204 The Hunting Field With Horse and Hound 



rabbit comes into the world naked and blind, a provision of 

 nature that best adapts each to the different conditions under 

 which it is born. If the rabbit could see at birth, it would 

 wander from home before it was able to protect itself by flight 

 from its hosts of enemies. The hare, on the contrary, being 

 born in the open would alike fall an easy prey to its enemies 

 if it made a move in their presence. They breed two or three 

 times a year between April and August, and produce from 

 two to four "larvet" at a time. They feed at evening and in 

 the early morning, wliile during the day they lie flattened out 

 in their "seal" or "form" in the open field, rather than in a 

 hedgerow or brush-heap, where without a burrow they would 

 easily be tracked and overtaken by foxes, weasels, skunks, etc., 

 who seek their prey in hidden and secluded spots. Like the 

 tliieves that they are, foxes and the like have no taste for 

 exposing themselves by travelling through open fields. Experi- 

 ence therefore has taught the hare that his safety lies in sleep- 

 ing for the day in the open fields where his body is most 

 exposed. A wise provision of nature, however, comes to his 

 rescue, by giving him a reddish brown coat that seems to 

 blend so well with every colour of the field as to nearly defy 

 detection even when one's eyes are resting upon him. "Find 

 your hare before you catch him" has a far wider meaning than 

 one might suppose. 



The ability of some persons to locate a hare is either a 

 gift or the cultivation of sight, or possibly the development 

 of the real hunting instinct such as our forefathers possessed, 

 and which we still find so highly developed in our native 

 trappers and in Indians who are born to and live by the chase. 



Anyone, therefore, who is good at finding hares is a most 

 welcome attache to any hare hunting organisation. Such a 

 one is scarce, even in England, where hunting the hare is in 

 general practice, and he is in great demand. Frightening up 

 a hare by walking upon her is not finding her. 



