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White's Natural History
of Selborne

The World's Great Books

Committee of Selection

Thomas B. Reed

Speaker of the House
of Representatives

Edward Everett Hale

Author of The Man
Without a Country

William R. Harper

President of the
University of Chicago

Ainsworth R. SpofFord

Of the Congressional
Library

Rossiter Johnson

Editor of Little Classics and Editor-in-Chief of this Series

Aldine Edition

The Natural History
of Selborne

By

Gilbert White

With a Critical and Biographical Introduction
by George H. Ellwanger

Illustrated

New York

D. Appleton and Company

1898

Copyright, 1898,
By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY.

WHITE'S "NATURAL HISTORY OF
SELBORNE"

" To view the leaves, thin dancers upon air,
Go eddying round, and small birds how they fare ;
To mark the structure of a plant or tree,
And all fair things of earth, how fair they be."

— John Woodvil.

THE stately yew that casts its shade in the old church-
yard at Selborne has shed its leaves full many a year,
and the swifts have returned to the lichened parish
church for upwards of a century, since Gilbert White gave to
the world his volume of Natural History. And like the yew
that remains forever green, and the swallows that return to
dip and turn upon themselves again, his fresh, instructive
chronicle continues to delight and its pages to unfold an
added charm.

It has long been enshrined as a classic on the library
shelves ; and, while its subtle attraction has been found diffi-
cult to analyze, it has nevertheless come to be recognized as
one of the immortal books, having nature as its theme, — one
of those volumes with which the discerning reader can ill
afford to be entirely unfamiliar. Indeed, in many minds
nature is more or less synonymous with the name of its
author, who is regarded as a sort of corollary and supplement
to that natural world with which he stood upon such intimate
terms of relationship.

A book on nature, it has been said, is certain to attract
readers much as a sportsman attracts attention who enters
a public place with a gun upon his shoulder or a string of fish
in his hand. Yet books on nature, after all, are no exception
in their lasting qualities to those on numerous other subjects,

iii

IV WHITE'S SELBORNE

their p^ermanence depending upon the man rather than upon
the topic. Or, as Martial has recorded, " the immortality of
a book depends upon its having a genius of its own."

The name of Gilbert White at once brings up a vision of
pastoral sights and sounds, — the dancing shade of cool beechen
groves, the crink of field-crickets and music of echoes, the
minstrelsy of birds, and the airy rush of himndines over
glassy meres. And still it is a question whether White is
read as widely as is usually supposed, despite the multiplicity
of editions that have succeeded the editio princeps. By the
" general reader " he is undoubtedly far better known through
those who have written concerning him than from a perusal
of his own writings. For, though his letters are packed with
information, the greater part of which holds as true to-day as
it did a century since, and though they have lost none of
their scholastic flavor with the lapse of years, it is to be
feared that the average person who is not interested in ornith-
ology, entomology, and botany is to a large extent unac-
quainted with him save by reputation, or at most by a hasty
dip into his register. And yet he is to be enjoyed by the
layman almost equally as well as by the naturalist; for so
simple, yet engaging, is his style that he who runs may read
with eminent profit and pleasure.

Not unmindful of the "Idyllia" of Theocritus and the
"Georgics" of Virgil, together with the works of other nat-
ure writers who have preceded him, we may term him the
founder of the nature school, or school of close observance
and minute analysis. No one who has succeeded him has
been more precise and fluent in recording the movements
of the feathered tribes, or in placing his observations more
vividly before the reader. He was sufficient of a scientist to
receive through science a valuable aid in his investigations,
though his natural receptivity and perceptivity, as distin-
guished from mere scientific accomplishments, count for the
major share in the work which has immortalized his name.

