About nine o’clock the proprietor took the chair in the parlour, at the
same time giving the order to “shut up the shutters in the room above,
and light up the pit.” This announcement seemed to rouse the spirits
of the impatient assembly, and even the dogs tied to the legs of the
tables ran out to the length of their leathern thongs, and their tails
curled like eels, as if they understood the meaning of the words.
“Why, that’s the little champion,” said the proprietor, patting a dog
with thighs like a grasshopper, and whose mouth opened back to its
ears. “Well, it _is_ a beauty! I wish I could gammon you to take a
‘fiver’ for it.” Then looking round the room, he added, “Well, gents,
I’m glad to see you look so comfortable.”
[Illustration: RATTING--“THE GRAHAM ARMS,” GRAHAM STREET.
[_From a Photograph._]]
The performances of the evening were somewhat hurried on by the
entering of a young gentleman, whom the waiters called “Cap’an.”
“Now, Jem, when is this match coming off?” the Captain asked
impatiently; and despite the assurance that they were getting
ready, he threatened to leave the place if kept waiting much longer.
This young officer seemed to be a great “fancier” of dogs, for he
made the round of the room, handling each animal in its turn, feeling
and squeezing its feet, and scrutinising its eyes and limbs with such
minuteness, that the French gentlemen were forced to inquire who he was.
There was no announcement that the room above was ready, though
everybody seemed to understand it; for all rose at once, and
mounting the broad wooden staircase, which led to what was once
the “drawing-room,” dropped their shillings into the hand of the
proprietor, and entered the rat-killing apartment.
“The pit,” as it is called, consists of a small circus, some six feet
in diameter. It is about as large as a centre flower-bed, and is fitted
with a high wooden rim that reaches to elbow height. Over it the
branches of a gas lamp are arranged, which light up the white painted
floor, and every part of the little arena. On one side of the room
is a recess, which the proprietor calls his “private box,” and this
apartment the Captain and his friend soon took possession of, whilst
the audience generally clambered upon the tables and forms, or hung
over the sides of the pit itself.
All the little dogs which the visitors had brought up with them were
now squalling and barking, and struggling in their masters’ arms, as if
they were thoroughly acquainted with the uses of the pit; and when a
rusty wire cage of rats, filled with the dark moving mass, was brought
forward, the noise of the dogs was so great that the proprietor was
obliged to shout out--“Now, you that have dogs _do_ make ’em shut up.”
The Captain was the first to jump into the pit. A man wanted to sell
him a bull-terrier, spotted like a fancy rabbit, and a dozen of rats
was the consequent order.
The Captain preferred pulling the rats out of the cage himself, laying
hold of them by their tails and jerking them into the arena. He was
cautioned by one of the men not to let them bite him, for “believe me,”
were the words, “you’ll never forget, Cap’an; these ’ere are none of
the cleanest.”
Whilst the rats were being counted out, some of those that had been
taken from the cage ran about the painted floor and climbed up the
young officer’s legs, making him shake them off and exclaim, “Get out,
you varmint!” whilst others of the ugly little animals sat upon their
hind legs, cleaning their faces with their paws.
When the dog in question was brought forth and shown the dozen rats, he
grew excited, and stretched himself in his owner’s arms, whilst all the
other animals joined in a full chorus of whining.
“Chuck him in,” said the Captain, and over went the dog; and in a
second the rats were running round the circus, or trying to hide
themselves between the small openings in the boards round the pit.
Although the proprietor of the dog endeavoured to speak up for it, by
declaring “it was a good ’un, and a very pretty performer,” still it
was evidently not worth much in a rat-killing sense; and if it had not
been for his “second,” who beat the sides of the pit with his hand, and
shouted “Hi! hi! at ’em!” in a most bewildering manner, we doubt if
the terrier would not have preferred leaving the rats to themselves,
to enjoy their lives. Some of the rats, when the dog advanced towards
them, sprang up in his face, making him draw back with astonishment.
Others, as he bit them, curled round in his mouth and fastened on his
nose, so that he had to carry them as a cat does its kittens. It also
required many shouts of “Drop it--dead ’un,” before he would leave
those he had killed.
We cannot say whether the dog was eventually bought; but from its
owner’s exclaiming, in a kind of apologetic tone, “Why, he never saw a
rat before in all his life,” we fancy no dealings took place.
The Captain seemed anxious to see as much sport as he could, for he
frequently asked those who carried dogs in their arms whether “his
little ’un would kill,” and appeared sorry when such answers were given
as--“My dog’s mouth’s a little out of order, Cap’an,” or “I’ve only
tried him at very small ’uns.”
One little dog was put in the pit to amuse himself with the dead
bodies. He seized hold of one almost as big as himself, shook it
furiously till the head thumped the floor like a drumstick, making
those around shout with laughter, and causing one man to exclaim, “He’s
a good ’un at shaking heads and tails, ain’t he?”
Preparations now began for the grand match of the evening, in which
fifty rats were to be killed. The “dead ’uns” were gathered up by their
tails and flung into the corner. The floor was swept, and a big flat
basket produced, like those in which chickens are brought to market,
and under whose iron wire top could be seen small mounds of closely
packed rats.
This match seemed to be between the proprietor and his son, and the
stake to be gained was only a bottle of lemonade, of which the father
stipulated he should have first drink.
It was strange to observe the daring manner in which the lad introduced
his hand into the rat cage, sometimes keeping it there for more than a
minute at a time, as he fumbled about and stirred up with his fingers
the living mass, picking out, as he had been requested, “only the big
’uns.”
When the fifty animals had been flung into the pit, they gathered
themselves together into a mound which reached one-third up the sides,
and which reminded one of the heap of hair-sweepings in a barber’s shop
after a heavy day’s cutting. These were all sewer and water-ditch
rats, and the smell that rose from them was like that from a hot drain.
