84 
RATS AND MICE, 
over the farm and yet not be seen. Rats like the 
dark best, and are very busy as soon as it gets 
dusk. They eat any kind of food they can find ; 
corn, or eggs, or meat, or ham : they do much harm 
in a mill, for they will soon gnaw a hole in a meal 
sack and get at the corn, and in a ship the men are 
even less glad to see them, for they will make a 
mess of much that they do not eat. I am sure we 
must send for a man with some dogs who know 
how to hunt them, and see if we can get rid of 
them ; but this will not be easy, for they are very 
sly, and will not run into a trap two at a time, as 
Mice have been seen to do. 
Mice are not so big as Rats, and are not so bold, 
nor do they do so much harm : they will bite if 
any one lays hold of them ; but this they do out 
of fear, and I am very sure they will not fly at any 
one. Mice can be made so tame as to draw a tiny 
cart, or to turn a toy mill, and even to sit up with 
a flag, held up by the fore paws. 
