Ɛpsilon

To Nature   [before 27 March 1879]1

Rats and Water-Casks

Mr. Nicols says, in Nature, vol. xix. p. 433:—

“A ship’s carpenter told me that, in the old days, before the use of iron tanks on board ship became general, the rats used to attack the water-casks, cutting the stave so thin that they could suck the water through the wood without actually making a hole in it. If any one could substantiate this it would have an important bearing on the question under consideration.”2

Capt. Wickham, when First Lieutenant on board H.M.S. Beagle,3 told me that when he was a midshipman it was his duty, on one of the king’s ships to see that certain vessels on deck were always kept full of water, in order to prevent the rats gnawing holes through the water casks, and that through such holes nearly all the water in a cask would leak away.

Charles Darwin

1
The date is established by the date of the issue of Nature in which the letter appeared.
2
Arthur Nicols had written to Nature about animal intelligence, as shown by rats gnawing through water pipes to get water (Nature, 20 February 1879, p. 365); his second letter on the topic, cited here by CD, was in response to objections (Nature, 13 March 1879, p. 433). Nicols had corresponded with CD on the subject in 1875 (see Correspondence vol. 23, letter from Arthur Nicols, 10 November 1875).
3
John Clements Wickham was first lieutenant on HMS Beagle from 1831 to 1836.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-8826,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-8826