THE ALPINE OR WHITE HARE. 115 



burrows are not easily discovered by an unaccustomed eye ; the 

 hare runs round the place several times, which completely 

 puzzles an observer, and then makes a bound over, without 

 leaving any footmark to detect her retreat. It is hollowed 

 out, like a mine, by the hare's scraping and breath, and the 

 herbage beneath nibbled bare. 



When deer-stalking in Glenartney in the autumn of 1850, 

 I was quite amazed at the multitudes of alpine hares. They 

 kept starting up on all sides, some as light-coloured as rabbits, 

 and others so dark as to resemble little moving pieces of 

 granite. I could only account for their numbers from the 

 abundance of fine green food and the absence of sheep, which 

 are as much avoided by hares as by deer, from their dirtying 

 the ground with their tarry x fleeces. 



An eyewitness, on whom I can depend, gave me a curious 

 account of the tactics of a hill-hare, which completely baffled 

 the tyrant of the. rocks. Puss, as is her wont when chased 

 by an eagle, sheltered herself under a stone. The eagle took 

 post at a little distance, and watched long, exactly like a cat 

 waiting for a mouse. Although her fierce foe was out of 

 sight, the hare seemed to have a mesmeric knowledge of his 

 vicinity, for she never would move so far from her hiding- 

 place as to be taken by surprise. Several times she came out 

 to feed, but the moment the eagle rose she was safe again. 

 At last her pursuer got tired and flew away. The white hare 

 has always a refuge of this kind where eagles haunt. 



The brown hare is not on good terms with his mountain 

 cousins. The latter have enormously increased, by the whole- 

 sale destruction of the larger vermin, such as eagles, wild-cats, 

 martens, &c. They have completely dispossessed the common 

 ones of those territories where they abound. Like the north- 

 ern hordes, I rather think they owe possession of the land as 



1 Should anybody be disposed to call in question the correctness of this word, I 

 beg to say my title to it is long use and wont : " Tarry woo' tarry woo' ! tarry 

 woo' is ill to spin.' 



