LEPUS 247 



to a special breed of fast hounds or leporarii in 1184 (StubUs 

 Select Charters, 1895, ] 57)> an d a royal pack of harriers is 

 mentioned in 1485 (" Wanderer," Field, 30th March 1912, 652). 



In Twici's Art of Hunting, written about 1327, the animal 

 heads the lists of hunted beasts, and the reason given is 

 " Because she is the most marvellous beast which is on this 

 earth. It carries grease, 1 and it croteys, 2 and gnaws, and these 

 (things) no beast in this earth, does except it. And at one time 

 it is male and at another time it is female." The last reason is 

 imaginary, and the earlier ones are based on the technicalities 

 of the chase ; but the quotation well illustrates the high regard 

 in which the animal was held. 



In the most famous hunting book of England, that of 

 Edward, second Duke of York, who was the Master of Game 

 to King Henry IV., a.d. 1406 to 141 3 (see Baillie-Grohman's 

 eds. of 1904 and 1909), itself largely a translation from the 

 even more famous French of Gaston de Foix (Livre de 

 Ckasse, a.d. 1387), the hare again heads the list of "beasts 

 of venery and chace," coming even before the stag. Any 

 modern sportsman might envy the Master of Game's know- 

 ledge of its habits, and his opinion of it is given as follows 

 (ed. 1909, 14) : 3 — "The hare is a good little beast, and much 

 good sport and liking is (sic) the hunting of her, more than 

 that of any other beast that any man knoweth, if he were not 

 so little." 



In the Boke of St Albans (i486) the hare retains a high, or 

 even a higher position, for we read that " That beest Kyng shall 

 be calde of all venery. . . . He is the mervellest beest that is 

 in any londe." 



By most subsequent writers, such as Shakespeare, 4 coursing, 



1 A technical term used amongst sportsmen for the fat of some animals of the 

 chase, see below, p. 254. 



2 "Croteys" were droppings, see below, p. 254. Apparently the hare was the 

 only beast combining grease and croteys ; all others with grease had fiants (Dryden's 

 Twici, 1908, 38). 



3 Note the hare is here called "he" and "she" indiscriminately, in accordance 

 with the strange belief of the time regarding its sex, see above, pp. 239-240. 



4 " If I fly, Marcius, halloo me like a hare."— Corz'o/anus, 1, 8. 

 " Say thou wilt course ; they greyhounds are as swift 

 As breathed stags, ay fleeter than the roe." 



— Taming of the Shrew, Introduction, sc. 2. 



