Mr Cole, when examined before the Committee of the House on the condition of the depositories of the Records some time ago, stated that "six or seven perfect skeletons of rats were found imbedded (in the Rolls); bones of these vermin were generally distributed throughout the mass, and a dog was employed in hunting the live ones."
Irishman Employed Shooting Rats.
Luttrell visited Sydney Smith at his parsonage in Somersetshire. The London wit told some amusing Irish stories, and his manner of telling them was so good. "One: 'Is your master at home, Paddy?' 'No, your honour.' 'Why, I saw him go in five minutes ago.' 'Faith, your honour, he's not exactly at home; he's only there in the back yard a-shooting rats with cannon, your honour, for his devarsion.'"[165]
James Watt and the Rat's Whiskers.
Mrs Schimmelpenninck in her youth lived at Birmingham, where she often met James Watt. In her autobiography (p. 34), she says, "Everybody practically knew the infinite variety of his talents and stores of knowledge. When Mr Watt entered a room, men of letters, men of science, nay, military men, artists, ladies, even little children thronged round him. I remember a celebrated Swedish artist having been instructed by him that rats' whiskers made the most pliant and elastic painting-brush; ladies would appeal to him on the best means of devising grates, curing smoky chimneys, warming their houses, and obtaining fast colours. I can speak from experience of his teaching me how to make a dulcimer, and improve a Jew's harp."
The Poet Gray compares the Poet-Laureate to a Rat-catcher.
The poet Gray very much despised such offices as that of the poet-laureate, or that held by Elkanah Settle, the last of the city poets whose name is held up to ridicule by Pope in the "Dunciad." In a letter to the Rev. Wm. Mason,[166] he puts this very strikingly:—
"Though I very well know the bland emolient saponaceous qualities both of sack and silver, yet if any great man would say to me, 'I make you rat-catcher to his Majesty, with a salary of £300 a year, and two butts of the best Malaga; and though it has been usual to catch a mouse or two, for form's sake, in public once a year, yet to you, sir, we shall not stand upon these things,' I cannot say I should jump at it; nay, if they would drop the very name of the office, and call me Sinecure to the King's Majesty, I should still feel a little awkward, and think everybody I saw smelt a rat about me: but I do not pretend to blame any one else that has not the same sensations. For my part, I would rather be serjeant-trumpeter or pinmaker to the palace."
Jeremy Bentham and the Mice.
The biographer of Jeremy Bentham[167] tells us that among the animals he was fond of were mice. They were encouraged "to play" about in his workshop. I remember, when one got among his papers, that he exclaimed, "Ho! ho! here's a mouse at work; why won't he come into my lap?—but then I ought to be writing legislation, and that would not do."