THE PEST OF RATS 13 



is left in shocks, especially near drains or other 

 rat-harbors, it is likely to be ruined. 



Shortly after the settlement of the Bermudas by 

 the British, the colony was infested with rats, which, 

 in the space of two years, had increased so alarm- 

 ingly that none of the islands were free from them, 

 and even fish were taken with rats in their bellies. 

 A writer in the Academy recalls some of the horrors 

 of this plague of rats. The rats, we are told, had 

 nests in almost every tree, and burrowed in most 

 places in the ground like rabbits. They devoured 

 everything that came in the way fruits, plants, and 

 even trees. Where corn was sown they would come by 

 troops in the night and scratch it out of the ground ; 

 'nay,' writes a contemporary chronicler, 'they so de- 

 voured the fruits of the earth that the people were des- 

 titute of bread for a year or two.' Every expedient 

 was tried to destroy them. Dogs were trained to hunt 

 them, who would kill a score or more in an hour. 

 Cats, both wild and tame, were employed in large 

 numbers for the same purpose; poisons and traps 

 every man having to set twelve traps were brought 

 into requisition; and even woods were set on fire, to 

 help to exterminate them. Every letter written at 

 this period by the plague-stricken colonists contains 

 some account of the dreadful scourge. 'Our great 

 enemies the rats threaten the subversion of the plan- 

 tation,' writes one colonist in July, 1616. 'Rats are a 

 great judgment of God upon us,' wrote another a 

 year later. ' At last it pleased God, but by what 



