TJie Hare. 



91 



THE HAKE. (Lepus timidus.) 



THIS small quadruped is well known at our tables as 

 affording a favourite food, notwithstanding the dark 

 colour of its flesh. Its swiftness cannot save it from the 

 search of its enemies, among whom man is the most in- 

 veterate. Unarmed and fearful, the Hare appears almost 

 to sleep with open eyes, so easily is it alarmed. Its hind 

 legs are longer than its fore ones, to enable it to run up 

 hills ; its eyes are so prominently placed, that they can 

 encompass at once the whole horizon of the plain where 

 it has chosen its form, for so its seat or bed is called ; 

 and its ears so long, that the least noise cannot escape it. 

 It seldom outlives its seventh year, and breeds plen- 

 tifully. Naturally wild and timorous, the Hare may, 

 however, be occasionally tamed. The following is from 

 the entertaining account given by Cowper, of three 

 Hares that he brought up tame in his house ; the names 

 he gave them were Puss, Tiney, and Bess. Tiney was a 

 reserved and surly Hare; Bess, who was a Hare of 

 great humour and drollery, died young. " Puss grew 

 presently familiar, would leap into my lap, raise him- 

 self upon his hinder feet, and bite the hair from my 

 temples. He would suffer me to take him up and carry 

 him about in my arms, and has more than once fallen 

 fast asleep upon my knee. He was ill three days, 



