“I calls myself a coster; some calls theirselves general dealers, but I doesn’t. I goes to market, and if one thing don’t suit, why I buys another.
“I don’t know whether you’ve heerd of it, master, or not, but I’m the man as they say kills rats—that’s to say, I kills ’em like a dog. I’m almost ashamed to mention it, and I shall never do it any more, but I’ve killed rats for a wager often. You see it’s only been done like for a lark; we’ve bin all together daring one another, and trying to do something as nobody else could. I remember the first time I did it for a wager, it was up at ——, where they’ve got a pit. There was a bull-dog a killing rats, so I says,
“‘Oh, that’s a duffin’ dog; any dog could kill quicker than him. I’d kill again him myself.’
“Well, then they chaffed me, and I warn’t goin’ to be done; so I says,
“‘I’ll kill again that dog for a sov’rin.’
“The sov’rin was staked. I went down to kill eight rats again the dog, and I beat him. I killed ’em like a dog, with my teeth. I went down hands and knees and bit ’em. I’ve done it three times for a sov’rin, and I’ve won each time. I feels very much ashamed of it, though.
“On the hind part of my neck, as you may see, sir, there’s a scar; that’s where I was bit by one; the rat twisted hisself round and held on like a vice. It was very bad, sir, for a long time; it festered, and broke out once or twice, but it’s all right now.”
Rats.
“The rat, though small, weak, and contemptible in its appearance, possesses properties that render it a more formidable enemy to mankind, and more injurious to the interests of society, than even those animals that are endued with the greatest strength and the most rapacious dispositions. To the one we can oppose united powers and superior arts; with regard to the other, experience has convinced us that no art can counteract the effects of its amazing fecundity, and that force is ineffectually directed against an animal possessed of such variety of means to elude it.
“There are two kinds of rats known in this country,—the black rat, which was formerly universal here, but is now very rarely seen, having been almost extirpated by the large brown kind, which is generally distinguished by the name of the Norway rat.