BLACK RAT. 241 



native quadrupeds. Its voracity, however, the 

 *avages which it makes among our corn and provi- 

 sions, and its prolificacy, render it injurious, and 

 therefore hateful. At least such it was when it 

 abounded in the country, but in Britain its career 

 is to appearance nearly ended, and the place of this 

 species is supplied by another, more powerful and 

 destructive, the Brown Rat. 



In the days of its prosperity, when that species 

 had not yet molested it, we find it represented as 

 extremely numerous in the more temperate countries 

 of Europe. " The Rat," says Buffon, " is omni- 

 vorous ; it eats fruit, gnaws wool, cotton, linen, 

 clothes, and furniture, pierces wood, makes holes in 

 the walls, lodges under the floors, in the vacuities of 

 the timber- work, and of the wainscot. It comes forth 

 only to look for food, and often carries to its re- 

 treats whatever it can drag thither, sometimes laying 

 up a store of provisions, especially when it has 

 young. In all places, at all times, its depredations 

 and ravages are felt : having an appetite for every 

 thing, its voracity is even tempted by human flesh ; 

 dying persons, prisoners, children in the cradle, 

 have been gnawn by this omnivorous quadruped, 

 Sewers, hospitals, unclean places, and granaries, 

 are its favourite retreats. It seeks warm places, 

 and in winter nestles near chimneys, or in hay or 

 straw. During this season it lives on fat, candles, 

 lard, cheese, walnuts, paper, and drinks its urine. 

 The loss which it occasions is not always trifling : 

 it seems to this animal that all nature owes a tribute 

 Q 



