THEBLACK RAT.
This animal is the old genuine English House-Rat, no other being known in and about houses, for many ages, in this country, and differs in many particulars from the Norway Rat, last described, for they do not burrow and run into shores as the others do, but chiefly lie in the cielings and wainscots in houses, and in out-houses they lie under the ridge-tiles and behind the rafters, and run along the side-plates; but their numbers are greatly diminished to what they were formerly, not many of them being now left, for the Norway Rats always drive them out, and kill them wherever they can come at them; as a proof of whichI was once exercising my employment at a gentleman’s house, and when the night came that I appointed to catch, I set all my traps going as usual, and in the lower part of the house, in the cellars, I caught the Norway Rats, but in the upper part of the house I took nothing but the black Rats; I then put them together into the great cage, to keep them alive till the morning, that the gentleman might see them, when the Norway Rats killed the black ones immediately, and devoured them in my presence.
These vermin are not near so bold, nor will feed so freely as the Norway Rat, and when you are troubled with any of them you must observe where they use, which you may do very easily, for if you go into any place and look up at the side-plates, you will perceive they will be quite black where they run along them, and likewise along the cross beams; on these cross beams place one of the traps you set for the NorwayRats, and put some of the same feed in them, but mix more bread in it than you did for the Norway Rat, and scent the trap in the same manner, and put some corn in of any sort: set a trap at each place where they use, and set them all to feed, as you do the others for the Norway Rat; and when you perceive that they come to feed boldly, then take them; but this must be done in the night, for they do not move by day-light, as the other rats will. By this method I catch them alive, but I have likewise taken them on the side-plates and beams, where they run, in wires and in snares, so that they swing off the beams; they are not near so savage as the Norway Rats, for they seldom kill any chickens or any thing of that kind, unless extremely hungry and sharp set indeed, but they are sly thieves for cheese, bacon, or any kind of eatables they can get at and pilfer.