THE COMMON OR BROWN HARE 255 



Scottish Gaelic — gearr="a. hare," gearrag=" a young hare or 

 leveret," and ;/iaig/ieac/i = " the 'field' animal," from mag/i = a "field" 

 or " plain," are general terms, to which {fide C. H. Alston) bhdn is added 

 for L. timidus in winter, and ructdJi (" red ") for L. europceus. 



Manx — mwaagh (= Scottish maigheacli). 



Welsh — cath eitliin, lit. = " cat of the furze" — compare the old 

 English name "furze-cat" applied to the hare in Reliquice Antique?, I., 

 133; ceinacli, 3. hare (already mentioned); ysgyfarnog, lit. = "the eared 

 animal," from ysgyfar = " an ear," and ysgyfam — " the ear of a beast." 



Cornish — scovarnek, scovarnog. 



Distribution : — The Common Hare is found naturally in several 

 sub-specific forms from Great Britain to the Ural mountains ; and 

 from Scotland, Denmark, the shores of the Baltic, and the White Sea 

 districts of North Russia (Blasius), southwards to the river Ebro in 

 Spain (Cabrera, in lit.), Italy, the Balkan Peninsula to the Peloponnese, 

 the northern shores of the Black Sea to the western shores of the Caspian, 

 the districts south of the Urals, and south at least to Trebizond. 



It is quite a recent immigrant or introduction in Scandinavia and 

 Finland, where, as in Arctic Europe generally, in Ireland, and in the 

 higher portions of the Alps, members of the group of varying hares are 

 alone indigenous ; in Sweden, it now ranges north of 56 N. lat. 

 (Lonnberg), and in Finland is spreading northwards. 



It meets in Spain a very distinct hare, L. granatensis of Rosenhauer 

 (1856) = ^. meridionalis of Graells (1897) = ^. lilfordi oi de Winton (1898), 

 which is found in the Balearics, and Iberian Peninsula south of the Ebro, 

 but in the north-west ranges up to the Pyrenees and just into France. 

 This is a small species, with hind feet measuring (including the claws) 

 115 to 125 mm., characteristic skull, the outer surfaces of the thighs bright 

 ochraceous, and the feet marked with white ; it has three sub-species. 



L. europceus does not occur in Sardinia, where is found L. mediter- 

 raneus of Wagner, a distinct small hare of dull coloration, with long ears, 

 and the hind feet (including the claws) measuring 95 to 108 mm. ; and it 

 is not indigenous either to Corsica or Sicily, its presence in both those 

 islands being due to introduction. Thus Polybius {History, § 12) stated 

 that in his time (r..c. 204) it was unknown in Corsica, and, as regards 

 Sicily, Julius Pollux {Onomasticon, v., § 12) quotes Aristotle as stating 

 (in a lost work) that the tyrant Anaxilas of Rhegium introduced hares 

 into that island, thus explaining their presence on the coinage of Sicily 

 and Rhegium (see Hill, Coins of Ancient Sicily, 1903, 47). The same 

 authority gives details of the introduction of hares in Karpathos, to the 

 detriment of the crops. L. europceus appears to be absent also from the 

 Parnassus mountains of Greece, whence Miller has recently described 

 L. parnassius, which resembles L. creticus, but is larger, has longer 

 ears, and distinct skull and teeth. The representatives in Crete and 



