126 60 MM ON HA-RE. 
tain and measled hares.. The former are more 
swift, vigorous, and have the flesh better tasted ; 
the latter chiefly frequent the marshes, when hunt- 
ed keep among low grounds, And their flesh itf 
moist, white, and flabby. When the male and 
female keep one particular spot, they will not 
suffer any strange hare to make its form in the 
same quarter, so that it is usually said, that the 
more you hunt, the more hares you shall have ; for, 
having killed one hdre, others come and takepos- 
sessionof its form. Many of these animals are 
found to live in woods and thickets, but they are 
naturally fonder of the open country, and are- con- 
strained only by fear to take shelter in places that* 
afford them neither a warm sun, nor an agreeable 
pasture. They are, therefore, usually seen stealing 
out of the edges of the wood, to taste the grass, that 
grows shorter and sweeter in the open fields than 
under the shade of the trees ; however, they sel- 
dom miss of being pursued ; and every excursion 
is a new adventure. They are shot at by poachers ; 
traced by their footsteps in the snow ; caught in 
springes ; dogs, birds, and cats, are all combined 
against them ; ants, snakes, and adders, drive them 
from their forms, especially in summer ; even fleas, 
from which most other animals are free, persecute 
this poor creature ; and, so various are its enemies, 
that it is seldom permitted to reach even that short 
term to which it is limited by nature. 
We shall now relate two anecdotes of the hare in 
its domestic state. 
While Dr. Townson was at Gottingen, he had 
a young hare brought to him, which he took so 
much pains with as to render it more familiar than 
these animals commonly are. In the evenings it 
soon became so frolicsome, as to run and jump 
about his sofa and bed ; sometimes in its play it 
would leap upon him, and pat him with its fore 
