26 LEPORID.E. 



sjion to swimming than to leaping, as, by his disinclination to the latter exertion, 

 by far the greater portion killed in the higher grounds of Ireland fall victims. 

 When a few stones are removed from the base of the loose mountain-walls, 

 though their entire height be very inconsiderable, the hare will take advantage 

 of the opening, rather than leap the wall ; a habit so universally known, that 

 by snares placed in these apertures they are easily secured, and chiefly when 

 going to, or returning from, their feeding ground. On this habit a difference 

 was observed by a person employed as gamekeeper in the neighbourhood of 

 Belfast, and who had previously served in the same capacity in Scotland. This 

 man remarked, with some surprise, that in a field where hares were generally 

 numerous, and which was separated from a plantation where they were pre- 

 served by a mill-race, over wliich was a wooden pipe, that they invariably, 

 when disturbed, ran for and crossed over it, rather than leap the race, which 

 the Scotch hare would have done. Although it has been thought proper to men- 

 tion such trivial facts, yet no stress is laid upon them, as we tind many animals 

 very much influenced by immediate circumstances. 



" In the descriptions of the Lepus tlmidus I have read, there is not any notice 

 of their herding together, when numerous ; but the intelligent gamekeeper be- 

 fore alluded to states, that in Northamptonshire he has frequently seen them, 

 when driven out of a plantation, congregate together, to the number of about 

 thirty, in the open ground. Where the Irish hares abound, their gregarious pro- 

 pensity is a marked character. In several demesnes in the North of Ireland, 

 when they were carefully preserved, they, on becoming plentiful, herded to- 

 gether like deer, and thus have I repeatedly seen from one to three hundred 

 moving together in one body like these animals. In all these demesnes they 

 eventually increased to such an extent as to prove most destructive to the plant- 

 ations, &c., and were consequently destroyed in great numbers; from a demesne 

 in the County of Down they, on several occasions, have been sent into Belfast 

 by the cart-load. This herding together is not the result of what might be per- 

 liaps considered semi-domestication in the demesne or park ; as, in a perfectly free 

 and wild state, when permitted to increase, they exliibit the same social and 

 gregarious habit." * 



After the preceding paper was written, I had opportunities — in the 

 month of September, 1842, spent in shooting-quarters, at Aberarder, in 

 Inverness-shire — of occasionally meeting with the Alpine hare on the 

 mountains, and of examining several individuals which wei'e shot ; and I 

 subsequently saw numbers of them in Aberdeen and Edinburgh. 



In these specimens I could not perceive any material difference in form 

 from that of the Irish hare ; and the dissimilarity in colour consisted only 

 in a different shade of grey. This I did not consider of any value as a 

 specific character, having observed that the general hue of the Alpine 

 hares varied in Scottish localities at the same season, and that the bluish- 

 grey tint was sometimes assumed by the Irish hare. In the succeeding 

 winter I examined, osteologically, specimens from Scotland and L'eland, 

 and found no greater differences than I had seen existing between Irish 



* " A sporting gentleman of my acquaintance for seven or eight years kept a 

 number of native hares in a large yard in the town of Belfast, chiefly for the 

 purpose of keeping up a sufficient supply for his InnUing-ground, and in this he 

 was, from the first, successful, as the females produced three times in the year. 

 The males, perhaps from an undue proportion relatively to the females, fought 

 so violently, that, for the sake of peace, a few of them were emasculated, and, in 

 consequence, grew to an amazing size. The same gentleman kept one of these 

 hares for several years, fastened, like a dog, by a chain and collar. Those which 

 had their liberty in the yard (which was extensive) never became tame; but 

 when taken young, and pains are bestowed upon them, they exhibit considerable 

 docility, and have been taught to play tricks, such as to beat a drum, &c." 



