The Melancholy Hare. 
159 
was in this shire an hare-park nigh Newmarket, preserved for the 
king’s game, let them here be particularly mentioned. Some prefer 
their sport in hunting before their flesh for eating, as accounting it 
melancholicke meat, and hard to be disgested; though others think all 
the hardness is now to come by it.” ( Worthies of England , vol. i. 
p. 153.) 
Burton attributes melancholy in many cases to diet, and 
includes this animal among the articles of food that pro¬ 
duce it. “ Hare, a black meat, melancholy, and hard of 
digestion; it breeds incubus, often eaten, and causeth fear¬ 
ful dreams; so doth all venison, and is condemned by a 
jury of phisicians ” (. Anatomy of Melancholy, vol. i. p. 218). 
The solitary habits of the hare have probably gained for 
it the reputation of gloominess. Drayton writes:— 
“ The melancholy hare form’d on brakes and briars.” 
( Polyolbion , song ii.) 
Prince Henry suggests, in reply to Falstajf’s assertion that 
he is “ as melancholy as a gib cat: ” “ What sayest thou to 
a hare or the melancholy of Moor-ditch ? ” (1 Henry IV., 
i. 2, 86). 
A hare was called a leveret the first year, a hare the 
second, and a great hare the third. There were several 
curious fancies connected with this animal. When it 
sleeps the hare’s eyelids do not quite join, which gave 
rise to the notion that it slept with its eyes open:— 
“ That looking to my gold with such hare’s eyes, 
That ever open, ay, even when they sleep.” 
(Ben Jonson, The Case is Altered, v. 4.) 
“ Tread softly, Trollio, my father sleeps still. 
Ay, forsooth: but he sleeps like a hare, with his eyes open, 
An that’s no good sign.” 
(Ford, The Lover's Melancholy, ii. 2.) 
Topsell gives an odd explanation of the expression hare¬ 
eyed :— 
“ The eyelids comming from the brows are too short to cover their 
eyes, and therefore this sence is very weake in them, and besides their 
