--- title: Rats and mice in the city, and the elephant and mouse myth — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Rats and mice in the city, and the elephant and mouse myth», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Wherever people live, brown rats and house mice live too, in drains, sheds, walls and under floors, eating the --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / Rats and mice in the city, and the ele… # Rats and mice in the city, and the elephant and mouse myth Lesson 222 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 17 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/0/) — Wherever people live, brown rats and house mice live too, in drains, sheds, walls and under floors, eating the food we drop and throw away. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/1/) — A rat can squeeze through a hole about the size of a coin, swim through a pipe and hold its breath for minutes, and its front teeth never stop growing, so it gnaws all the time, even through cables. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/2/) — Rats are clever and careful: offered a new food, a rat nibbles a tiny bit and waits to see whether it feels ill, and in experiments rats have freed a trapped friend even when there was chocolate on offer. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/4/) — And the cartoon elephant that screams and jumps on a chair at the sight of a mouse? - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/5/) — There is no good evidence that real elephants are especially afraid of mice. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/6/) — Brown rats live wherever people live; they eat our waste and shelter in drains, sewers and buildings. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/7/) — A rat can squeeze through a hole about the size of a coin, because its ribs are flexible and its skull decides what fits. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/8/) — Rats are good swimmers and can hold their breath for a few minutes, so they can swim through pipes. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/9/) — Fleas carried by rats helped spread the plague called the Black Death, but scientists now think human fleas and lice also spread it from person to person. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/10/) — Rats are cautious with new food: they nibble a little and wait to see whether they feel ill. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/11/) — In experiments, rats opened a cage to free another trapped rat, even when they could have eaten chocolate instead. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/12/) — Real rats have a superb sense of smell and taste, and they learn which foods are safe by smelling the breath of other rats. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/13/) — A rat's front teeth never stop growing, so it gnaws to keep them short; the teeth are tough enough to chew through wood, plastic and cables. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/14/) — House mice come indoors in winter for warmth and food, and eat crumbs, seeds, grain and sweet foods, which they like better than cheese. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/15/) — There is no good evidence that real elephants are especially scared of mice; like many animals, they may startle at any small sudden movement near their feet. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/16/) — African giant pouched rats are trained to sniff out landmines; they are light enough not to set them off and their noses are excellent. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/17/) — A rat or a mouse has four legs, a long tail and two pairs of long front teeth, one pair on top and one below. - ← previous: [Pigeons: head bobbing, homing and city cliffs](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/221-pigeons-head-bobbing-homing-and-city-cliffs/) - next →: [Gulls: chip thieves, rain dances and salty water](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)