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Whilst Pantagruel was writing these foresaid verses, Panurge halved and fixed upon a great stake the horns of a roebuck, together with the skin and the right forefoot thereof, the ears of three leverets, the chine of a coney, the jaws of a hare, the wings of two bustards, the feet of four queest-doves, a bottle or borracho full of vinegar, a horn wherein to put salt, a wooden spit, a larding stick, a scurvy kettle full of holes, a dripping-pan to make sauce in, an earthen salt-cellar, and a goblet of Beauvais.
If we had only been at home we should have been on the watch; but my poor leveret, and my two friends' poor leverets, were sleeping so comfortably when the wicked weasel stole on them one by one, and bit their necks and killed them. He could not eat them, nor half of them, he only killed them for revenge, and oh! dear little Sir Bevis, what shall I do? what shall I do?"
The hare, in other circumstances, would have rejoiced at the overthrow of King Kapchack, who was no favourite with her race, for he had, once or twice, out of wanton cruelty, pecked weakly leverets to death, just to try the temper of his bill.
It is their city, and there is a nest in every crevice, almost under every tile. Sometimes the partridges run between the ricks, and when the bats come out of the roof, leverets play in the waggon-track. At even a fern-owl beats by, passing close to the eaves whence the moths issue.
The worst offender among the residents is the tawny owl, to which I find the following reference in the famous Malmesbury MSS.: "Common here ... a great destroyer of young game and leverets ... they sit in ivy bushes during the day, and I have known one remain, altho' its mate was killed, in the same tree, in such a state of torpor did it appear to be...." The screech owl is a harmless bird and a terror to mice, and any doubt as to its claim on the farmer's hospitality would at once be removed by cursory examination of the undigested pellets which, in common with hawks, these birds cast up after their meals.
A few weeks afterwards, when she was about to separate from her leverets, an incident occurred that might have been attended with fatal results. A poacher, prowling along the far side of the hedgerow, and occasionally stopping to peep through the bushes for partridges "jugging" in the grass-field, caught sight of the leverets nibbling the clover near a small blackthorn.
This said, they made ready supper, and, of extraordinary besides his daily fare, were roasted sixteen oxen, three heifers, two and thirty calves, three score and three fat kids, four score and fifteen wethers, three hundred farrow pigs or sheats soused in sweet wine or must, eleven score partridges, seven hundred snipes and woodcocks, four hundred Loudun and Cornwall capons, six thousand pullets, and as many pigeons, six hundred crammed hens, fourteen hundred leverets, or young hares and rabbits, three hundred and three buzzards, and one thousand and seven hundred cockerels.
A big sloe-hare, with a leveret or two not for sale and that doe's leverets must have been in the rushes somewhere may, upon occasion, show unexpected fighting-powers. And this one did.
But first we'll climb further up the hill. You were asking me about the leaping places of the hares: I know of one of these leaping places, and I think I know of two hares that use them and have lately 'kittled' in snug little 'forms' not far away. We must hurry, else the does will have left the leverets and gone to feed in the clover. You go first.
The game-laws forbade them to weed their fields lest they should disturb the young partridges or leverets; to manure the soil with any thing which might injure their flavor; or even to mow or reap till the grass or corn was no longer required as shelter for the young coveys.
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