Nor are his terse and graceful diction, his quiet humor, and
apt citation a less conspicuous factor in the charm of his
chronicle, through whose leaves filters the sunlight of
Hampshire fields and flicker the shadows of Hampshire

WHITE'S SELBORNE V

groves. One wonders at first sight how, with one eye upon
his parochial flock, he could use the other to so great an
extent in connection with his varied charges of the natural
world ; or how, watching the migrants as closely as he did,
he could find time to stroke his parlor cat and attend his
weekly concert "of a first and second fiddle." It must be
borne in mind, however, that the series of epistles addressed
to Thomas Pennant and the Hon. Daines Harrington, in
which his observations are recorded, extend over a period of
more than twenty years ; while in his ninety-first letter, under
date of May 7th, 1779, he says that it was then more than
forty years that he had paid some attention to the ornithol-
ogy of the district without being able to exhaust the subject,
new occurrences still arising as long as any inquiries were
kept alive. That he did not originally contemplate a book,
but that his letters gradually grew into a volume, might be
presumed from the fact that no dates are attached to his first
nine epistles. On the other hand, eleven of his latest letters
are also without chronological record, the concluding one,
however, being dated June 25th, 1787, the first dated epistle
being that of August 4th, 1767.

The traveler who is hurried by on the southwestern ex-
press, in journeying from Southampton to London, obtains
a glimpse of the beauties of Hampshire, within whose confines
Selborne lies secluded, — its red-tiled cottages and smiling
flower gardens, its ancestral trees and halls, its graceful church
spires, and well-tilled fields and verdant meadows, which greet
him on every side. But in order to become acquainted with
the true character of a country, — especially a country like
England, so rich in historical monuments and associations, —
one must often leave the beaten highway and seek the less
trodden paths. And to understand the " Natural History of
Selborne," it is necessary to be familiar with the place which
was its genesis and inspiration, as well as to acquaint oneself,
so far as may be, with the character and life of its author.

Gilbert White was born July i8th, 1720, at Selborne,
and died, aged seventy-two years and eleven months, on
June 26th, 1793. He received his early education at Ba-
singstoke, and afterwards went to Oxford to become Fellow

VI WHITE'S SELBORNE

of Oriel and one of the senior Proctors of the University.
But the beauties of the country proved for him a stronger
magnet than the more intellectual atmosphere of the town,
and he soon returned to the place of his birth and his beloved
Hampshire hills. Here he became curate, also officiating as
curate of Faringdon eighteen years, his leisure time being
devoted to his favorite pursuit.

It is much to be regretted that, apart from what is revealed
through his writings, so little is known of the man himself,
few anecdotes or reminiscences of his private life having sur-
vived him. It is known, nevertheless, that he was a person
of retiring manners, beloved by his parishioners and children,
and, despite the engrossing nature of his occupations, not
averse to a good table and creature comforts. That he was
fond of field sports during his earlier years is apparent from
the references to sport in several of his letters, from the dates
of which it is clear that he gave up this pastime when com-
paratively young, doubtless on account of its interference with
his chosen studies.^ He has been referred to as "the Addi-
son of Natural History," and "a. clergyman without having
any duties to perform." His chronicle, in truth, would seem
to be a case of "retired leisure," — a product or outcome of
the most leisurely mental activity. Like the country parson
of " The Deserted Village " —

" A man he was to all the country dear,
And passing rich with forty pounds a year ;
Remote from towns he ran his godly race,
Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his place."

One pictures him, in imagination, with his pale Malacca
walking-stick and knee-breeches, sauntering through the
winding path to Long Lythe, studying the cause of the
smoky atmosphere ; or treading the sheep-walks in quest
of some new butterfly, pausing perhaps to hold communion
with a favorite echo which returns him his quotations from
Ovid, Virgil, and Lucretius. Or, mayhap, aglow with ex-
citement, he is contemplating the stately march of that
rara avis, the hoopoe, feeding near his garden; or, with ear

1 Letters XVI., XLII., XLVI.

WHITE'S SELBORNE Vli

alert, is listening to the mysterious humming as of bees in
the air, which follows him from the Money Dells to his
avenue gate, though not one insect is to be seen. Perchance
from his eyry, beneath the beeches of the Hanger, he is
watching a file of rooks wending their way to the Tisted
Woods ; or, threading a rocky lane, he stoops to admire the
lovely fronds of the hart's-tongue fern. Or, amid the gloam-
ing of a bland midsummer's evening, one fancies him strolling
to the Plestor, where he may trace the graceful wheels of the
churn-owl, hawking round the giant oak in pursuit of fern-
chafers, yet ever most intent in observing the migrants, and
in following swift and swallow as they

" in rapid, giddy ring,
Dash round the steeple, unsubdued of wing."

