372 THE COMMON HARE. 



and exercise to those who prefer such manly and innocent 

 sports to all others. 



" These heroes bold in leather breeches, 

 Do leap o'er five-barr'd gates and ditches, 

 The perils of the field to dare 

 To hunt that furious beast the hare. 

 Oh ! courage rare." 



To see a number of mounted huntsmen recklessly scampering 

 over the country with a pack of harriers, and then to reflect that 

 the object of all their galloping, leaping, hallooing, and barking, 

 is to chase and destroy, not a large and ferocious animal, but 

 a small timid hare, would be deemed in the highest degree cruel 

 and ridiculous, were the spectacle not so frequent. The chase 

 of so small an animal by so formidable a host, reminds one of 

 the favourite sport of Christiana, Queen of Sweden, who used 

 to shoot fleas with a piece of artillery, still exhibited at the 

 royal arsenal at Stockholm. The poet Thomson may well 

 indeed exclaim, 



" Poor is the triumph o'er the timid hare !" 



The stratagems used by the hare to evade its pursuers are too 

 curious to be omitted here j and as I at all times prefer 

 Shakespeare's poetry to any man's prose, his excellent account 

 of her proceedings is introduced : 



" And when thou hast on foot the purblind hare, 

 Mark the poor wretch ; to overshoot his troubles, 

 How he out-runs the wind, and with what care 

 He cranks* and crosses with a thousand doubles. 



The many musitsf thro' the which he goes, 



Are like a labyrinth t' amaze his foes. 



Sometime he runs among a flock of sheep, 

 To make the cunning hounds mistake their smell; 

 And sometime where earthdelving conies keep, 

 To stop the loud pursuers in their yell ; 



And sometime sorteth^. with a herd of deer : 



Danger diviseth shifts, wit waits on fear. 



* To crank is to wind about, to meander. f Musits are gaps in a hedge. 



J Sorteth here means, associateth, consorteth. 



