inside the next brier-patch, counting the digs of 

 his clumsy pursuer. 



I suppose that this "blind alley " kind of road 

 is due to the fact that the rabbits have no regu- 

 lar homes. They make a nest for the young; 

 but they never have dens, like minks and coons. 

 In New England they often live in holes and 

 among the crannies of the stone walls ; and there, 

 as far as I have seen, they rarely or never make 

 roads. Farther south, where the winters are 

 less severe, they dig no holes, for they prefer an 

 open, even an exposed, bed to any sort of shelter. 



Shelters are dangerous. Bunny cannot back 

 into a burrow and bare his teeth to his enemy ; 

 he is not a fighter. He can run, and he knows 

 it ; legs are his salvation, and he must have room 

 to limber them. If he has to fight, then give 

 him the open, not a hole ; for it is to be a kanga- 

 roo kicking match, and a large ring is needed. 

 He had as well surrender himself at once as to 

 run into a hole that has only one opening. 



During the cold, snowy weather the rabbits 



usually leave the bare fields for the woods, 



though the older and wiser ones more frequently 



suffer the storms than risk the greater danger 



[214] 



