76 
RABBITS. 
RABBITS. 
Rabbits have long been favorite pets with boys, and they deserve to 
be so, for they are brisk, merry, bright-eyed little creatures; and being, 
moreover, easy to rear, will richly repay the care and attention lavished 
upon them. The color of the wild rabbit is a brownish gray; the tail black 
above and white beneath. In its domestic state it is of various colors— 
white, black, and piebald. Over all the temperate and warm parts of 
America the rabbit is diffused; and in its wild state it thrives admirably in 
the United States. 
The extraordinary prolific nature of the rabbit has often been remarked 
upon, and it has been calculated that a single pair, whose progeny w r ere left 
undisturbed and unmolested by the many enemies that prey upon poor 
bunny, would, in four years, produce the amazing number of 1,274,840 
descendants. They attain an age of eight or nine years, under favorable 
circumstances. A geutleman who devoted a good deal of time to rearing 
rabbits, and observing their manners and customs, noticed that the off¬ 
spring paid great deference to their first father. Upon a call which they 
w'ero accustomed to obey, he always puts himself at their head, marching 
first, and stationing himself at the entrance of their burrow, where he re¬ 
mained until they had all passed in before him. The males are, however, 
frequently cruel to their young, whom they sometimes kill and devour. It 
is a pretty sight, in a rabbit warren, to see them coming out of an evening 
