CH. VII, MOUNTAIN HARE. Ill 



authenticated instances of this fear being entirely 

 put aside ; indeed it could scarcely be otherwise 

 with so powerful and fierce a, bird as an eagle, when 

 so weak and timid a bird as a partridge has been 

 known to fly at and strike a man's legs like a game- 

 cock on her young ones being too nearly approached. 

 This I have seen happen, and therefore I can easily 

 believe that an eagle may do the same in defence of 

 her young. 



The actual damage done to game by eagles is, in 

 my opinion, comparatively small, the favourite food 

 of these birds being the mountain hare, and every 

 sportsman knows that the fewer of these animals he 

 has on his ground the better : where they increase 

 too rapidly (and no animal does increase more 

 quickly) they become a perfect plague to grouse 

 dogs, for however well broken your setters and 

 pohiters may be, the manner in which mountain hares 

 run cannot fail to make the dogs fidgety and 

 anxious, besides tainting the ground. Instead of 

 running clear away when started, like the common 

 lowland hare, this animal {Lepus albus) hops quietly 

 from before the dog's nose, and stops to sit erect on 

 the very first hillock she meets with within a hun- 

 dred yards of the dogs. When again approached 

 she repeats the same trick, and frequently remains 

 for a quarter of an hour going slowly in front of the 



