i82 ROYAL ROCK BEAGLE HUNT. 



inconsistent with tlie statement of authorities, that leverets begin to breed at 

 about a year old. 



Mankind is a terrible destroyer of hares, shooting-men, coursingmen, 

 and hunting-men account for a great many ; poachers are credited with 

 killing great numbers, and in places where hares are scarce it is quite 

 customary to lay the blame on them. Besides all these, birds and beasts of 

 prey are always on the look-out for them. Stoats, in packs, hunt them at 

 night by scent, and in full cry like hounds, sticking to them till they are run 

 down exhausted. Weasels, ferrets, polecats, and hedgehogs kill them and 

 their leverets, when they can. Hawks, owls, and ravens pounce on young 

 leverets at every opportunity. It is really wonderful that any manage to 

 escape these always present dangers. 



The hare lives a solitary life, the jack not bothering himself with any 

 care of the young ones, which remain with the doe for less than a month, 

 being soon able to take care of themselves. The doe keeps her leverets 

 usually in a hollow in the open ground, avoiding hedge-rows, where the stoat, 

 weasel, or hedgehog would be likely to find them. AVhen they are able to 

 leave the mother, each leveret makes its own form, about eighty yards apart ; 

 thus when we find a leveret, there is almost sure to be one or more others in 

 the same field, and it is advisable to take the hounds away from that spot at 

 once. 



It is very difficult for man, bird, or beast to spy a hare on her form. 

 She lies quite flat, her body hiding the hind legs, and her head on her fore 

 legs, presenting no contrast of colour to catch the eye, her fur being much of 

 the same tone as fallow land, old dry tufted grass, and other covers where 

 she loves to make her form. Hounds will often step over a hare on her 

 form without noticing her, and few beaglers can see them ten yards away, 

 even when pointed out to them. Indeed, it seems to be a special gift with 

 some men, and there can be no doubt that many a hare is missed in the 

 course of drawing, when passed quite close. How often it has happened to 

 all of us, in drawing a field, to be startled by a peculiar sort of " swirl " just 

 behind us, and looking round to see a hare scudding away, which must have 

 been just under our feet. 



Ah ! there she lies ; she trembles as she sits, 

 With horror seiz'd. The wither'd grass that clings 

 Around her head, of the same russet hue, 

 Almost deceiv'd my sight, had not her eyes, 

 With life full-beaming, her vain wiles betray'd. 



'Tis instinct that directs the jealous hare 

 To chuse her soft abode. With step revers'd 

 She forms the doubling maze ; then, ere the morn 

 Peeps thro' the clouds, leaps to her close recess. 



