THE LIFE OF MAMMALS 
hare of northeastern India, which has small eyes, bristly short 
ears, short hind legs, and much the manner of a rabbit. 
The term ‘rabbit’ has wholly replaced “hare” in America, 
because the common small hare of the eastern United States, 
quickly seen by the first English settlers, looked 
to them more like the rabbit they had known at 
home than like their bigger hare; and they ignored the differ- 
ence in habits as they did so many other facts in their careless 
naming of the ani- 
mals of the New 
World after those 
of Europe. It must 
always be remem- 
bered that the first 
Pilgrims, Puritans, 
and southern “ad- 
venturers’? were 
mainly from cities, 
and knew little of 
rural things, to 
whichignorance, by 
the way, they owed most of their early misfortunes in the colonies. 
The true rabbit or ‘“‘cony”’ differs from its relatives by its 
small size (average weight two and a half to three pounds), 
short ears and hind legs; but more in its habits, for its young 
are born naked, blind, and helpless, and it is comparatively 
slow-footed. Hence it has been compelled to become a bur- 
rower for the safety of both itself and its babies, and, as is 
usual with animals become burrowers, has acquired the habit 
of gathering in communities, whose crowded diggings or “war- 
rens” are labyrinths of subterranean runways. Even this, 
however, would hardly suffice to preserve this timid and nearly 
defenseless race were not several litters of five to eight young 
(leverets) produced by each pair annually to make good the 
408 
Rabbits. 
Brownell, Phot. 
AMERICAN COTTONTAIL RABBIT. 
