instead of getting away through the gateway, which was entirely open in every way. When we passed through the gateway, and had gone but ten or twelve yards, my brother put his foot almost on another hare, and when she went away killed her. He then found that his foot was resting on three leverets not bigger than rats, and it was evident that the first hare, being the jack, had shirked the gateway so as not to run over the doe in her form. We had dogs with us, but they did not chase, although probably the hare might have expected they would. I may add that, so far as we could see, there was no other means of exit from the first close but the gateway, it being surrounded, except in that one place, with an unusually high fence and ditch on either side.'[1]
Apropos of leverets, I may remark that the hare makes a very delightful pet, provided it be captured young and treated with judicious kindness. Everyone knows the story of the poet Cowper's hares, but they were in no sense singular. Many hares had been domesticated before Cowper tamed his pets, the results varying according to the disposition of the individual animal, and the respective pains bestowed upon its education. Some years ago my friends
- ↑ Zoologist, 1883, p. 75.
