Now, on hands and knees (the turf is dry and soft), creep up one side of the bowl-like hollow, where, the thistles make a parapet on the edge, and from behind it look out upon the ground all broken up into low humps, some covered with nettles, others plainly heaps of sand. It is the site of an immense rabbit-burrow, the relic of an old warren which once occupied half the field. The nettle-covered heaps mark old excavations; where the sand shows, there the miners have been recently at work. At the sound of approaching footsteps those inhabitants that had been abroad hastily rushed into their caves, but now (after waiting awhile, and forgetting that the adjacent hollow might hide the enemy) a dozen or more have come forth within easy gunshot. Though a few like this are always looking in and out all through the day, it is not till the approach of evening that they come out in any number. This is a favourite spot from whence to get a shot at them, but the aim must be deadly, or the rabbit will escape though never so severely wounded. The holes are so numerous that he has never more than a yard to scramble, and as he goes down into the earth his own weight carries him on. If he can but live ten seconds after the lead strikes him, he will generally escape you. Watching patiently (without firing), after the twilight has deepened into night presently you are aware of a longer, larger creature than a rabbit stealing out, seeming to travel close to the earth: it is a badger. There are almost always a couple somewhere about the warren. Their residence is easily discovered because of the huge heap of sand thrown out from the rabbit-hole they have chosen; and it is this ease of discovery that has caused the diminution of their numbers by shot or spade. The ground sounds hollow underneath the foot--perhaps half an acre is literally bored away under the surface; and you have to thread your way in and out a labyrinth of holes, the earth about some of them perceptibly yielding to your weight. There must be waggon-loads of the sand that has been thrown out. Beyond this central populous quarter suburbs of burrows extend in several directions, and there are detached settlements fifty and a hundred yards away. In ferreting this place the greatest care has to be taken that the ferret is lined with a long string, or so fed that he will not lie in; otherwise, if he is not picked up the moment he appears at the mouth of the hole, he will become so excited at the number of rabbits, and so thirsty for blood, that he will refuse to come forth.