FERRETS AND RABBITS AGAIN 409 



and set every run that crosses the furrow, 

 whether they be good or bad. You will 

 find that you catch as many rabbits in 

 the bad runs as in the good ones, for in 

 good bright runs the hares often knock down 

 the snares. Hares leave the cover before the 

 rabbits, and, as they are first down the runs, 

 they knock over the snares. 



If you find a snare knocked down in what is 

 plainly a rabbit run you . may know that it is 

 not the work of a hare, but of a cunning old 

 buck, who jumps over the snare and knocks 

 it over with his hind legs. In this case set 

 two snares, three or four feet apart, in the 

 same run ; the old buck, thinking he has done 

 you, sails gaily down the run, and jumps over 

 the first snare right into the second one, and 

 so gets caught. 



It is quite wonderful the cunning with which 

 rabbits baffle the snarer. I once set snares 

 in a stubble field, by a foot path, but used to 

 lose two or three rabbits out of the snares, 

 every night. I watched them but no one 

 came, and yet the rabbits got away all the 



