A RAT-KILLING SHEEP.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 4079, 18 August 1884, Page 4

A RAT-KILLING SHEEP.

In the centre of O'Connor's Kensington rat-pit last night stood a stout short-legged sheep, with his neck encircled by a brasscollar and his black nose sheathed in a kid muzzlo. His name is Brum, and he Avas there to kill rats on a Avager made by his OAvncr and trainer, "Stono" M'Alister. Between fifty and sixty spectators Avere present. Last fall M'Alister, Avho is a sporting butcher, found three dead rats in Brum's pen. A clay or two later he saw the sheep kill a rat. That act saved Brum from being converted into chops. His owner resolved to train him. Under training Brum improA-ed so rapidly that M'Alister made five matches in which the sheep was to kill rats against time. The first match came off last night, Oth April, M'Alister Avagering 100 dollars that tho sheep would take the lives of forty rats in sixty minutes. In the betting the odds Avcro against the sheep, and M'Alister and two or three friends made Avagcrs right and left. George Tatncll Avas chosen referee and time-keeper, and at nine o'clock the forty rats Avcro emptied out of cages into the pit. The rats scampered about the pit, the referee called time, and M'Alister let go Brum and vaulted out of the pit, leaving him muzzled. " The muzzle! tho muzzle ! takeoff tho muzzle,

Stono !" shouted half-a-dozen men. "He don't kill 'em Avith his mouth," replied M'Alister, seating himself complacently on tho railing of the pit, and adding, "That sheep'll fool you all." Suit proved. The shoe]), without paying the slightest attention to the crowd, made two leaps to the corner of the pit in Avhich a dozen rats or more Avere huddled. Then raising himself upon his hind legs, he brought the care-fully-sharpened hoofs of his fore feet down like a flash in the pile of rats. This act Avas repeated five times in almost as many seconds, and the dead bodies of eight rats lay on the floor. Facing about, Brum gave a shrill blast and darted across the pit to another nest of rats. There he repeated tho stamping and strewed the pit with dead rodents. At the end of nine minutes there Avere but thirteen rats alive in the pit. Those Brum chased Avith the pertinacity and determination of a bull-dog, and killed them one by one. The fortieth rat was slaughtered in exactly thirty-four minutes from tho moment Brum Avas loosed. Several times during the match rats fastened their teeth in the leather muzzle, but the sheep easily shook off. —Philadelphia Times.