Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 35, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 September 1887 — “RATS HEZ GENIUS.” [ARTICLE]

“RATS HEZ GENIUS.”

An Old and Truthful Miner Tells Some Stories About Them. “Wur you a-speakin’ about rats in coal mines?" inquired an old miner ■who never tells a lie, up in Hazleton, Pa. “Wai, naow, I kin tell ye they’s almighty pow’ful critters, ’n don’t ye make no mistake. Big ez cats, they is, and powerful smart—smart as operators, b* gosh! Ye’ve got to git up almighty early in the mornin’ to git ahead of them rats. “W’at brings ’em thur? Why, cussedness, I reckon; thet an’ the grain which comes daown to the mules. They scrapes a livin’ somehaow. Es they can’t get anything better, w’y they eats a miner onct in a while. Many a miner has gone to git his dinner out of his box only to find that the rats had been thar before him, gnawed a hole in the box ’ithout asking no questions an’ toted off the grub. Thet’s common, thet is. “Naow, don’t ye believe thet story about the mule-tenders findin’ three feet of dead rats behind the mules in the mornin’, where the mules hez kicked ’em to death. Thet’s chestnuts. But ther’s somethin’ you kin believe, an’ I see it with my own eyes a hundred times. Ye know us miners hez to take a can of ile with us to work with. Naow, them rats is powerful fond of ile, but as the ile can has a narrow neck it takes a genius to get at it—leastways for a rat. Wot, do ye think a rat gits discouraged? No, sir! He jes’ sets straddlewise of thet ’ere can’s shoulder, dips his tail into the ile an’ then purceeds to mastercate thet tail. Fact! Any miner of ’sperience ’tell ye so. “Course ye know haow rats steal eggs. Rat No. 1 takes an egg in his paws an’ lays on his back. Rat No. 2 he lays hold of No. I’s tail an’ hauls him along, egg an’ all, to his hidin’ place. I tell you rats hez genius that they hez.”