EDUCATED RATS.
By Neal Dow.
In the Congregationalist is a curious story about rats, which seems to indicate that they will not remain where their company is not desired, if politely invited to change their quarters, though everybody knows that they are driven out with difficulty. Here is a perfectly true story which corroborates that one.
My house is supposed to be rat-proof, and was so when quite new, but at one time, more than twenty years ago, we had a large colony of the rodents, greatly to our annoyance, and it was with us a matter of daily wonder where they found a weak spot in our defenses among them. One evening a young lady from a friend's family, living in a large, fine house nearly a mile away, was with us, and the talk turned on rats, as we heard ours scampering up and down the walls.
The young lady said that none had ever been in their house, and she did not think there was any point at which they could enter. My eldest daughter, a great wit, said: "I've heard that, if politely invited to do so in writing, rats will leave any house and go to any other to which they may be directed, and I will tell ours that at your house they will find spacious quarters and an excellent commissariat."
At the moment, before us all, she wrote the most grandiloquent letter to the large family of rats that had so favored us with their presence, pointing out to them that at No. 65 Pearl Street was a large, fine house which had never been favored with the residence of any of their family, where they would find ample quarters and a fat larder. When finished, she read the missive to the company, and we had a great laugh over it. As an old superstition, she then put lard upon it, and carried it into the attic, where it would probably be found by those to whom it was directed.
A few days later the young lady was at our house again, and burst into a laugh, exclaiming: "Our house is overrun with rats!" That recalled to us the fact that we had heard none in our walls. My daughter went to the attic, and the letter was gone. While they were talking and laughing over the curious affair, a friend came in, and, hearing the talk, said that two evenings before, in the bright moonlight, he saw several rats running down Congress Street, which was the straight road to Pearl Street. We have never been troubled with them since, but I have not heard how it has been with the house to which our beneficiaries were directed.
SAGACIOUS DOGS.
The following story is told by the Chinese minister at Washington:
"There was a Chinaman who had three dogs. When he came home one evening he found them asleep on his couch of teakwood and marble. He whipped them and drove them forth.