The grasshopper-lark sounds his sibilous whisper, and the
smallest willow-wren his shivering noise in the tops of tall
woods, and he is there to hear ; the lesser whitethroat comes
to probe the nectaries of his crown-imperials, and he is pres-
ent to perceive. He turns over on his pillow at night to
mark the stone-curlews uttering their short, quick note while
passing overhead, a watchword that they may not stray and
lose their companions. He knew the habits, haunts, and
food of every feathered inhabitant of his parish, from the
bustard, the largest British land fowl, to the golden-crested
wren, the smallest of the British avifauna. The sight or call
of some strange visitant, like the stilted plover, was to him as
the draught of some marvelous vintage, or the ecstasy of the
collector who discovers a hidden Raphael or Rembrandt. He
had, moreover, a retinue of boys — of whom there were a
goodly number in the village — at his constant beck and call,
to climb trees for him in search of the birds' nests and eggs
he coveted, as well as to destroy the wasps' nests, the denizens
of which devoured the produce of his garden.

"The parish I live in," he says, "is a very abrupt, uneven
country, full of hills and woods, and therefore full of birds."
In close proximity are the Sussex Downs, the climate is tem-
pered by the near vicinity of the sea, while numerous streams

contribute to

" the chalky Wey that rolls a milky wave."

viii WHITE'S SELBORNE

He further describes it as an anathoth, — a place of responses
or echoes.^

Its climate a century ago, notwithstanding, must have been
very variable, inasmuch as he places the flowering of the
hawthorn as occurring in different years, from 1768 to 1793,
upon dates as widely apart as April twentieth and June
eleventh ; the first appearance of the orange-tip butterfly
from March thirteenth to May nineteenth, and the gleam of
the first glowworm's evening lamp from May first to the
second week of June. A perfect type of English woodland
scenery, the outline of the parish where nearly all his obser-
vations were made, comprised not less than thirty miles. Sel-
borne is still shut off from the railway and the fret of the much-
traveled highway, being nearly five miles distant from the
nearest railway connection, Liss, on the one hand, and from
Alton on the other. The village is sheltered and protected
from the westerly winds by the Hanger ("hanger " being the
old Saxon term for "wood"), — a very steep acclivity three
quarters of a mile in length, the elbow of a chain of long hills,
forming the northern slope of Selborne Hill, three hundred
feet higher than the village. Besides the original ascent
termed the Zigzag, White had a road constructed called the
Bostal, — his favorite walk, — leading to the heights, where
he and his friends were wont to repair to drink tea of a
pleasant summer's evening. The summit commands a fine
view of the South Downs, and is the "beech-grown hill"
and " romantic spot " so poetically alluded to in " The Invi-

..." whence in prospect lies
Whate'er of landscape charms our feasting eyes ;
The pointed spire, the hall, the pasture-plain,
The russet fallow and the golden grain ;
The breezy lake that sheds a gleaming light,
'Til all the fading picture fails the sight."

The old rocky hollow lanes that are frequently referred to,
the one communicating with Alton and the other with the

1 In a district so diversified as this, so full of hollow vales and hanging woods,
it is no wonder that echoes should abound. Many we have discovered that return
the cry of a pack of dogs, the notes of a hunting-horn, a tunable ring of bells, or
the melody of birds, very agreeably. — Letier LXXX.

WHITE'S SELBORNE IX

Forest, which even then were dangerous in winter, are now
entirely closed to traffic, and impassable, as also are those on
the other side of the village leading to Liss and Petersfield.
These, the aboriginal paths, gradually sank into the soil, the
rains and freshets seeking them for their channels, and the
frosts undermining them year by year. The bindweed and
other trailing plants set foot upon their banks ; gradually
they became enclosed by vegetation, and in their cloistered
gloom rare plants and innumerable forms of wild life sought
seclusion.

