ss, and a dog was employed in hunting the live ones."

IRISHMAN EMPLOYED SHOOTING RATS.

Luttrell visited Sydney Smith at his parsonage in Somersetshire. The
London wit told some amusing Irish stories, and his manner of telling
them was so good. "One: 'Is your master at home, Paddy?' '_No_, your
honour.' 'Why, I saw him go in five minutes ago.' 'Faith, your honour,
he's not exactly at home; he's only there in the back yard a-shooting
rats with cannon, your honour, for his _devarsion_.'"[165]

JAMES WATT AND THE RAT'S WHISKERS.

Mrs Schimmelpenninck in her youth lived at Birmingham, where she often
met James Watt. In her autobiography (p. 34), she says, "Everybody
practically knew the infinite variety of his talents and stores of
knowledge. When Mr Watt entered a room, men of letters, men of science,
nay, military men, artists, ladies, even little children thronged round
him. I remember a celebrated Swedish artist having been instructed by
him that rats' whiskers made the most pliant and elastic painting-brush;
ladies would appeal to him on the best means of devising grates, curing
smoky chimneys, warming their houses, and obtaining fast colours. I can
speak from experience of his teaching me how to make a dulcimer, and
improve a Jew's harp."

THE POET GRAY COMPARES THE POET-LAUREATE TO A RAT-CATCHER.

The poet Gray very much despised such offices as that of the
poet-laureate, or that held by Elkanah Settle, the last of the city
poets whose name is held up to ridicule by Pope in the "Dunciad." In a
letter to the Rev. Wm. Mason,[166] he puts this very strikingly:--

"Though I very well know the bland emolient saponaceous qualities both
of sack and silver, yet if any great man would say to me, 'I make you
rat-catcher to his Majesty, with a salary of L300 a year, and two butts
of the best Malaga; and though it has been usual to catch a mouse or
two, for form's sake, in public once a year, yet to you, sir, we shall
not stand upon these things,' I cannot say I should jump at it; nay, if
they would drop the very name of the office, and call me Sinecure to the
King's Majesty, I should still feel a little awkward, and think
everybody I saw smelt a rat about me: but I do not pretend to blame any
one else that has not the same sensations. For my part, I would rather
be serjeant-trumpeter or pinmaker to the palace."

JEREMY BENTHAM AND THE MICE.

The biographer of Jeremy Bentham[167] tells us that among the animals