The Rambles of a Rat

Let not my readers suppose that in writing The Rambles of a Rat I have simply been blowing bubbles of fancy for their amusement, to divert them during an idle hour. Like the hollow glass balls which children delight in, my bubbles of fancy have something solid within them, – facts are enclosed in my fiction. I have indeed made rats talk, feel, and reflect, as those little creatures certainly never did; but the courage, presence of mind, fidelity, and kindness, which I have attributed to my heroes, have been shown by real rats. Such adventures as I have described have actually happened to them, unless they be those recorded in the 19th chapter, for which I have no authority. For my anecdotes of this much-despised race I am principally indebted to an interesting article on the subject which appeared in the “Quarterly Review.”

I would suggest to my readers how wide and delightful a field of knowledge natural history must open to all, when there is so much to interest and admire even in those animals which we usually regard with contempt and disgust. The examination of the wondrous works of nature is a study elevating as well as delightful; for the more deeply we search into the wonders around us, the more clearly we discover the wisdom which is displayed even in the lowest forms of creation!

My very earliest recollection is of running about in a shed adjoining a large warehouse, somewhere in the neighbourhood of Poplar, and close to the River Thames, which thereabouts is certainly no silver stream.

A merry life we led of it in that shed, my seven brothers and I! It was a sort of palace of rubbish, a mansion of odds and ends, where rats might frolic and gambol, and play at hide-and-seek, to their hearts’ content. We had nibbled a nice little way into the warehouse above mentioned; and there, every night, we feasted at our ease, growing as sleek and plump as any rats in the United Kingdom.

We were of an ancient race of British rats, my seven brothers and I. It is said that our ancestors came over with the Conqueror, William; and we are not a little proud of our Norman descent. Our smaller forms, sleek black coats, long tails, and fine large ears, make us altogether distinct from the Norwegian brown rat, on which we look with – I was going to say with contempt, but I rather think that it is quite another feeling, and one to which neither rats nor men generally like to plead guilty. I know that we do not usually choose to keep company with them; but whether it be because their forms are coarser, their manners less refined, and their pedigree not so long, or whether it be because they sometimes have a fancy to nibble off the ears of their neighbours, or, when their appetite is uncommonly sharp, make a meal of their Norman cousins, we need not particularly inquire.

I said that I and my seven brothers were black rats; but I ought to make one exception. The youngest of the family was piebald – a curious peculiarity, which I never noticed in any other of our race. Yes, he was piebald; and not only had he this misfortune, but he was the clumsiest and most ill-shaped rat that ever nibbled a candle-end! Now, this was no fault of his, and certainly was no reason why he should have been despised by his more fortunate brothers. Man, of course, as a superior creature, would only look with kindness and pity upon a companion so unhappy as to have personal defects. He would never ridicule a condition which might have been his own, nor find a subject for merriment in that which to another was a cause of annoyance; but we were only inconsiderate young rats, and there was no end to our jokes on our piebald comrade. “Oddity,” “Guinea-pig,” “Old Spotty,” and “Frightful” – such were the names which we gave him. The first was that by which he was best known, and the only one to which he chose to answer. But he was a good-humoured fellow, poor Oddity, and bore our rudeness with patience and temper. He pursued the plan which I would recommend to all rats in his position: he joined the mirth which his own appearance raised; and when we made merry at the awkward manner in which he waddled after his more light-footed companions, he never took it amiss, nor retired into a corner of the shed to sulk, amidst rope-ends and bits of rusty iron.

I have said that we had merry nights in the warehouse. Often has the moon looked in through the dull, many-paned windows, lighting our revels; though we cared little for light, our delicate feelers almost supplying the place of eyes. But one night above all nights I remember!

There had been a great deal of moving about in the warehouse during the day, running of trucks, and rolling of casks. Brisk, the liveliest of my brothers, had sat watching in a hole from noon until dusk, and now hurried through our little passage into the shed, where we were all nestling behind some old canvass. He brought us news of a coming feast.

“A ship has arrived from India,” said he, “and we’ll have a glance at the cargo. They’ve been busy stowing it away next door. There’s rice – ”