DESTRUCTION OF RATS. 
87 
all public functionaries — the police. Their private avoca- 
tions are thieving, dog-stealing, and pioneering for burglars. 
When you once call one of these individuals in for the pur- 
pose of destroying your rats, he claims the privilege of prowl- 
ing at will through your entire establishment, under the 
pretence of ascertaining the holes and runs of the rats. Thus 
does he ransack every hole and corner, from the garret to the 
cellar ; and here and there, where he deems it convenient, he 
will deposit some cake, oatmeal, or biscuit, and with it a 
dead rat ; but whether he uses poison or not is a matter of 
no consequence, since no one ever thinks of testing it by 
tasting it. Thus does he practise his deception upon the 
unwary, and will work for anything they choose to give 
him. Indeed you can engage one of these worthy 
functionaries for anything between pence and pounds ; 
or they will sell you any amount of their poisoned cake, 
from a penny-worth to a crowns-worth. They are by 
no means nice to a shade, as sixpenny- worth of coarse oatmeal 
and a penny-worth of sugar, with a little grease and a frying- 
pan, will make a pound's-worth of their secret rat poison. 
They are perfectly indifferent as to pay, since they do not 
depend upon you for subsistence, but look sharply out after 
the gold and silver rats that chance may throw in their way 
in the shape of spoons, watches, &c. Nor are they by any 
means particular as to the shape or weight, but at all times 
prefer gold to silver. By-and-by the dead rats are brought 
forward as a proof of their professional skill. But after you 
have paid him well for poisoning a few dead rats, and he 
has fairly decamped from your premises, just have the kind- 
ness to see if all the door-keys, bolts, and shutter-fastenings 
are safe, or you may be visited in the night by another class 
of ratcatchers, who are made perfectly acquainted with all the 
nightly locations of every individual in your house ; and if 
you have a house-dog, before going to bed just see if he is 
not lying prostrate, and, from his convulsive appearance, 
showing every symptom of death before morning. 
Nevertheless, in a large place like London, there are some 
practical ratcatchers to be met with, who, in their way, are 
as honest as most other people. But these men are mostly 
responsible individuals, being house and shopkeepers, conse^ 
quently seldom prowl the streets for sixpenny, shilling, and 
