Foreign News: Mouse Racing

Squatters were not the only problem racking Britain last week. There were also mice.

The storm broke in Hobbies, a magazine devoted to the delights of private boondoggling. A recent issue included a report on a new sport—mouseboat racing —the invention of a ten-year-old anonymous moppet. Necessary paraphernalia: 18-inch racing boats, mice, a bathtub or pond. In racing, the mice propel the boats by walking a treadmill attached to a small paddle wheel. Said Hobbies: “No cruelty is imposed on the creature since experience shows that mice derive much enjoyment from their wheel-turning activity.”

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals thought otherwise. In an ultimatum to Hobbies, officers of the Royal Society deplored the sport. Said an R.S.P.C.A. inspector with finality: “Anyone who knows about boys will know that … the mice will be prodded unmercifully to ginger them up.” Britons tensed themselves for a finish fight. Then the iron curtain clanked down. Hobbies censored all news of mouseboat racing, refused to divulge even the inventor’s name.

Meanwhile, in Bath, a National Wheel Racing Mouse Club was organized. Founder Laurie Jackson had already enrolled 48 members, all adults who presumably could be trusted not to ginger up their mice. For a race track they had chartered the “Royal Oak,” a hall attached to a Bath pub. In Mouse Monthly, chief spokesman for the N.W.R.M.C., Britons learned more about mouse wheel racing: the track is twelve feet long and has six runways. The mice, one to a runway, propel diminutive wheels, by trotting on a two-inch treadpath. Entry fee for each race: two shillings sixpence. All mice will be pedigreed and registered, like horses, in an official stud book.

Cruelty to mice? Says Founder Jackson: Pooh! “Just gives ’em a spot of healthy exercise.”