In this corner, too, the bank being dry and sandy, there is a large settlement of rabbits, and now and then some of these find their way to the orchard and garden along the hedge. Rabbits have their own social laws and customs adapted to the special conditions of their way of life. At the breeding season there seems to be a tendency to migrate on the part of the younger rabbits from the great `bury' hitherto their home. Many solitary holes at some distance are then occupied, and the fresh sand thrown out shows that a tenant has entered on possession. In this way one or two take up their residence more than half-way down the hedge towards the orchard. Then the doe seems to have a desire to separate herself at a certain period from the rest. She goes out into the mowing grass perhaps thirty yards from the `bury,' and there the young are born in a short hole excavated for the purpose. The young rabbits naturally remain close to their birthplace; they are conducted to the hedge as soon as they are old enough to run about; and so a fresh colony is formed. As they get larger, or, say, soon after midsummer, they appear to show a tendency to roam; and by the autumn, if left undisturbed, descendants from the original settlement will have pushed outposts to a considerable distance. These, having been bred near, have little fear of entering the orchard, or even the garden, and next season will rear their offspring close at hand and feed in the enclosure, using the close-cropped hawthorn as a cover. Weasels also occasionally come down the hedge into the orchard for the various prey they find there; they visit the outhouses and sheds, too, at intervals in the cattle yards adjoining the house. More rarely the stoat does the same. A weasel may frequently be found prowling in the highway hedge. When a weasel runs fast on a level hard surface--as across a road--the hinder quarters seem every now and then to jump up as if rebounding from the surface; his legs look too short for the speed he is going. This peculiar motion gives them when in haste an odd appearance. In a less degree, a mouse rushing in alarm across a road does the same. The motion ceases the moment mouse or weasel reaches the turf, which is rarely quite level.