The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-05-17
CONCERNING A MOBILE RAT.

From the Montgomery Advertiser.
 Presumably the Mobile Register puts it's reputation as a newspaper behind the following news story taken from it's col umns:
 Wednesday afternoon a great, gray rat, with flashing red eyes, emerged from the mouth of the sewer at the foot of Cont street and gazed ferociously around. His whiskers bristled with pent-up wrath and his long tail quivered with suppressed emotion.
 Suddenly, with a squeak of rage, he hurled himself at the throat of a huge shaggy dog that passed his way, and for a few moments there was a battle for blood. Weight, size and strength finally told, and the old rat was slain. After the fighting rat was dead it was | discovered that the body literally rocked | of alcohol. His courage was that of John Barleycorn. He was drunk when he at tackled the dog.
 i And no wonder that old rat was fighting drunk, for $150O worth of whisky. wines, | brandy, gin and beer had been poured 1 into the sewer at police headQuarters. 1t
 was the stock seized at Klosky's last Oc. tober. They say the fish got on a jag, | too.
 1 We submit that the Register should not have said that the rat was drunk" It should have said he was drinking. D | That's the way to write 1t up when a
 mans booze puts i'm in print, rule which the Register scrupulously follows in, of A ,,,@ rat that didn't know any better than to l lap up mixed liquor out of a sewer is en- | titled to respect and sympathy, not ridi-
 cule Then, to make it worse, he was
 drinking tiger liquor, said to be the
 vilest member of the demons family. l CONSTRUCTING LAW HUMANELY
 From the New York World. l Roger Waters was killed while trying
 to save the life of fellow employe caught by a cave-in where both were al work on Fifth avenue. Under the old law
 of employers liability his widow could
 not have recovered damages. He was
 acting outside the range of his employ.
 ment. Indeed under the old fellow
 servant doctrine if he had been killed
 by the negligence of the fellow employe
 within the range of his employment, his
 widow could not have recovered dam
 ages
 | Strictly speaking, it may even be said | that the widow could not have compensa-
 tion under the new system. But the 1 workmen's compensation commission properly strained a point in the letter oi
 the law and awarded damages The em. p,oying company took the case to tht commission on the ground that 'it would | be a narrow and disappointing view'' tt hold that the legislature intended denia
 of the benefits of the compensation act il
 cases C injury or death growing out o1
 the heroism of an employe who steps jus
 outside the limits of employment to savs life
 That certainly would have been a mar row and disappointing view. But courts i have before this stuck to the letter O. the law and done as great violence tt
 common sense and common justice ant common feelings of humanity as would have been done had the letter of the law been strictly adhered to in this case Public opinion will have nothing but ap plause for this court of appeals decision It construes humane statute in tb ' broaC Humane mo lie scnseTV'nE sT''7-
 in wi en Inc ste 1e vas written.