Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 689 / March 10, 1877

We all know that the rabbit is an interesting animal, easily kept in hutches on a little clover or dandelion. Boys like to keep rabbits, because they are amusing. In our day, we have kept rabbits, or kinnins , as they were called in the local vernacular, such being a corruption of the old well-known legal term, coneys. Our coneys though few in number were an immense source of amusement. We built a house for them with an exterior courtyard, gathered and brought dandelions for them, which it was delightful to see them munching. Finally, we made something of them commercially, which was acceptable in the absence of pocket-money. They did not bring much—eightpence a pair or so; but eightpence was a great thing in the days of yore, and was very serviceable as a means of buying books.
Between the keeping of a few tame rabbits and the liberty enjoyed by rabbits in a wild state, there is a mighty difference. The tame rabbits can be kept within bounds; the wild rabbits increase inordinately, and are apt to do mischief beyond all calculation. Originally a friend to rabbits, we have lived to know that they are the torment of the farmer. It is not so much what they consume, but what they contaminate. Whole fields of hay are ruined by their odious presence. Instances could be given of farmers claiming damage to the amount of a hundred a year from their landlords on account of rabbits; and the best thing the landlords can do is to allow their tenant-farmers to kill all the rabbits they can lay their hands on. Not until then will there be any peace on the score of this intolerable nuisance.
The rapid increase of rabbits once they have got a footing is one of the wonders of nature. We could almost fancy that rabbits were designed to appropriate the whole earth; for, let alone, there will spring from a single pair through successive generations in one year as many as sixty thousand! Of course, at this rate there would soon be no vegetation left for sheep or cattle, and dead rabbits hanging up by the heels would be the only butcher-meat. Fortunately nature adopts means to keep the multiplication of these creatures in check. It sends birds of prey, such as hawks and other kinds of raptores , also stoats and weasels, whose function is to make constant war on rabbits and keep their numbers within reasonable bounds. In this way, the balance of nature is kept up. It would almost seem as if nature, while creating in profusion, had facilitated the destruction of rabbits; for so slight is their hold of life, that no quadrupeds, as far as we are aware, are so easily and painlessly killed. Latterly, the beneficent balance of nature has been upset, by the reckless shooting of hawks and other birds of prey, with a view to save the feathered game, and professional warreners have to be introduced to remedy the error. Yet, notwithstanding all that warreners and sportsmen can do, rabbits are apt to become a nuisance.