The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-06-17
STRANGE PETS.
CONVICTS WHO HAVE SHOWN
 FONDNESS FOR ANIMALS.

NIurderer's Framed Rats-A Trusty Who
 Tames AHigatOrs-Bank Wrecker's Canaries-DOgs and Cats We'll Cared for in Jail-PigeOns as Prison Birds.
 Whether because they feel that the hand of all mankind is raised against them, and therefore they are forced to turn to dumb animals for love and cOmpanionship, or whether it is to divert minds during the long, dreary hours behind prison walls. it is a note worthy fact that many of the con- victs in the penitentiary. says the Columbus Press, Post, evince marked fondness for animal pets and show re- markable tact and patience in their care and training.
 Many of these prisoners, who dur ing their confinement have by their loving care and tender patience won the devotion and fidelity of their dumb friend were noted during their freedom for cruelty and brutality. Some of l these convicts, who are so strongly at taehed to their pets that they would risk their lives in protecting them from harm and would share their last crust of bread with them, are serving life sentences for murder.
 As the number and species of anil mals permitted to live inside the prison walls are for the most part very limited the prisoners who are desirous of cul- tivating pets must put up with such animals as chance throws in their way. This often leads to peculiar selections, but none are more strange than the choice of pets made by two convicts at present inmates of the Ohio Peniten- tiary.
 One of these prisoners is Morgan l McSweeney, about SO years old, who is serving life sentence for murder com- mitted in Washington county. He was received at the prison in 1898, and, be- ing an engineer, he was put to work running a steam pump that supplies water to the prison kitchen and laundry. This pump is situated in a dark, dismal corner of the kitchen basement, and is entirely shut off from where any of the other prisoners are | employed.
 This basement, like many other parts of the penitentiary plant, is infested with rats, hundreds making their home in the holes and crevices of the crumb- ling walls and beneath broken floor l ing of the old building.
 Gradually the rats grew accustomed to McSweeney's presence, and rats. Because of his lonely existence he began to take an interest in watch ing them as they would poke their heads out of their holes and stare at him. ready to dart back again at his slightest mo vement.
 The more the old man watched the rodents the more interested he became ', in them and their habits. They were his only living companions, and he felt kindly toward them he took the quick est and easiest way to win their trust and friendship by feeding them. He began by placing bits of bread, meat and other morsels of food near their holes. These the rats would stealthily crawl to and seize and the dart back to their nets. -,
 Gradually McSweeney placed the food farther and farther away from the rod ents' holes and closer to the chair in which he sat, until by months of patient perseverance, never offering to harm or scare them, he won the con- fdence of the rats to such an extent l fhoF how .ierbf tn h ic chair and eat the food out of his hands.
 The engineer soon had the rats so well trained that whenever he wished to feed them all he had to do was to give a low peculiar whistle and dozens of them, some almost as big as cats, would dart from their holes. Without wait l ing an instant they would swarm all over McSweeney, running up his legs, under his coat, on his head and shoul- ders, and in fact everywhere they could gain a footing.
 On one of these occasions the rodents, not finding enough food on McSween- ey's person to satisfy their appetites, devoured the entire back of his coat collar and the back of his coat before he knew what they were doing.
 After while the rats became so fond I of their benefactor that there was scarcely an hour in the day that there were not at least dozen of his strange pets crawling around on McSweeney's s lap or perched somewhere on his body. All he had to do was to give vent to his peculiar whistle and the whole vast army of them would rush from their hiding places and literally cover him by sWarming over his body.
 McSweeney kept on feeding and playing with his his pets in this man. ner for more than four years, and only closed his intimate relations with the rodents when the prison authorities a few months ago changed his employ ment from running the pump to work ing around the corridors in the east wing of the prison.
 Although this present employment is 1 much more congenial and he has the society of several sother convicts. McSweeney says he hated to leave the pump solely because it hurt him to part company with the pet rats.
 Many a ti1ne," said McSweeney, q l have had the rats so thick about me that when I got up from my chair to walk away would be obliged to shove I them out of the way with my foot in | order to find space to walk without