It behoves the Rat-catcher to be always attentive to his customers, those, I mean, who want live Rats wherewith to try their dogs.  Amongst mine I have the honour to include clients of highest rank and position, barristers, magistrates, solicitors and a host of sporting gentry.  If the Rat-catcher’s efforts commend themselves to such gentlemen, and he always maintains a respectable appearance, he will obtain some very nice outings in the country.  Oft-times a party of gentlemen have sent for me in the summer, having arranged with me to bring four or five ferrets and Ratting appliances, and we have gone 50 miles up the country.  They would bring their terrier dogs, and we would hunt all along the brooks and rivers, and round the corn and wheat fields, putting the Rats we caught into the cage, and after lunch, taking the Rats to a meadow and coursing them with their dogs, which I think it real good sport.  We would put up at the best hotels and repeat the procedure next day, very often taking a drag or coach, and driving ten or a dozen miles farther up the country.

I can assure my readers that the Rat-catcher is well remunerated for the trouble he undertakes in these cases, and moreover this is the class of people he requires to fraternise with.  There is always a plentiful supply of “refreshments” on these outings, and I would therefore advise the Rat-catcher not to indulge too freely.

The foregoing is, of course, a brief sketch of the pleasantest part of a Rat-catcher’s life, and to complete the picture I may as well describe some of the other features, and the way he has to rough it sometimes.  Well, Rat-catchers are generally called upon to supply Rats for the Rat coursings usually held at beerhouses, etc., on Saturday afternoons, which one often sees advertised.  Now, if he binds himself to supply a coursing at a certain date, the bills announcing the event are printed and posted, all of which means expense.  Then you are bound to secure the live Rats, whatever be the weather.  In doing this I always followed the threshing machine to the bays and stacks. (Anyone that catches Rats regularly can tell by looking at the bays or stacks whether there are many Rats in or not.) I remember many times when the men have started threshing a bay of wheat in which were a great many Rats, and by dark they have threshed only half of the bay.  At such times the Rat-catcher must not leave the remaining half, no, not for half-an-hour throughout the whole night, for if he does the Rats will run out.  To stop the Rats from leaving, the Rat-catcher has to lie on the top of the bay or go about every thirty minutes and beat the bottom with sticks until daylight, in order to keep the Rats in.  Then, after the machine re-starts, and the bottom of the bay is reached, the Rat-catcher will be well paid for his trouble, for he may get, say, 150 good Rats for the coursing, at six shillings per dozen.  The reason I call them good coursing Rats is because they have not been handled, and that enables them to run well.