HARES AND RABBITS. 23t 



they rapidly increase in spite of natural enemies." The passing 

 of the Ground-Game Act has, of course, permitted the tenant- 

 farmer to reduce the number of Rabbits on his land to such 

 limits as he may think fit ; and, in spite of their rapidity of 

 increase, we are never likely in this country to have swarms of 

 Rabbits like those which have devastated some portions of 

 Australia. 



Favourable seasons have something to do with abnormal 

 increase, and Mr. Trevor-Battye observes : — " Last season 

 (1893), owing to the extraordinary weather, was remaikable as 

 a Rabbit-year. These animals almost amounted to a ' plague ' in 

 some parts of England. Never can I remember in the palmiest 

 days, before the Ground-Game Act, more Rabbits in districts 

 with which I am familiar.'' 



The remarkable paralysis, and loss of all kind of bodily and 

 mental power, which seizes a Rabbit or Hare when hunted by 

 a Stoat or Weasel, has been already alluded to when treating of 

 those Carnivores, and is one of the most curious physiological 

 peculiarities of the members of the group under consideration. 

 Although, when suddenly frightened, a Rabbit will plunge with- 

 out hesitation into any water which may happen to be near, in 

 which it will swim strongly and boldly, it appears that these 

 animals take naturally to the water even less readily than the 

 Hare. 



At the age of about six or eight months the doe Rabbit com- 

 mences to breed; and as it produces several litters in a year, each 

 of which comprises from five to eight young ones, the rate of its 

 increase is very rapid. Although living in large colonies. 

 Rabbits are not polygamous animals, but associate in pairs, and 

 apparently remain thus attached for life. Before giving birth 

 to her offspring, the female forms a separate burrow for their 

 reception, at the termination of which is a soft nest lined with 

 fur plucked from her own body. Blind and naked as they are 