A short distance from Selborne is Wolmer Forest, a fre-
quent haunt of the naturalist, — a wild region, seven miles in
length by two and a half in width, abounding with bogs,
fern, and heath, and containing three considerable meres or
ponds, — the home of many curious plants and insects, and
a chosen harbor of wild fowl. The retreat of duck and teal,
dabchicks and water-hens, snipe, pheasants, and foxes, it
afforded the Selborne curate " much entertainment as a
sportsman and naturalist." During White's time this area —
the name of which is misleading, for the " forest " was more
like a fen — consisted entirely of sand, without a standing
tree in its whole extent, but studded with extensive marshes
and meres. This anciently formed part of the Anderida Silva
of the Romans, extending from Kent, across Sussex, into the
borders of Hampshire. It has been Crown property from a
date before the Conquest, and was one of the favorite hunt-
ing-grounds of the Plantagenet kings. Recently, the Guild-
ford Natural History Society has advanced a proposal to
the Department of Woods and Forests that Wolmer be
reserved as a sanctuary for wild birds, in which they, their
nests, and eggs may remain unmolested throughout the year.
Latterly the waters of Wolmer have shrunk, and much of its
former wastes are now covered with plantations of pine and
oak.

This region, with the immediate environment of Selborne
village, together with an occasional excursion to points some-
what more remote, was his principal field of observation.
The Sussex Chalk Downs he also visited annually for upwards
of thirty years, viewing their shapely figured aspect with fresh

X WHITE'S SELBORNE

admiration year by year.^ How well he improved his oppor-
tunities, a perusal of any one of his letters will amply attest.
But the opportune occasion and his inherent qualities as a
naturalist would have figured but little in the wonderfully
interesting record he has left, were it not for his swift infer-
ence, his unflagging patience, and the graphic, pleasing style
in which his facts are chronicled. To those who dwell amid
rural surroundings all their lives without making an observa-
tion about nature, his volume is a school, from which the
veriest tyro may learn to regard and record, nearly every one
having about him a fertile mine to be explored if he but set
about it in the right way.

Analogous reasoning served White but rarely ; his facts
are taken at first hand, or, as he himself says, from the sub-
ject itself, and not from the writings of others. His eye
was as keen as Thoreau's and Jefferies's, although he lacked
the vivid imaginative sense of the Walden recluse, and the
intensely artistic feeling of the great essayist of the Wiltshire
Downs. His modesty withal was on a par with his wondrous
patience, as was equally his spirit of contentment with his lot
in life. His studies of echoes and honey-dews, of wasps and
bees, of fogs and mists, of crickets and field-mice, of frosts
and meteors, of cobwebs and aphides — all have a peculiar
charm as presented on his classic page ; while his " Natural-
ist's Calendar," compiled jointly with William Markwick,
which records the earliest and the latest times in which the
circumstances noted were observed, is almost a natural his-
tory in itself.

But the birds were his favorite topic, whose habits he
never tired of investigating. It was his opinion that a good
ornithologist should be able to distinguish these by their air

^ Perhaps I may be singular in my opinion, and not so happy as to convey to
you the same idea, but I never contemplate these mountains without thinking I
perceive somewhat analogous to growth in their gentle swellings and smooth
fungus-like protuberances, their fluted sides, and regular hollows and slopes that
carry at once the air of vegetative dilatation and expansion. Or was there ever
a time when these immense masses of calcareous matter were thrown into fer-
mentation by some adventitious moisture; were raised and leavened into such
shapes by some plastic power; and so made to swell and heave their broad backs
into the sky so much above the less animated clay of the wild below ? — Letter L VI.

