426 SPORTING ADVENTURES IN THE FAR WEST. 



CHAPTER XVI. 



HARES. 



Hares.— Their Abundance.— The "Jack Rabbit."— Mark Twain's Opin- 

 ion of its Speed.— Marvellous Tales of Pioneers.— What constitutes an 

 Oregon Mule.— Coursing - clubs.— California Greyhounds.— Character- 

 istics of the Water-hare.— Swims like a Retriever.— How it escapes its 

 Pursuers. —The Swamp -hare. —Its Peculiar Appearance. —Measure- 

 ments.— The Washington, Prairie, California, Wood, and Sage Hares, 

 and the Smaller Varieties.— Peculiar Character of Baird's Rabbit.— The 

 Males suckle the Young.— Dissection by a Surgeon.— How Indians and 

 Whites capture Hares. 



Hares are so abundant in the Far West and South-west 

 that they are considered nuisances in many sections of the 

 country. Their numbers are actually incalculable in sev- 

 eral places, and any ordinary shot can easily kill from 

 twenty to fifty in a day without much trouble, and in many 

 cases he may bag one hundred without travelling more 

 than two or three miles. No person who has not been in 

 the country can possibly comprehend how profuse they 

 are, or how little fear they have of man. I have hunted 

 them with a shot-gun; but I found that after awhile to be 

 mere butchery, and was compelled, for the sake of sport, 

 to use a rifle, and to try and shoot every one in the head, 

 or not consider it a fair kill. When the creatures stand 

 within twenty feet or less of you, and look at you as 

 though you were no more dangerous than a shrub, it is 

 proof positive that man is a stranger to them ; yet this I 

 have seen frequently. 



The great hare, and the species most characteristic of 

 the Far West, is the Lepus callotis, known as the mule 

 and the jackass rabbit; yet it is no more a rabbit than 

 any of the European hares, for it does not burrow as the 

 L. cuniculus of Europe does, nor is it so prolific, neither 



