THE GRAY RAT. 



Known also as the Brown Rat, the House -Rat, 

 the Sewer- Rat, the Norway Rat, the Common 

 Rat, &c. 



IN the following it is proposed to deal only with 

 the less commonly known habits and character- 

 istics of this odious and universally detested creature, 

 for the gray rat is, unhappily, so well known to 

 every one that a detailed account of its life's history 

 would prove dull reading. 



Unto whom the world is indebted for the original 

 stock of gray rats, and whence this animal came 

 when first it made its debut on our shores, 

 are subjects which hitherto have proved fruitful 

 grounds for exploration among authors of the 

 more serious type of natural history works ; but, 

 to sum up the evidence, it would seem that the 

 gray rat hailed originally from Persia, and that it 

 first came to England from the Baltic early in 

 the seventeenth century. Since then there has 

 been a free exchange of gray rats all the world 

 over. From every port where ships touch they 

 have spread, steadily increasing in numbers from 

 east to west till in many parts they have exter- 

 minated not a few of the native animals, just as, 

 with their introduction to Great Britain, they 

 speedily exterminated the original black rat, which 

 was a far less repulsive creature. In parts of 

 America the rat population has become too great 

 for the cities, with the result that the usual rat 

 colonists, launching forth, have taken possession 

 of vast areas of swamp, where they thrive and 

 multiply remote from human habitation. 



W.A. S 



