The Rambles of a Rat

had occurred. We were by no means the only rats who found a living in the place at the expense of our enemy, man. There were a good many of the

Was it not he who in single combat had met and conquered a young ferret! an exploit in itself quite sufficient to establish his fame as a warrior. They had been opposed to each other in a room lighted by a single window. Whiskerandos, whose intelligence a

lost one ear, and the other had been grievously curtailed of its proportions, so that altogether he had paid for fame at the price of be

seen this in life, (I am now an old and experienced rat,) I have seen a mean race following and flattering their superiors, ready to lick the dust from their feet, not from real admiration or attachment, but, like a mi

king into a corner. I almost think that I should have returned the bite, had not his formidable companion been so near; and it was probably this circumstance which gave the mean rat courage thus to attack me without provocation. From wha

x brothers had been caught, I saw Whiskerandos and his follower merrily advancing tow

were no friends of mine; but then they were rats; they were of the race

however, at a respectful distance;

round and faced me. I re

s ugly black rats!" Shabby was a great fighter with words; those of his character usually are; nor was he in the least particular, w

you go one foot farther!" I exclaim

p his hind legs with a saucy flourish as he s

uder than that of all my six brothers put together. He would not take advice, and he found the consequences. He thought himself wiser than hi

of his companion. He knew too well that it was impossible to rescue him now. Then, w

the obligation. Though you are black and I am brown, no difference betw

rub noses upon it!" and no

ight; I knew that no extremity would ever induce him to eat up his friend; and many a ramble have we had together, and through many strange paths has he led me. I ventured even in

n the heroic Whiskerandos? He had not, however, been so great a traveller as Furry,-he had never yet crossed the water; but

rned rat, was quite of the same opinion-that the ancestors of the brown rats came over from Hanover to England with George I. We liked to cal

t it is a calumny, a base calumny! We came from Persia, from the land of the East; an army of us swam across the Volga, driven by an earthquake from our own country. Depend upon it,

pride of birth, his anxiety to be thought of an ancient family-"the great matter is not whethe