238 EVOLUTION IN NATURE ANH UNDER DOMESTICATION. 



European cotton-tail with a similar American species, animals 

 of a black colour, or giants, or rabbits with extremely long ears, 

 should have resulted, is not so very out of the common, if we 

 see how yellow and chocolate and silver rats, and waltzers orig- 

 inate from a cross between two or threee sub-species of Mus 

 rattus. 



As to the cross between tame rabbits and the European hare, 

 we know that Belgian and French rabbit- fanciers are convinced 

 that the cross is possible and that it has been made in both 

 countries. There are tame rabbits which very closely resemble 

 hares, and which certainly look as if they had descended from 

 some hare ancestor. We have tried the cross but failed, the 

 difficulty lying, we think, in the fact that a male hare will 

 not easily breed in an enclosure, being too nervous. 



In France it was told us, that a male hare in an enclosure will 

 mate with female rabbits, provided the hare is given a dark 

 house in which to hide, and the person who introduces the rab- 

 bit hides himseli. We feel certain, that it is only a matter of 

 technique to produce these hybrids. 



The wild rabbit, such as it exists in a state of nature, is in no 

 way a desirable domestic animal. It is next to impossible to 

 tame one, and we do not know of a single instance of their breed- 

 ing in hutches For this reason it seems probable, that only 

 after some cross, the animals have become sufficiently variabl e 

 to admit of domestication The tameness of animals is certainly 

 not a matter of domestication. We mean, that no long series of 

 generations in captivity will make any wild animal more trac- 

 table, if it was pure to start with. Rats of the species Mus con- 

 color, and Sumatran field-rats are just as wild and untractable 

 after several generations of captivity as the wild-caught ani- 

 mals. But in the house-rat group, where we have crossed several 

 species, we have by a sort of unconscious selection of those ani- 

 mals which would breed in comparatively small cages, obtained 

 a strain of animals which will breed quite readily in captivity 

 and which can easily be made tame We doubt very much 

 whether any wild animal would make a satisfactory domestic 



