THE FERRET. 135 



or make the least noise. In Essex, rabbits bolt well 

 only during the months of October, November, arid 

 December." 



The routine of ferret economy, here laid down, 

 savours very strongly of the experience of one who 

 used the net rather than the gun as his engine of 

 destruction against the coney. Shooting, in places 

 where rabbits live, for the most part, under ground, 

 is the slowest of slow sport: ferreting to nets is 

 butchery, as relates to the smaller animals. To put 

 the hand into a contrivance such as they boil cab- 

 bages in, and squeeze to death a soft, inoffensive 

 little animal, such as one might imagine a kitten in 

 paradise to be, is certainly not a recreation worthy a 

 true knight. Rabbit shooting, where it may be had as 

 a wild sport, even if unaccompanied with the quick dash 

 and excitement, for which it is distinguished under its 

 most favourable aspect, is at all events divested of the 

 fire -side flavour of grimalkinism : is very neat practice 

 for the young shooter, and certainly not beneath the 

 dignity of his ambition. But if got up in a warren 

 for sixpence a blaze, offal in, with a kill (the warrener 

 always stipulates for the skin), there is something in 

 it singularly infra dig. A gun is neither a conve- 

 nient nor a fitting agent in a warren, nor rabbit 

 shooting the sport of a gentleman anywhere, save in 

 wild woodlands, or such rural districts as disencumber 

 it of all apropos of onion sauce. 



