222 THE RABBIT. 



the leap, and succeed, browsing on the other side ; 

 ere a week is up they are nibbling the grass 

 nearly a mile away keeping a weather-eye open 

 for Long-Legs, who is apt to pounce furiously 

 upon them at any time. 



All along nature's weeding-out process, designed 

 to keep their numbers in check, is going on. 

 There comes a rainy spell, during which several 

 of the young rabbits contract liver complaints 

 through eating too much wet grass, and die. In 

 the wood near there lives a wild-cat of the tame 

 variety. She actually shares a room under a rock 

 with several adult rabbits, and each night she 

 steals forth along a rabbit-runway, as though 

 she were one of the colony; yet ten minutes 

 later she is crouching behind a wall, a sinister 

 vision of bristling fur and gleaming eyes, wait- 

 ing for the first unwary youngster that comes 

 her way ! 



Then one night a whole battalion that set off 

 northwards fails to return ; and at dawn, before 

 the respectable world is astir, a ramshackle motor- 

 car takes a sackload of netted rabbits to a neigh- 

 bouring station. 



In spite of these drainages, however, the home- 

 warren becomes more and more thickly stocked, 

 every mother taking her young there as soon 

 as they are old enough. And now we see the 

 value of old Long-Legs, who in the past has been 

 a bully and a tyrant, apparently neither useful 

 nor ornamental. The family whose career we have 

 so far followed are now strong and independent ; 

 but Long-Legs is still the terror of their lives, 

 driving them out whenever he sees them, as if 

 intent on inflicting some bodily injury. Glad to 

 be rid of him, they turn at length to the great 



