To these hills, in the late winter of a year long ago, there came a hare in search of a spot to which she might safely commit her young. She was hard to satisfy, rejecting for this reason or for that a score of harbourages that competed for her favour. One night she all but decided on a bramble-patch near the top of Caer Bran; the next she fancied first a heathery knoll on Bartinney, then an abandoned mine-heap on Sancreed Beacon; and at the last moment rejected both for the western slope of Chapel Carn Brea, partly on account of its uninterrupted outlook, but more because it was less overrun than the sister hills by the predatory creatures that infested the countryside. All through the month of March she had not seen a polecat or even a stoat upon the hillside; only once had she detected on it the trail of an enemy; so with a feeling of security the timorous mother entrusted her young to its keeping, laying them in a tussock of coarse grass near a ruined chantry. They were pretty little things with wide-open eyes, distinguishable by only the white star in the forehead of the male and the greater restlessness that he displayed. The tiny fellow, as if eager to explore the world into which he had just been born, was all agog to be out and about in the afterglow, and had not his mother checked him till the impulse passed, he would have left the form and perhaps lost himself amongst the furze. He constantly renewed his struggles to have his way; but the moment he ceased, she removed the restraining pad and caressed him till, like his sister, he became drowsy and at length fell asleep. When the stars shone bright, the hare rose, stretched her stately limbs, covered the little sleepers with the grass-blades, gathered herself for a spring, and leapt to an outcropping rock. On landing she leapt again and again and again, in order to prevent any beast of prey from following her tracks and discovering the form. After taking these precautions she made for the crest of the hill, and standing on the ruin, snuffed the wind and scrutinised the waste. Presently, assured that no enemy threatened, she set out for the feeding-ground. At the foot of the long slope she repeated her ruse of the leaps, and passed through a hole in the wall that separated the wild from the farm land, to which she had been attracted by the tender herbage of the young wheat.