90 DESTRUCTION OF RATS. [169I. 



before our Discoveries tliere^ ; for I have often found in the 

 Eeiation of Voyagers that they met with prodigious quanti- 

 ties in Desert and unknown Islands. It's not impossible 

 that some Ship might have toiich'd, or been cast away there ; 

 but let our Modern Philosophers say what they will, I have 

 very good reason to believe, that Eats as well as other kind 

 of Vermin are engender'd sometimes by Corruption, tho' they 

 are also brought forth by the common way of Generation. 

 If 'tis the good pleasure of God, the Great Master of the 

 Universe, that it shou'd be so, what shou'd hinder Eats being 

 found in those Islands where never any vessel was ?^ 



Whereas the Americans have Adders which are naturally 

 bent to exterminate this Villanous Eace, as also Cats and 

 Dogs that are taught to make War upon them, we had 

 nothing to assist us but Owls^ and Traps. We soon banish'd 

 them from our Quarters, by the help of the latter ; however 

 we must own, that a new Multitude sometimes return'd, 

 and found us new Work to clear them. The most ready and 

 sure way of getting rid of great Numbers of them, wou'd be 

 to lay poyson'd Meat for them ; the Island not being very 

 big, this wou'd soon have a very good Effect ; and nothing 

 could come of it that we needed apprehend, if it haj)pen'd 

 before the Isle was well setled. 



1 De Rochfort, in speaking of the various inconveniences to be met 

 with in the Antilles, says that it was only after ships began frequenting 

 these islands that ra^s multiplied to such an extent as to injure the 

 crops and vegetables ; previously they were unknown to the Caraib 

 Indians. {Histoire Naturdle dcs lies Antilles^ L. de Poiucy et C. de 

 Ptochfort, 2nd edit., 1865, p. 277.) 



2 The rats were probably of recent introduction. Vessels had 

 touched at the island before Leguat's time on their way to India. 



3 The owls of Rodriguez are now extinct, but some bones found in 

 one of its caves by Sir E. Newton in 187-i attest Leguat's veracity. 

 These bones belong to two species, for one of which M. Alph. Milne 

 Edwards proposes the name of Slrix (Alheiie) murivora ; of the other 

 only one bone, a tibia, having been produced for examination, no 

 specific name could be given. {Ann. des Sc. nat. Zool. (5), xix, art. 3.) 



