THE MOUNTAIN HARE 
LEPUS VARIABILIS 
T he Scottish, blue, white, and mountain hare are all names for 
the same animal, which is not confined to the British Islands. 
Various specific names have been proposed for it in Europe, such 
as alpinust borealis, and variabilis. The last-named was bestowed 
by Pallas in 1778, and has ever since been generally adopted. 
It is appropriate enough, having reference to the seasonal 
change of colour which in this animal is conspicuous. 
It has of late been suggested that Linnaeus described this species under 
the name Lepus timidus, but for the reasons stated in the foregoing article, 
I am unable to share that opinion. Moreover, the confusion which would 
arise in the literature of zoology by transferring the name timidus to the 
variable hare is too serious to be contemplated, and it seems wiser to fol- 
low the example of the majority of authors — auctorum plurimorum — ^who 
have employed the names here adopted {timidus and variabilis) for the 
last 140 years. It is unnecessary in a work like the present to discuss 
the various “sub-species ” which have been proposed for both the common 
brown hare and the mountain hare, based either upon individual varia- 
tion or geographical distribution. Some idea may be formed of the lengths 
to which modern systematists now go in changing names and creating 
“ sub-species ” when we find it seriously proposed to distinguish the 
common brown hare of England from the continental form by calling it 
Lepus europceus occidentalis, the description being taken from a specimen 
killed in Herefordshire. 
We are told that the “ British form ” is, on the average, not so heavy 
as its continental representative; but I have never seen any hares in France, 
Holland, Belgium, Italy or Greece that at all approached in size and 
weight the fine big hares that we get in our own eastern counties. Again, we 
are told that the “ British form ” is of a richer and darker colour, but I 
have met with too many individual variations of colour even within the 
limits of a single English county to attach any importance to what may be 
called such “hair-splitting ” views. I remember on one occasion, after a 
day’s shooting in Norfolk, when 153 hares were laid out, seeing a number 
of them weighed. The difference in size, shape, colour and weight was so 
marked that a specialist in “hair splitting,” if so disposed, might easily 
186 
