A DISCUSSION OF THE CAT 
A Friend of the Cat 
Horne of your readers ask about getting 
rid of rats. One Fall I tilled barn floor 
full of State corn, and did not busk it 
out until Kpring. Result, i found t had 
between 20 and 10 rats, and they would 
••at into anything left in either barn in 
broad daylight. That Spring I raised up 
a family of kittens, and with the help of 
two old eats and a steel trap in the meal 
box, they soon disappeared, and I haven’t 
seen a rat track in six months. It will 
always he necessary to keep at least two 
cats at barn, as then you can pile up 
grain iu hags without loss. If I bad a lot 
of rats, I should borrow at least eight 
eats, and I wouldn’t have to keep them 
long, either. L. G. mint urn. 
New York. 
No Use for a Cat 
I read the article on “Rat Diseases and 
Fats, 1 ’ by E. L. T. I think it was Mark 
Twain who said difference of opinion was 
a good filing—it makes horse-racing pos¬ 
sible. The neighbor who lost 12 cats 
shorn! be punished by having ull of them 
come back, each with his nine Lives, and he 
be obliged to keep them all so well fed that 
they would not catch birds. Wo try to 
make our place attractive for the birds, 
but are kept, busy continually chasing 
away cats—two or three cals for each 
bird. I feel sometimes that I would like 
to shoot two or three eats and hang them 
up to scare the others away, as we used 
to do with crows. I wish there was some 
way of killing a neighbor’s cat without 
having the neighbor feel offended over it 
Wo had five nests destroyed last year, 
or the mother bird killed. We sec no 
reason why a cat should not be faxed and 
a license required, the same as a dog. 
Personally, I believe cats destroy more 
song birds than any other one enemy 
they have. G. V. 
Hampden Co., Mass. 
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Do Birds Destroy Vermin? 
I notice that some professor (he must 
have been a professor) in an agricultural 
experiment station has learned that a 
barn owl is equal to a dozen cars .as ,a 
rat and mull sc destroyer. Exact, state¬ 
ments Of this kind, especially from scien¬ 
tific sources, are interest ing, and this 
would he far more interesting if we could 
know how the problem was solved and the 
solution arrived at. 
For sixty-odd years as a fanner (not 
counting uiy childhood) I have been an 
interested observer of cats, rats, and mice. 
I have noticed that when our one or two 
oats were out of commission, the rats and 
mice increased to a point where it was 
unendurable. At Stub times the neigh¬ 
bors’ cals would learn where there was 
good hunting and drop in occasionally, 
t have no means of knowing how many 
barn owls we have hod at any time. nor. 
being nocturnal in my habits, but to the 
observation of a layman they had nothing 
to do with the crop of rats and mice. 
From what I know I should hesitate long 
to go into the breeding of barn owls to 
rid my plate of these vermin. 
The fact seems to be that a lot of bird- 
lovers. together with a few scientific gen¬ 
tlemen, have become bird maniacs. If the 
head and ears of old Tubby appear above 
the grass down in the meadow, they jump 
to the conclusion tiiat she is watching for 
a flock of quail, whereas, in nine hundred 
and ninety-nine cases out of a thousand 
i I ha to to be so accurate, but the pro¬ 
fessors drive me to it) she is hunting her 
favorite game, the field mouse, which is 
now. thanks to the eat-phobists. becoming 
a serious menace to farm crops. I am 
convinced that the crow, in destroying 
nests of eggs and young birds, is a far 
worse enemy of the little birds than is 
the cat. but as he happens to wear 
feathers, he seems immune from scien¬ 
tific attacks. E. X. BARRETT. 
Virginia. 
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TTnion. 
