446 SPANISH-TOWN. 



Rat has a good deal of fulvous intermingled with 

 grey in its coat, and though it is at this time by far 

 the most numerous of these vermin, it is of com- 

 paratively recent importation. The negroes are said 

 to distinguish it by the name of the George Rat. 

 This name is a curious coincidence with the historic 

 scandal that, under the name of the Hanoverian 

 Rat, assigns a similar introduction to the ship that 

 brought the Brunswick family to the British shores. 

 It is larger than the Black Rat, and has a fur harsh 

 and short. This is the common House Rat ; out of 

 doors it is the pest of the corn-field and the cane- 

 piece ; it inhabits the pinguin fences. A gentleman 

 informs me that on a plantation of which he was 

 overseer, the annual number taken, from accounts 

 minutely kept in paying premiums for their destruc- 

 tion, was 12,000 of these Rats, through a succession 

 of years. 



" Of the Cane-piece Rat I can learn nothing, ex- 

 cept that it is supposed to be the animal commonly 

 spoken of as the Charles Price Rat. It is unusually 

 large." 



Further inquiries gave reason to believe that no 

 connexion existed between Sir Charles Price's im- 

 portation and the Rat of the cane-fields, or any Rat 

 at all, beyond vulgar rumour. My friend remarks 

 in a letter of April 22nd, 1847; — " You remind 

 me that no satisfactory history has been given of the 

 animal Sir C. Price introduced into the colony, out 

 of which grew the story of the Charley Price Rat. 

 I had a conversation some short time ago with his 

 great-grandson Mr. George Price, of Worthy Park, 



