INTRODUCTION.
However trifling and contemptible the following Treatise may appear to some persons, the author flatters himself that it will be productive of great public utility, although the subject is but low and humble.
Many ingenious writers have greatly distinguished themselves in treating of that noble and useful animal the horse; of the method of breeding horned cattle, sheep, and other animals, serviceable and beneficial to mankind; this little work, on the contrary, takes cognizance of those animals, noxious to the community, describes their wonderful wilyness and sagacity, and the uncommon and surprizing methods they take for self-preservation and getting their prey; the research, may, perhaps, give the reader great satisfaction, for the infinite wisdom ofthe great Creator is as conspicuous in a mole as in a camel, in an ant as in a lion.
And as most noblemen, gentlemen, and others, who have country seats are generally, if not constantly, troubled with various kinds of vermin, greatly detrimental and destructive to their property in the following instances, viz. in many places where gentlemen have hare-warrens and pheasantries, they are troubled with foxes, their waters with otters, those great destroyers of fish; their poultry are killed by polecats, stoats, and weasels; in other places they are pestered with wild cats, who originally strayed from the farm and other lone houses, and running into the woods, breed in great numbers and do incredible mischief, in destroying the game, poultry, rabbits, and young leverets; in many other places they are troubled with sheep-killing dogs, who in the night-time worry and kill great numbers of sheep, so useful and necessary to the commonwealth, and the staplecommodity of the kingdom. But of all the noxious animals none do more mischief than rats; both the old English black rat and the Norway rat, especially the latter, which is the most mischievous animal in the creation. In all the above cases, rules, not drawn from theory, but from twenty years strict observation and practice, are laid down in the plainest manner, to find out their haunts and hiding places; with the easiest methods how to take and destroy them, to the great joy and emolument of the persons who have been injured and pestered with them. Rules for taking and destroying moles and mice are likewise given, and the nature of ferrets is also described, with instructions when it is proper to make use of them, and when not.
And as the noxious part of the creation is not confined to the earth only, many of the winged inhabitants of the air are equally pernicious to the gentleman and the farmer, their natures are described, with proper andsuitable directions how to take and destroy them, from the buzzard and the kite, to the smallest bird of prey, without which the author would have estimated his work as incomplete.
On the whole, if the following little Treatise should any ways answer the intent for which it was written, the author will obtain the end he aimed at, and gratify the utmost extent of his ambition and wishes, namely, the good and advantage of his fellow-subjects, and the general good of the community.