A 220 
Tht RURAL NEW-YORKER 
February 9, 1924 
When it stretched 
more than 5 times 
its length —we knew that 
we had added longer wear 
Twice! Three times! Four— five times its 
length and more, a strip of rubber cut 
from a “ U. S.” Boot will stretch without 
breaking! 
Here’s why every length of the five means 
extra wear: 
Every step you take your boots bend and 
wrinkle. Thousands of times each day—the 
same strains in the same spots. 
It’s these strains that make 
ordinary rubber crack and 
break. 
Into “U. S.”’Boots is put rub¬ 
ber as live as an elastic band. 
Rubber that has the flexibility to 
stand constant bending. Rubber 
that stays strong and pliable— 
that resists strain and prevents 
breaking. 
Anchored in this solid rubber is 
layer on layer of tough fabric rein¬ 
forcements. In the places where the 
hard strains come there are from seven to eleven 
separate plies of rubber and fabric in “U. S.” Boots. 
Reinforcements that give rugged strength—rubber 
that stays tough and resisting—these are the reasons why 
“U. S. ” Boots mean longer wear and better service. 
Ask for “U. S.” Boots. If you’ve never worn them 
before, now is the time to begin. Thousands of farmers 
all over the country are wearing them today. 
Other “U. S.” Rubber Footwear 
You’ll find every type of rubber footwear in the big 
“ U. S. ” line. There is the “ U. S. ” Walrus, the famous 
all-rubber overshoe—the “U. S.” lace Bootee, a rub¬ 
ber workshoe for spring and fall—“U. S. ” Arctics and 
Rubbers—all styles and sizes for the whole family. 
Look for the “U. S. ” trade mark whenever you buy 
—the honor mark of the largest rubber organization 
in the world. 
United States Rubber Company 
Ask for 
“U.Sr Boots 
Trade Mark 
Ply on ply of fabric and 
rubber are built into the 
ivallsofthe “JJ .S.” Boot. 
Here at the instep where 
heavy strains come are 
8 separate layers. 
A Champion of the Cat 
I read with much interest the article 
by William E. Smith of Massachusetts, 
on page 1542, in which he comments on 
Mrs. A. D. J.’s article on “Cats as Rat 
Catchers,” and writes <on condemning 
the cat. lie would lead one to believe 
that the cat’s sole aim in life is to kill 
valuable birds and chickens as well as to 
“upset the bean-pot, get stuck up with 
fly paper and howl all night on the 
piazza.” In the next column on the 
same page of The R. N.-Y. under the 
title of “Squirrels in the Home,” Mrs. 
M. C. B. highly praises the cat for rid¬ 
ding her cellar of squirrels after traps 
and poisons had failed. Probably Mr. 
Smith would have recommended that Mrs. 
M. C. B. should have killed her cat and 
let the squirrels enjoy themselves chew¬ 
ing up the fruit and vegetables she had 
stored away for the Winter. Surely the 
I bought of the poor birds which her cat 
killed will have consoled her for the loss 
of her Winter provisions which the 
squirrels will have destroyed.. For, Mr. 
Smith asserts, “a good hunter such as 
hunts mice will get on the average of 50 
birds a year and one has been known to 
destroy six broods of young and two old 
birds in one day.” 
I do not wish to ridicule Mr. Smith’s 
article or any other article in which one 
sets forth his true convictions, and it 
must be granted that his attitude toward 
the cat is the same as the attitude of 
thousands of others. However, as he ac¬ 
cuses Mrs. A. D. J. of making slighting 
remarks in regard to the destruction of 
bird life, it is only fair that he in turn 
should be criticized for his slighting re¬ 
marks in regard to the value of the cat. 
I maintain that cats are the only re¬ 
liable remedy for rats on a large farm 
where large* quantities of grain are 
stored. There may be exceptions, but I 
don’t know of any. I have always lived 
on such a farm in Southeastern New 
York and up to a year and a half ago 
have always had one or more cats and 
was never troubled with rats. Finally 
when my last cat died I took to heart 
some articles in bird magazines which 
condemned the cat for all that was bad 
and I decided not to get another. In 
less than six months the farm was over¬ 
run with rats and they soon became so 
numerous as to chew the grain bags full 
of holes, eating and wasting large quan¬ 
tities of it, chewed a great deal of our 
Winter’s supply of apples and kept us 
awake nights by the rumble of their feet 
on the floor overhead and the sound of 
their continual gnawing. When I opened 
the barn door to do the evening chores 
whole droves of them would scamper—• 
not that they were afraid of me, for they 
would come out in my very presence and 
show fight when I tried to kill them 
with a stick. Often when I threw feed 
in for the horses a drove of them would 
jump into the manger, and the horses, 
being afraid of them, would strain at 
their halters while the rats proceeded 
to devour their feed. They even got so 
they chewed the cows in the stanchions 
and made raw sores on them. In the 
Spring we attempted to raise chickens 
but, even though we moved the coops 
some distance from the buildings, the 
rats soon found them and made short 
work of most of the chicks. I used 
traps and caught many, but, as the say¬ 
ing goes, “three new ones came to every 
funeral.” Poison seemed to. be a tonic 
for them. I got a cat and in less than 
six months time all the rats and mice 
had vanished and at present I am not 
troubled by them at all. 
You ask how a cat could possibly rid 
a farm of so many rats. My only an¬ 
swer is that she persevered and conquered 
against great odds. She was no excep¬ 
tion but simply a good ratter. Any other 
] good cat could have done the same. 
Now as far as cats and bird life is 
concerned I believe that if the rats and 
! mice which a cat catches annually, were 
allowed to live they would destroy many 
times more birds than the cat would. Did 
Mr. Smith ever stop to think of the num¬ 
berless birds, especially those nesting on 
or near the ground, whose eggs and 
young are eaten by rats and mice? lie 
says that he wonders if Mrs. A. D. J. has 
any knowledge of the great value of the 
song sparrow and the chipping sparrow. 
If Mrs. A. D. J. is a rural housewife of 
the average observing nature I am sure 
she is aware of their great usefulness and 
incidentally she may know something of 
the English sparrow also, especially if 
she has a garden. This is probably the 
bird she has in mind when she speaks of 
sparrows as nuisances. It cannot be 
denied that many other small birds make 
nuisances of themselves in the plum and 
cherry trees by picking at the ripe fruit. 
However. I believe that most birds are 
very valuable and that we should make 
special efforts for their protection. 
In all my experience with cats I have 
seldom seen one with a dead bird. _ I 
think that most people will agree with 
me the ill-fed. stray and untrained cats 
are the ones that do the mischief. When 
cats are young they can be taught in a 
very short time to leave chickens alone. 
The well-trained family eat rarely 
catches a bird and the good he does by 
destroying rats and mice is far greater 
than the harm he does by the few birds 
he may destroy. In my opinion every 
large farm should have at least one or 
two good cats. 
I question Mr. Smith’s statement that 
WHAT? TWINS? 
Yes. 
The names? 
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