WHITE'S SELBORNE xi

as well as by their colors and shape, on the ground as well as
on the wing, and in the bush as well as in the hand.^ Many
of the numerous species of the songsters which he de-
scribes are already more or less familiar to the reader through
the poets ; as the nightingale, redbreast, blackcap, linnet,
ouzel, wren, and starling ; the blackbird, or merle ; the thrush,
or mavis ; the ring-dove, or cushat ; the skylark, " messenger
of morn ; " the cuckoo, " darling of the spring ; " the missel-
thrush, or stormcock, which loves to sing in wind and rain ;
and the chaffinch and yellowhammer, beloved by Jefferies.^

Numerous other birds which he describes, on the contrary,
are strangers to one not versed in British ornithology ; as,
for instance, the chiff-chaff, hedge-sparrow, fieldfare, titlark,
sedge-warbler, willow-lark, stone-chat, whin-chat, redstart, and
wryneck, as well as the marsh-titmouse, with his two quaint
notes "like the whetting of a saw" ; and that "delicate poly-
glot," the sedge-bird, with his medley of notes resembling the
songs of other birds. Among strange birds may also be enu-
merated the nut-hatch, which he could hear a furlong or more
off; the stone-curlew, whose clamor was audible to him at the
distance of a mile ; the smallest uncrested willow-wren, which
utters two sharp, piercing notes so loud in hollow woods as to
occasion an echo ; and the grasshopper-lark, chirping all
night.

He early discovered that all species whose habit it is to
continue in full song until after midsummer, which Thoreau
characterizes as "the poets and true singers," breed more

1 Letter LXXXIV.

2 The yellowhammer is almost the longest of all the singers. In the spring he
sings, in the summer he sings, and he continues when the last sheaves are being
carried from the wheat-field. . . . The yellowhammer is the most persistent indi-
vidually, but I think the blackbirds when listened to are the masters of the fields.
Before one can finish another begins, like the summer ripples succeeding behind
each other, so that the melodious sound merely changes its position. Now here,
now in the corner, then across the field, again in the distant copse, where it seems
about to sink, when it rises again almost at hand. Like a great human artist, the
blackbird makes no effort, being fully conscious that his liquid tone cannot be
matched. He utters a few delicious notes, and carelessly quits the green stage of
the oak till it pleases him to sing again. Without the blackbird, in whose throat
the sweetness of the green fields dwells, the days would be only partly summer. —
Richard Jefferies, The Pageant of Summer.

Xll WHITE'S SELBORNE

than once, laying it down as an ornithological maxim that
as long as incubation is going on, there is music. Of
such songsters he specifies the yellowhammer as the most
persistent, the late estival chorus being additionally strength-
ened by the woodlark, wren, redbreast, whitethroat, goldfinch,
linnet, and swallow, whose caressing warble he justly includes
in the strain of the minstrels. His favorite chorister, besides
the nightingale, was the blackcap, " with his full, deep, sweet,
loud, and wild pipe " and soft and varied modulations, the
wild sweetness of which always brought to his mind the lines
of the song in "As You Like It," —

" And turn his merry note
Unto the sweet bird's throat."

Among English songsters, the nightingale has been so
extolled as to have left comparatively little room for his
rivals, — the blackbird, blackcap, and thrush. These, never-
theless, especially the two former, are held by not a few to
be on a par with the favorite bird of the poets.^ No one who
has heard them will forget the clear, ringing, liquid notes of
the blackbird and thrush, and the soft, flute-like tones of the
blackcap's "breezy strain." The nightingale of the Surrey
lanes and Middlesex copses, however, is said to be quite dis-
tinct, so far as his voice is concerned, from his brother in the
west, whjere he is regarded as but a feeble performer in com-
parison. To " listen to the nightingale," one must be upon
the scene early in the season, preferably near London, and
then await the pleasure of the minstrel, who is fickle and capri-
cious in his singing, and whose season of song at the longest
is extremely brief.

It is less as an analyst of avian melody, or a poetical inter-
preter of the beauties of outward nature, than as a chronicler

1 Amongst our charming song-birds, I must not omit the blackcap, which is,
I think, quite on an equality with the nightingale. Mr. Symes thought that its
mellow notes are equal, if not superior in richness of tone, to any in the nightin-
gale's song, and in this opinion I perfectly agree with him. — Edward Jesse,
Scenes and Occupations of a Country Life.

