A curios report about the effect of water on the rats is current: "Had you heard that, all the rats north of the river were coming south?"
"*No," slys the interested listener " who said 30?" Why a friend of mine saw a string of them coming across from Ch'ihhao to Chinkiang. big rat was in the ead, the next one had his tail in the mouth, and 50 on successively. The big one towed the others just like a steam-launch tows small craft.
"Ah, yes, and when they reach Chingkiang they're boxed and taken to the south gate to be let loose."
This is the story the Chinese tell. Per haps the foreign boy would say "Rats
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.