2(2 HUNTING THE HARE 



pose itu' line suc(\'ssfiill)- liii off and the run pro- 

 ceeding. 



Further checks will doubtless take place, and will 

 test the capacity of hounds and huntsman a good 

 deal more than the first. As the hare finds herself 

 more pressed she will try shifts and dodges which 

 show an extraordinary amount of natural instinct in 

 evading pursuit ; though if we consider for a moment 

 what the life of a hare is, it is not so wonderful after 

 all, for a hare, when we come to think of it, spends 

 her life in being hunted. Stoat, weasel, fox, or dog, 

 one or the other, is constantly after her, and the 

 hereditary instinct she possesses of evading all these 

 from her earliest youth teaches her, when pursued by 

 a pack of hounds, to try the same expedients which 

 have been successful in baffling her various pursuers 

 many times before. 



It is a good education in studying the wiles of a 

 hunted hare to walk after one for a couple of hours 

 or more in freshly fallen snow. The distance she 

 will come back on her own track, the extraordinary 

 leaps she will mal^e at right angles to it before 

 starting afresh in another direction, the circles and 

 windings she will describe, will be astonishing to 

 anyone who has never tried this method of investi- 

 gating the dodges of a hunted hare. After she has 