The Captain amused himself by flicking at them with his pocket
handkerchief, and offering them the lighted end of his cigar, which the
little creatures tamely snuffed at, and drew back from, as they singed
their noses.
It was also a favourite amusement to blow on the mound of rats, for
they seemed to dislike the cold wind, which sent them fluttering about
like so many feathers; indeed, whilst the match was going on, whenever
the little animals collected together, and formed a barricade as it
were to the dog, the cry of “Blow on ’em! blow on ’em!” was given by
the spectators, and the dog’s second puffed at them as if extinguishing
a fire, when they would dart off like so many sparks.
The company was kept waiting so long for the match to begin that
the impatient Captain again threatened to leave the house, and was
only quieted by the proprietor’s reply of “My dear friend, be easy,
the boy’s on the stairs with the dog;” and true enough we shortly
heard a wheezing and a screaming in the passage without, as if some
strong-winded animal were being strangled, and presently a boy entered,
carrying in his arms a bull-terrier in a perfect fit of excitement,
foaming at the mouth and stretching its neck forward, so that the
collar which held it back seemed to be cutting its throat in two.
The animal was nearly mad with rage--scratching and struggling to get
loose. “Lay hold a little closer up to the head or he’ll turn round and
nip yer,” said the proprietor to his son.
Whilst the gasping dog was fastened up in a corner to writhe its
impatience away, the landlord made inquiries for a stop-watch, and also
for an umpire to decide, as he added, “whether the rats were dead or
alive when they’re ‘killed,’ as Paddy says.”
When all the arrangements had been made the “second” and the dog jumped
into the pit, and after “letting him see ’em a bit,” the terrier was
let loose.
The moment the dog was “free,” he became quiet in a most business-like
manner, and rushed at the rats, burying his nose in the mound till he
brought out one in his mouth. In a short time a dozen rats with wetted
necks were lying bleeding on the floor, and the white paint of the pit
became grained with blood.
In a little time the terrier had a rat hanging to his nose, which,
despite his tossing, still held on. He dashed up against the sides,
leaving a patch of blood as if a strawberry had been smashed there.
“He doesn’t squeal, that’s one good thing,” said one of the lookers-on.
As the rats fell on their sides after a bite they were collected
together in the centre, where they lay quivering in their death-gasps!
“Hi, Butcher! hi, Butcher!” shouted the second, “good dog!
bur-r-r-r-r-h!” and he beat the sides of the pit like a drum till the
dog flew about with new life.
“Dead ’un! drop it!” he cried, when the terrier “nosed” a rat kicking
on its side, as it slowly expired of its broken neck.
“Time!” said the proprietor, when four of the eight minutes had
expired, and the dog was caught up and held panting, his neck stretched
out like a serpent’s, staring intently at the rats which still kept
crawling about.
The poor little wretches in this brief interval, as if forgetting their
danger, again commenced cleaning themselves, some nibbling the ends of
their tails, others hopping about, going now to the legs of the lad in
the pit, and sniffing at his trousers, or, strange to say, advancing,
smelling, to within a few paces of their enemy the dog.
The dog lost the match, and the proprietor, we presume, honourably paid
the bottle of lemonade to his son. But he was evidently displeased with
the dog’s behaviour, for he said, “He won’t do for me--he’s not one of
my sort! Here, Jim, tell Mr. G. he may have him if he likes; I won’t
give him house room.”
A plentiful shower of halfpence was thrown into the pit as a reward for
the second who had backed the dog.
A slight pause now took place in the proceedings, during which the
landlord requested that the gentlemen “would give their minds up to
drinking; you know the love I have for you,” he added jocularly, “and
that I don’t care for any of you;” whilst the waiter accompanied the
invitation with a cry of “Give your orders, gentlemen,” and the lad
with the rats asked if “any other gentleman would like any rats.”
Several other dogs were tried, and amongst them one who, from the
size of his stomach, had evidently been accustomed to large dinners,
and looked upon rat-killing as a sport and not as a business. The
appearance of this fat animal was greeted with remarks such as “Why
don’t you feed your dog?” and “You shouldn’t give him more than five
meals a-day.”
Another impatient bull-terrier was thrown into the midst of a dozen
rats. He did his duty so well, that the admiration of the spectators
was focussed upon him.
“Ah,” said one, “_he’d_ do better at a hundred than twelve;” whilst
another observed, “Rat-killing’s _his_ game, I can see;” while the
landlord himself said, “He’s a very pretty creetur’, and I’d back him
to kill against anybody’s dog at eight and a half or nine.”
The Captain was so startled with this terrier’s “cleverness,” that he
vowed that if she could kill fifteen in a minute “he’d give a hundred
guineas for her.”
It was nearly twelve o’clock before the evening’s performance
concluded. Several of the spectators tried their dogs upon two or
three rats, either the biggest or the smallest that could be found: and
many offers as to what “he wanted for the dog,” and many inquiries as
to “who was its father,” were made before the company broke up.
At last the landlord, finding that no “gentleman would like a few
rats,” and that his exhortations to “give their minds up to drinking”
produced no further effect upon the company, spoke the epilogue of the
rat tragedies in these words;--
“Gentlemen, I give a very handsome solid silver collar to be killed for
next Tuesday. Open to all the world, only they must be novice dogs, or
at least such as is not considered _phee_nomenons. We shall have plenty
of sport, gentlemen, and there will be loads of rat-killing. I hope to
see all my kind friends, not forgetting your dogs, likewise; and may
they be like the Irishman all over, who had good trouble to catch and
kill ’em, and took good care they didn’t come to life again. Gentlemen,
there is a good parlour down-stairs, where we meets for harmony and
entertainment.”