off your dog on a straightaway and warm him up a bit by nearly letting
him catch you. Then keeping just one hop ahead, you lead him at a long
slant full tilt into a breast-high barb-wire. I've seen many a dog and
fox crippled, and one big hound killed outright this way. But I've also
seen more than one rabbit lose his life in trying it."

Rag early learnt what some rabbits never learn at all, that 'hole-up' is
not such a fine ruse as it seems; it may be the certain safety of a wise
rabbit, but soon or late is a sure death-trap to a fool. A young rabbit
always thinks of it first, an old rabbit never tries it till all others
fail. It means escape from a man or dog, a fox or a bird of prey, but it
means sudden death if the foe is a ferret, mink, skunk, or weasel.

There were but two ground-holes in the Swamp. One on the Sunning Bank,
which was a dry sheltered knoll in the South-end. It was open and
sloping to the sun, and here on fine days the Cottontails took their
sun-baths. They stretched out among the fragrant pine needles and
winter-green in odd cat-like positions, and turned slowly over as though
roasting and wishing all sides well done. And they blinked and panted,
and squirmed as if in dreadful pain; yet this was one of the keenest
enjoyments they knew.

Just over the brow of the knoll was a large pine stump. Its grotesque
roots wriggled out above the yellow sand-bank like dragons, and under
their protecting claws a sulky old woodchuck had digged a den long ago.

He became more sour and ill-tempered as weeks went by, and one day
waited to quarrel with Olifant's dog instead of going in so that Molly
Cottontail was able to take possession of the den an hour later.

This, the pine-root hole, was afterward very coolly taken by a
self-sufficient young skunk who with less valor might have enjoyed
greater longevity, for he imagined--that even man with a gun would fly
from him. Instead of keeping Molly from the den for good, therefore, his
reign, like that of a certain Hebrew king, was over in seven days.

The other, the fern-hole, was in a fern thicket next the clover field.
It was small and damp, and useless except as a last retreat. It also
was the work of a woodchuck, a well-meaning friendly neighbor, but
a harebrained youngster whose skin in the form of a whiplash was now
developing higher horse-power in the Olifant working team.

"Simple justice," said the old man, "for that hide was raised on stolen
feed tha