Page:The Hare.djvu/70

NATURAL HISTORY OF THE HARE The hoary appearance of this hare is due to numerous white hairs which extend along the entire length of the animal, from the shoulders to the flanks. The markings of pied quadrupeds are often symmetrically arranged, but Mr. Whitaker records a hare 'which had the whole of one side from nose to rump pure white, and on the other side a patch of white as big as one's hand behind the shoulder.' This animal was killed in a wood in Nottinghamshire in the month of January.

A pretty variety of the hare was killed upon the borders of Hants and Dorset in the autumn of 1889. Mr. Corbin states that it was a male, and not fullgrown. 'The ordinary brown colour was replaced by silvery grey, darker on the back and paler beneath, interspersed with darker but white-tipped hairs, giving it a singularly grizzled appearance.' The rarest variety of colour in the hare is the pure black form. A list of the black hares that have been killed in Great Britain would be a very short one. One of the number was caught as a tiny leveret in Epping Forest, some thirty years ago, i.e. in June 1865; this was kept alive as a pet. Another black hare used to perambulate the North of England at one time, as a distinguished performer in a so-called 'Happy Family.'