hus be allowed a whole pine tree for its dinner, gnawing round instead
of up and down it; but perhaps it is necessary in order to thin these
trees, which are wont to grow up densely.

The hares (Lepus Americanus) were very familiar. One had her form under
my house all winter, separated from me only by the flooring, and
she startled me each morning by her hasty departure when I began to
stir--thump, thump, thump, striking her head against the floor timbers
in her hurry. They used to come round my door at dusk to nibble the
potato parings which I had thrown out, and were so nearly the color of
the ground that they could hardly be distinguished when still. Sometimes
in the twilight I alternately lost and recovered sight of one sitting
motionless under my window. When I opened my door in the evening, off
they would go with a squeak and a bounce. Near at hand they only excited
my pity. One evening one sat by my door two paces from me, at first
trembling with fear, yet unwilling to move; a poor wee thing, lean and
bony, with ragged ears and sharp nose, scant tail and slender paws. It
looked as if Nature no longer contained the breed of nobler bloods, but
stood on her last toes. Its large eyes appeared young and unhealthy,
almost dropsical. I took a step, and lo, away it scud with an elastic
spring over the snow-crust, straightening its body and its limbs into
graceful length, and soon put the forest between me and itself--the wild
free venison, asserting its vigor and the dignity of Nature. Not without
reason was its slenderness. Such then was its nature. (Lepus, levipes,
light-foot, some think.)

What is a country without rabbits and partridges? They are among the
most simple and indigenous animal products; ancient and venerable
families known to antiquity as to modern times; of the very hue and
substance of Nature, nearest allied to leaves and to the ground--and to
one another; it is either winged or it is legged. It is hardly as if you
had seen a wild creature when a rabbit or a partridge bursts away, only
a natural one, as much to be expected as rustling leaves. The partridge
and the rabbit are still sure to thrive, like true natives of the soil,
whatever revolutions occur. If the forest is cut off, the sprouts and
bushes which spring up afford them concealment, and they become more
numerous than ever. That must be a poor country indeed that does not
support a hare. Our woods teem with them both, and around every swamp
m