had managed to 

 get away with the loss of that lengthy member. 

 He good-humouredly showed the tail to his next- 

 door neighbour, demanding the owner of it, should 

 he by chance secure it. And sure enough, two days 

 after the trapping of the injured animal actually 

 came about ; and the rat, minus a tail, with the 

 close-shorn stump almost perfectly healed, was taken 

 to the first and rightful captor, with a message 

 attached to it asking to have the doubly unfortunate 

 quadruped re- tailed ! 



