BLOODHOUNDS OF THE HEDGEROW. 119 



snake ; for his body and neck are long and slender and 

 his legs short. Apparently he is not in haste, but rather 

 lingers over the scent. This is repeated five or six times, 

 till the whole length of the hedgerow has been traversed 

 sometimes up and down again. The chase may be easily 

 observed by any one who will keep a little in the back- 

 ground. Although the bank be tenanted by fifty other 

 rabbits, past whose hiding-place the weasel must go, yet 

 they scarcely take any notice. One or two whom he has 

 approached too closely bolt out and in again ; but as a 

 mass the furry population remain quiet, as if perfectly 

 aware that they are not yet marked out for slaughter. 



At last, having exhausted the resources of the bank, 

 the rabbit rushes across the field to a hedgerow, perhaps a 

 hundred yards away. Here the wretched creature seems 

 to find a difficulty in obtaining admittance. Hardly has 

 he disappeared in a hole before he comes out again, as if 

 the inhabitants of the place refused to give him shelter. 

 For many animals have a strong tribal feeling, and their 

 sympathy, like that of man in a savage state, is confined 

 within their special settlement. 



With birds it is the same : rooks, for instance, will not 

 allow a strange pair to build in their trees, but drive them 

 off with relentless beak, tearing down the half-formed nest, 

 and taking the materials to their own use. The sentiment, 

 ' If Jacob take a wife of the daughters of Heth, what good 

 shall my life do me ?' appears to animate the breasts of 



