The Rat-Catcher of Hamelin

The Rat-Catcher of Hamelin

Written by June Crebbin Illustrated by Caroline Romanet

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Chapter 1 On the banks of a great river in northern Germany, there is a town called Hamelin.

Once, many years ago, the townsfolk of Hamelin lived happy and contented lives. They worked hard.

Their crops grew. Their harvests were plentiful.

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The bakeries were full of newly baked loaves.

The butchers sold tasty cuts of meat. The gardeners grew all manner of fruit and vegetables. The people helped each other. They made good laws. They kept the peace. But one day, that peace was broken.

Rats!

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Of course, there’d always been rats in Hamelin, scuttling after the grain in the storehouses, but the town cats had soon got rid of those. Now, rats swarmed through the town – hundreds of them, fierce and mean and hungry.

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They ate the grain in the storehouses. They ate the cheeses in the dairies. They ate the meat hanging on hooks in the pantries. They tumbled into barrels and drank until they were full. They streamed into shops and houses, attacking anyone in their path.

Mothers snatched up babies out of their cots and held them close.

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Older children tried to run out of the way, but the rats were quicker with their mean little eyes and their sharp, pointy teeth. They bit deep and scratched deeper.

Within hours, where the skin was broken, ugly red patches appeared, blisters and swellings.

Children cried out in pain and many lay sick with fever, struggling to breathe.

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The townsfolk locked their doors and kept the windows tightly shut, even though the air was thick with the summer heat. At night, no one could sleep, listening to rats scrabbling and chewing under floorboards. But they dreaded daylight more, when they could see them, and they knew disease from the rats would spread. Rats were everywhere, in every street and alley.

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Nothing and no one was safe.

“Something has to be done, and done quickly,” said one citizen. So the townsfolk met in the marketplace.

“What can we do?” said another citizen.

“Set the cats on them!” someone cried.

“That’s what we usually do.” But by then, the cats were either dead or too scared.

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“We must put down traps,” said another. So traps were set all over the town. But the rats, clever rats, weren’t tempted by the food in the traps. They knew how to chew their way into sacks of grain. They knew how to squeeze through the tiniest holes into shops and houses. They knew where to find plenty of food.

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“We must put down poison,” said another.

“That’ll finish them.” But the rats, clever rats, took one sniff and left it alone.

“Get rid of their nests!” cried another citizen.

So the people of Hamelin went out with pikes and sticks and poked out the nests and blocked up the holes. But the rats, clever rats, made new nests in different holes.

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