WORM-WOOD HARE. 
2Y3 
part, coloured as the crown of the head ; posteriorly, asny white ; at the 
apex margined with black ; internally, nearly naked, excepting the pos- 
terior part, where they are grizzled with grayish black and white ; in the 
apical portion they are chiefly white. 
DIMENSIONS. 
Inches. Lines. 
Length from nose to root of tail. 
From heel to point of longest nail. 
Height of ears externally, - 
From ear to point of nose. 
Tail (vertebrae) about. 
To end of fur, - . . . 
12 0 
3 2 
2 8 
2 7 
1 1 
1 9 
HABITS. 
Mr. Townsend, who procured this species at Fort Walla-walla, re- 
marks, “ it is here abundant but very shy and retired, keeping constantly 
in the densest wormwood bushes, and leaping with singular speed from 
one to another when pursued. I have never seen it dart away and run 
to a great distance like other Hares. I found it very difficult to shoot this 
animal, for the reasons stated. I had been residing at Fort Walla-walla 
for two weeks, and had procured only two, when at the suggestion of Mr. 
Pambrun, I collected a party of a dozen Indians armed with bows and ar- 
rows, and sallied forth. We hunted through the wormwood within about 
a mile of the Fort, and in a few hours returned bringing eleven Hares. 
The keen eyes of the Indians discovered the little creatures squatting 
under the bushes, where to a white man they would have been totally in- 
visible. This Hare, when wounded and taken, screams lilre our common 
species. 
GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 
“ This small Hare,” we are informed by Mr. Townsend, “ inhabits the 
wormwood plains near the banks of the streams in the neighbourhood of 
Fort Walla-walla. I cannot define its range with any degree of cer- 
tainty, but I have every reason to believe that it is very contracted, never 
having met with it many miles from this locality.” 
