Illustration of the Pied Piper of Hamelin playing music. The Pied Piper is a character from a fictional story about a rat catcher hired by the town of Hamelin, Germany to remove a plague of rats. However, the villagers refuse to pay him for his services. The Pied Piper then used his flute to lead all the children away from the town, never to be seen again. Reproduction of an original print from 1881.