Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 4 (1900).djvu/156

128 good and careful observer:—"It is not easy to distinguish a Hare when crouching in a ploughed field, his colour harmonises so well with the clods, so that an unpractised eye generally fails to note him. An old hand with the gun cannot pass a field without involuntarily glancing along the furrows made by the plough, to see if their regular grooves are broken by anything hiding therein." .... "If you watch the farmers driving to market, you will see that they glance up the furrows to note the workmanship and look for game; you may tell from a distance if they espy a Hare, by the check of the rein and the extended hand pointing." Though the American Hare has the colour of its pile turned grey in winter, it is still much persecuted by the Great Virginian and Snowy Owls, "which prey extensively on the animal, keeping it in a constant state of dread, especially during winter, when, in common with other rodents, it seeks to evade the stoop of rapacious birds by diving instantly headlong into the snow, thus escaping them, but ensuring destruction by man, and such animals as the Fisher-cat and Lynx, who can easily dig it out." It must not be overlooked that many zoologists and evolutionists estimate the survival of the Hare as due to the protection acquired by their speed, the animals having lived under conditions in which only the swift could escape the attacks of their enemies. Besides this aspect, the animal trusts to its highly developed cunning. Mr. Kearton, a good and practical observer, writes:—"When Hares are going to seek their day or sleeping quarters, they practise a very ingenious trick in order to mislead and baffle their enemies. This consists of travelling for some distance in a direction they have no intention of pursuing, and then doubling back exactly along their own track for a good way, and suddenly leaving it by making a tremendous sideward bound to right or left. This being accomplished to their satisfaction, they trot off at right angles to the path they have just left, and go to their forms." The Hare itself seems to be well aware that the safety gained by colourconcealment is very precarious. The poet Somerville knew this.