the animal had walked slowly backwards. This deceives many
who at such times go out to pick up anything that comes in their way;
for they trace the trail in the wrong direction. The truth is, that when
the rabbit pauses for the hinder feet to come up he again rests
momentarily upon these before the two foremost are put forth, and so
presses not only the paw proper but the whole first joint of the hind
leg upon the snow. A glance at the hind feet of a rabbit will show what
I mean: they will be found to display plain signs of friction against
the ground.

The habit has given the creature considerable power of standing up on
the hinder feet; he can not only sit on his haunches, but raise himself
almost upright, and remain in that position to listen for some little
time. For the same reason he can bark the ash saplings higher up than
would be imagined: where he cannot reach, the mice climb up and nibble
straight lines across the young pole, as if done with a single stroke
from a saw that scraped away the rind but did not reach the wood.

In front of a large rabbit bury the grass will be found discoloured with
sand at some distance from the mouth of the hole. This is explained by
particles adherent to the rabbits' hind feet, and rubbing off against
the grass blades. Country people call this peculiar gait 'sloppetting;'
and one result of it is that the rabbits wear away the grass where they
are numerous almost as much as they eat it away.

There was such a space worn by the attrition of feet sprinkled with sand
before the extensive burrow at the top of the meadow where I shot the
woodpigeon. These marks suggested to us that we should attempt some more
wholesale system of capture than shooting. It was not for the mere
desire of destruction, but for a special purpose, that we turned our
attention to wiring. The punt, though much beloved, was, like all punts,
a very bad sailer. A boat with a keel that could tack, and so work into
the wind's eye, was our ambition.

The blacksmith Ikey readily purchased every rabbit we obtained at
sixpence each. Rabbits were not so dear then as now; but of course he
made a large profit even then. The same rabbits at present would be
worth fifteen or eighteen pence. Every sixpence was carefully saved, but
it was clear that a long time must elapse before the goal was attained.
The blacksmith started the idea of putting up a 'turnpike'--_i.e._ a
wire--but professed ignorance as to the method of s