HUNTER AND HUNTED Hares have the high ground to themselves
at present, the few upland rabbits having been eliminated, and they are the quarry of the hill fox, that lean, yellow one that trots from bracken patch to bracken patch, or pauses on the scree beneath a great rock before slink- ing away into the shelter of the boulders ahead. The buzzards that hunt the hill com- pete with this fox for voles, Mice and lesser things, and they will swoop to a leveret if he can be surprised among the bleached grass and rush clumps. Walking a track that is often frequented by both the hunter- and the hunted at the weekend, I saw in front of me a half- grown hare going very slowly and, at a height of about a hundred feet, a pair of sailing, searching buzzards. It made me wonder how either could bear the tension, survival for one depending on the keenness of its eyes and for the other on stealthy movement and natural camouflage. There is, of course, no tension except in the mind of an observer, for this is the natural life of the hare, the buzzard, the fox and many other creatures which know the ways of their neighbours and enemies.
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