532 THE QUADRUPEDS OF ARIZONA. 
the flora over large tracts, where grasses and succulent 
herbs are mostly wanting. Its flesh is said to derive a 
bitter taste from this sort of food; though I have eaten — 
these hares from various regions without noticing any 
difference in their quality. At Fort Whipple, the species 
is very common the year round, and almost every sort 
of locality is frequented by them, though they chiefly 
affect grassy meadows and open glades, interspersed with 
copses, or clumps of oak trees, or patches of briery un- 
dergrowth. The gulches or “washes” as they are called, 
leading out of mountain ravines, and thickly set with 
grease-wood (Obione canescens), are favorite resorts. 
They feed much upon this plant; and by their incessant 
coursings through patches of it, they wear little intersect- 
ing avenues, along which they ramble at their leisure. 
When feeding at their ease, and unsuspicious of danger, 
they move with a sort of lazy abandon, performing a suc- 
cession of careless leaps; now nibbling the shrubs over- 
head, now the grass at their feet. They are not at all 
gregarious, though peculiar attractions may bring many 
together in the same spot. They do not burrow, but 
construct a “form”. in which they squat. I do not think 
these are permanent; but rather that they are extem- 
porized, as wanted, in some convenient bush ; though the 
case may be different during the season of reproduction. 
It has been stated by some authors, that only two or three 
are produced at a birth, which I know to be at least not 
always the case, having found as many as six embryos in 
the multipartite womb of a pregnant female. In the lat- 
e of Fort Whipple the young are brought forth in 
Although so timid, like all hares, is species will ad- 
mit of a very close approach when it fancies itself hidden 
