Arizona weekly enterprise., 1888-10-27

Rats Play Havoc with the Fe1ts-Children
 PolSo Canes Under the Strings-Finding
 n Lost Pocketbook-ResuIts of Mans
 Carelessness.
 Look out for that rati'' was the excla- nation of a piano tuner to reporter, a few days ago, as he stood watching him take piano to pieces. The words had barely been said when large, lean rat jumped out of the instrument and scam pered across the room and out of an open door. While he was deXterously remov ing the rats nest from inside the piano the reporter asked if rats were usually part and parcel of pianos The tuner re- marked that while probably two-thirds of the instruments in residences were free from the rodents, the other third were in- fested with them, at least that had been his experience during twenty years of his life. Those in the country, especially in well to do farmers houses, were gener- ally inhabited by rats, and in dozens of cases fully half bushel of small scraps of paper that had been carried there by the pests had been discovered The paper and the nests were not so bad, but rats very frequently did the instrument much damage. Rats play havoc with the felts in the action, and he had repaired pianos where the felts had all been eaten away. Occasionally hungry rat Is discovered that shows fight, and the yielding of broomstick, with the accompanying screaming by the women folk, is neces- sary to get rid of the animal.
 Children oftentimes cause pianos to get out of order, but while the trouble caused by them is usually quickly repaired there are times when they do more damage than rats. Left alone in the room with an open instrument the spirit of mischief comes over them, and a cane or book is poked in under or among the strings. The owner returns to play on the piano, and then finds it at siXeS and sevens. As everything was all right but few min utes before the cause of the trouble can not be understood, and then there is buster about the house. Should the piano be new one the maker is blamed, the instrument is condemned, and sharp letter is forwarded to the seller. The re- pairer with fear and trembling hastens to the scene, the trouble is found, and after apologies, the whipping of the small boy who did the mischief, and the payment of the bill for repairs, the piano Is left to it's fate.
 WHERE THE MONEY GOES
 Picking up a five cent piece lying on the action, the tuner said: Here is something, too, l find as well as rats nests and the work of children. To be sure money is not found frequently, especially in any considerable amount, out the finding of two fat pocketbooks and ten dollar gold piece I will never forget. The gold had been placed in the piano for safe keeping by young lady, and it's hiding place for gotten, and my finding it, of course, made the owner happy. The bringing to light of one of the pocketbooks made mo $50 richer, that being 0 present from it's loser. It had been missing for year, and contained $600. Detectives had been hunting for thieves who, it was supposed, the pocketbooS brought back the recol- lection that 1t had been laid on the top lid of an upright piano, and that it had no doubt fallen in the inside, where had found it.
 'Instead of getting 0 reward I came near being arrested, and perhaps sen l fenced to term of imprisonment for finding the purse. Its contents were over | $200, and like the other one, having been carelessly left on top of the instrument, ! it fell inside. Being missed while l was ] in the house, and the owner of the money, a country justice, remembering where he had laid it, suspicion rested on me as the one who had taken it. When remarked the mysterious actions of the justice, his wife and two daughters, he told me of his loss and what he suspected, and threatened my arrest unless the money was ilnmedi- ately produced. It was bad predicament to be i'll, and what to do puzzled me. The finding of the other pocletbook flashed across my mind. l suggested a search in the interior of the piano, and there it was found to my icy. The old man took it without as much as saying Thank you, and to this day l think he holds the l opinion that l hid it away in the piano. " Chicago Journal