rapidly, and with but
little expenditure of food. Sold at the age of four months, it realises,
in France, a price four times greater than that commanded by a rabbit of
the same age; and at a year old it weighs on an average ten pounds, and
sometimes as much as sixteen pounds. It breeds at four months, continues
thirty days in gestation, and yearly produces five or six litters of
from five to eight young. To produce this hybrid is by no means
difficult. A leveret, just old enough to dispense with the maternal
nutriment, should be placed with a few doe rabbits of his own age,
apart from other animals. He will soon become familiar with the does,
and when they attain the age of puberty, all the rabbits save one or two
should be removed. Speedily those left with the hare will become with
young, upon which they should be removed, and replaced by others. After
this the hare should be kept in a hutch by himself, and a doe left with
him at night only. As the hare is naturally a very shy animal, it will
only breed when perfect quietness prevails. The half-bred produced in
the first instance should now be put to the hare, and a cross, three
parts hare, and one part rabbit, obtained. The permanent breed should
then be obtained by crossing the quadroon doe leporide, if I may use the
term, with the half-bred buck.

I have directed attention to the production of the leporide because
I believe that the problems in relation to it, which have been solved
by M. Roux, have an important bearing upon the breeding of animals
of greater importance than hares and rabbits. Here we find a race of
animals produced by the fusion of two species, which naturally exist in
a state of mutual enmity, and which differ in many important respects.
The hare and the rabbit are respectively of but little value as food, at
least they are of no importance to the feeder; yet a cross between them
turns out to be an excellent meat-producing animal, which may be reared
with considerable profit to the feeder. It is thus clearly shown that
two kinds of animals, neither of which is of great utility, may give
rise to an excellent cross, if their blood, so to speak, be blended in
proper proportions. A half-bred animal may be less valuable than its
parents, but a quadroon may greatly excel its progenitors. The goat
and sheep are so closely related that they are classed by naturalists
under one head--_Capridae_. Some kinds of sheep have hair like goats, and
certain variet