THE BABBIT. 45 



rank as species, did they not invariably display a tendency to re- 

 cede to the ancestral short brown fur and upright ears of the wild 

 Eabbit. 



This animal lives, as we all know, in burrows, and is mostly of 

 a social nature, a considerable number of burrows being gathered 

 together and known by the name of a Warren. Whenever the 

 Eabbits find an undisturbed spot, which combines the advantages 

 of a sandy situation with the vicinity of food, they establish them- 

 selves forthwith, and sink their multitudinous tunnels into the 

 ground. The favorite locality for the Eabbit is a loose, sandy, or 

 gravelly goil, covered with patches of furze bushes ; for the soil 

 is easily excavated, and is very dry, and the young shoots of the 

 furze yield a food equally grateful and nutritious. Moreover, the 

 tangled roots of the furze afford an excellent protection to the 

 burrows, and the overhanging branches, with their prickly ver- 

 dure, serve admirabFy to shelter the entrances. 



When once they have established themselves, the Eabbits in- 

 crease with almost incredible rapidity, nearly rivaling the rats 

 and mice in fecundity, and converting the land into a very honey- 

 comb of burrows. Indeed, were not the flesh of the Eabbit mar- 

 ketable, and its fur .valuable — were not the stoat, the weasel, the 

 hawk, and other furred and feathered depredators extremely fond 

 of young Eabbits, the animals would spread so fast as to become 

 a positive nuisance. In some places they have increased to such 

 an extent, that the safety of buildings has been greatly endanger- 

 ed by the deep and ramifying tunnels which they have sunk be- 

 side the foundations ; and I know of a case where they have mul- 

 tiplied so inordinately, that the proprietor of the ground, albeit a 

 most stanch conservator of animal life, has been obliged in self- 

 defense to have them exterminated. 



It is not a very easy matter to drive the creatures from any 

 place of which they have Already taken possession, and even after 

 employing all the paraphernalia of ferrets, nets, and guns, two or 

 three isolated individuals are apt to escape, and if they should 

 chance to be of opposite sexes, the Eabbit host is marvelously 

 soon reproduced. The creature becomes a parent at a very early 

 age, and by the time that a Eabbit is a year old it may have at- 

 tained the dignity of a grandparent. 



As is the case with most animals, the Eabbit seeks a quiet and 

 retired spot for her littlb nursery. She does not produce her 

 young in any of the burrows to which the general Eabbit colony 



