Full Revelations of a Professional Rat-catcher, After 25 Years' Experience

Ike Matthews

Friendly Societies' Printing Company, Limited, 1898 - Rats - 62 pages

What people are saying

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - Kisners42 - LibraryThing

If you ever wanted to know the lot of a British rat catcher circa the end of the 19th century then this is the book for you. Ike Matthews gives a candid and honest account of the trials and pleasures ...

User Review -

Short and easy read. I enjoyed it. A great look into the life of an English rat catcher in the 1800s. Funny how little has changed in our abilities the control these little rodents.

Contents

• Section 1: 1
• Section 2: 23
• Section 3: 32
• Section 4: 43

Popular passages

Page 39 - On lifting the flag at the bottom of the steps, we found 15 whole eggs, some good and some bad, all of which I am quite satisfied the Eats had carried down those nine stone steps ! How they had done so I cannot explain, but content myself with stating only the plain facts of my own personal observation.

Page 14 - Eats face the cayenne pepper. Cayenne is alright for any dry place and will last a long time, but it will not do in any water closets or any damp places, as dampness takes all the nature out of the cayenne. After ferreting in any kind of building, always go carefully round the outside, and see that there are no broken air grids, or broken cellar windows, as these are likely ways that the Eats gei into the building at first.

Page 29 - ... on the snout from under the string; otherwise the ferret may experience a tickling sensation, and not work so well as it should; see also that the string is tied tightly around the ferret's neck; if not it can easily pull off the muzzle with its paws. Whenever a ferret is severely bitten by a Eat the best course to take immediately you get it home is to bathe the wound in clean luKe-warm water.

Page 55 - Still, you have driven them all down the drains, and after making the drain good they cannot get back again into the building. Now, in a case like this I always trap them two or three nights and catch a few, just to give satisfaction to those engaging me. Sometimes gentlemen will write inviting me to meet them at a certain farm, and bring my ferrets and a good supply of nets, alleging that there are "hundreds of Eats in the stacks.

Page 56 - Eats in underneath, and then the Eats can always get into the kitchens up the back of the fireplace. Most property owners would do well to take note of this fact. I must tell my readers, especially those having large shops, &c., that it is a good plan, if possible, to turn off the gas and water every night and week-end, for I have seen a good many cases where the Eats in the night-time have eaten through a water-pipe, and the place has been flooded by morning.

Page 26 - This starts, always under the belly, and you will find that the skin becomes very red and speckled. Thisis easily remedied by the simple process of washing in lukewarm water and rubbing with sweet oil and black sulphur. The same mixture will answer for " foot rot " if rubbed well into the paws. The general cause of this, latter disease is neglect of the ferrets and the hutches not being cleaned out regularly. I think the best bedding for ferrets is good oat straw, fresh every fortnight. Throw th&...

Page 38 - ... dragging or rolling them along the floor with their front paws, until they get them to the mouth of the hole. I remember one place where I was ferreting. There was an old cellar, the door of which at the top of the steps had to my knowledge been nailed up two or three years. Out of the hen house the Eats had eaten a hole at each side of the cellar door at the bottom.

Page 58 - ... board dividing them from the Eats, and the Eats having eaten holes through the boards in the kennel! I have also found at an out-house an old bitch Eat and nine young ones in an old tin trunk without a lid. I have also caught Eats and taken young ones out of the nest from under railway sleepers where trains have been running and shunting operations carried on every day.

Page 30 - Rat-catching and waterside hunting (especially if it be a puppy) is to never allow anybody but yourself to have anything to do with it, it being the worst thing possible to let a working dog have too many masters. Break it in to the ferrets first, and then it is a good plan to go up the river banks, with...

Bibliographic information

• Title: Full Revelations of a Professional Rat-catcher, After 25 Years' Experience
• Author: Ike Matthews
• Edition: 2
• Publisher: Friendly Societies' Printing Company, Limited, 1898
• Original from: the University of California
• Digitized: Nov 16, 2007
• Length: 62 pages