EAEHIT3.] 



SHOOTING, 



[babbits. 



CHAPTER XVI. 



BABBITS. 



Theee are four kinds of rabbits known among 

 dealers and fanciers. They are called loar- 

 ■reners, parkers, hedfjeliogs, an d sioeethearts. The 

 warreners are widely distributed, and are to be 

 found in almost every section of the British 

 coast, where there are sand-banks, or mounds 

 of any kind. Though all of one species, they 

 vary considerably in size ; those in the English 

 warrens being greatly superior to those found 

 in Scotland, both in bulk and flavour. The 

 warren rabbits of the Irish coast are very much 

 like those of Scotland ; though, on the whole, 

 a shade larger in bulk. The richest and finest 

 are located in the warrens along the eastern 

 coast of England, extending from Lincolnshire 

 to Berwick-upon-Tweed. It is a curious fact, 

 but, nevertheless, one well ascertained, that all 

 the rabbits on the warrens in the west side of 

 the island, are of a comparatively diminutive 

 size, and, in many places, have a strong fishy 

 taste. 



Those who rent warrens with a view to com- 

 mercial objects, seldom or ever allow shooting 

 upon them. The reason is, that when a rabbit 

 is wounded it will make for some hole or bur- 

 row ; and it is known to regular shooters of 

 them in such places, that so strong and power- 

 ful is this desire to get back to their holes, 

 that, in the very struggles of death, rabbits will 

 often succeed in getting into a sand-burrow. 

 l^ow, we are informed by warreners, that if a 

 wounded or dying rabbit get into a burrow, 

 none of the living ones will ever pass it. They 

 will die in their holes first ; so that a single 

 wounded or dead animal will cause the death 

 of perhaps a score of its own kind in tlie 

 same locality. This, as a matter of course, 

 becomes a serious loss to the proprietor of a 

 warren. As much as a couple of guineas have 

 been offered for two or three shots in a warren, 

 and refused, solely upon this ground. 



The obstinacy of the rabbit is curious ; and 



it is equally, if not more singular, in reference 



to the ferret. This little animal is often used 



by sportsmen to make the rabbits spring out 



606 



of their holes ; they are also very extensively 

 used by warreners to make them spring, and 

 fall into small poke-nets, as they are called, 

 placed at the mouths of the holes. These fer- 

 rets are sometimes long in coming forth from 

 the warren-holes ; when the warreners have to 

 dig for them, and will perhaps find them lying, 

 though muzzled, beside a dead rabbit, whose 

 very brains have been scratched out, or its 

 back-bone laid bare, rather than budge an inch 

 for the ferret. This is a circumstance of daily 

 occurrence in all the great rabbit warrens that 

 lie on the eastern side of the island in the north 

 of England. Nothing injures the productive 

 remuneration of a regular warren so much as 

 shooting over it, even though it be but for a 

 week or two in a season. 



The parJcer and the fieigeliog rabbits are 

 very much alike. They both frequent planta- 

 tions, and high inland rocky ground, and are 

 nearly of the same length and weight as the 

 general run of Scotch and Irish rabbits. In 

 many parts of England, and even in Scotland, 

 it has, of late years, been a custom among gen- 

 tlemen of landed estates, who are much at- 

 tached to fox-hunting, to introduce these 

 parker and hedgehog rabbits into certain 

 localities of their grounds, with a view of sup- 

 porting the foxes. But we believe that, in 

 numerous cases, the rabbits are found to 

 breed in such prodigious numbers, that they 

 become a regular nuisance, and very difficult 

 indeed to root out again. Besides, the practice 

 has given rise to serious disputes and bick- 

 erings among farmers and their landlords, 

 about the destruction of the crops of grain by 

 the rabbits in such places. A person of con- 

 siderable experience, writing on the wild 

 rabbit, says — " It would be no easy matter to 

 say what weight a wild rabbit would attain if 

 taken and fed like any of those prize animals, 

 such as sheep, cattle, &c. ; for in the case of 

 sheep, the difference of feeding, against the 

 natural food which the animal seeks for itself, 

 is almost incredible, at least to tliose who have 