There is no note so sweet and deep and melodious as that of the blackbird
to be heard in our fields ; it is even richer than the nightingale's, though not so
varied. — Richard Jefferies, Wild Life in a Southern County.

WHITE'S SELBORNE Xlll

of the ways and habits of the feathered hosts, and a historian
or custodian of facts and causes relating to the natural world,
that White claims attention. To know the poetry and soul
of the bird, to comprehend the utterance of the breeze and
voice of the wild flower, to catch the whisper of the unfold-
ing leaf, and penetrate the message of the blue sky bending
over, one must turn to the golden pages of the prose poet of
Coate, for no one has succeeded in interpreting them so
beautifully, so lovingly, so tenderly, as he.

Except for his deafness, which incommoded him greatly
at times during his later years, the senses of White were
marvelously acute, enabling him to detect many things that
were imperceptible to the ordinary observer. Thus he could
hear the swallow, while engaged in foraging for insects, snap
her bill when a fly was taken, a sound resembling the noise
at the shutting of a watch-case ; but the motion of the mandi-
bles was too quick to be perceived. On the other hand, he
could discern the eve-jarr in the twilight, while circling swiftly
round an oak that swarmed with fern-chafers, thrust out its
short leg occasionally, and, by a bend of the head, convey its
prey into its mouth.^

He discovered that the swallows, like very many insects,
propagate on the wing, as well as eat, drink, bathe, collect
materials for their nests, and feed their young while in flight,
rising very early and retiring to roost very late, being in rapid
action during the height of summer at least sixteen hours.
Swallows and martins, he says, that have numerous fami-
lies, are continually feeding them every two or three minutes ;
whereas the swifts, that have but two young to maintain, are
much at their leisure, and do not attend on their nests for
hours together. The swifts seldom being seen hawking, like
the swallow, near the ground or water, but seeking their food
in a more elevated plane than the other species, he concludes
that they, together with the larger bats, derive their suste-
nance from some sort of high-flying gnats or insects which
are short of continuance ; and that the brief sojourn of the
swifts, accordingly, is governed by the defect of their food
supply. It was noticed by him that birds are largely influ-

1 Letters LVII., XLVII.

XIV WHITE'S SELBORNE

enced in their choice of food by color, red being especially
favored by many species, much as bees and numerous insects
are partial to flowers of certain hues.

It would have been interesting could White have watched
the mysterious movements of one of our game birds, the
woodcock, some of whose habits — especially its strange
disappearance during the moulting season — would have puz-
zled him perchance as greatly as the vanishing swallow kind,
which he would fain believe hybernated in the Island, instead
of migrating to a warmer clime. The drumming of the ruffed
grouse, in like manner, which so long baffled the naturalists,
would have afforded him an equal opportunity for close
investigation. Although he declares there is no bird
whose habits he has studied so closely as those of the fern-
owl or goat-sucker, — a favorite also with Thoreau, — the
reader will place the swallow tribe on an equal plane. To
these he recurs continually, much as does the Walden phi-
losopher to his mysterious "night-warbler," and his owl, "the
alpha and omega of sound."

Throughout the pages of the "Natural History of Selborne,"
the migrants are ever his deepest concern, the subject of
migration even yet affording mysteries that have scarcely
been penetrated. The olden belief that the swallow kind
hybernated under water or in the ground or caves, was
shared by him, though sometimes, it would seem, in a waver-
ing way, he reverting continually to the subject in numerous
letters. Nor could he bring himself to believe that certain
other birds of passage — which were feeble fliers, and which
throughout the summer flitted but from hedge to hedge — could
be able to traverse the seas in flight to remote continents.

It was likewise a mystery to him whence the ring-ouzels
migrate so mysteriously every September, to make their
appearance again, as if on their return, every April; as, in
his earlier letters, he was also perplexed that the swift should
leave before the middle of August invariably, while the house-
martin remained till the middle of October.

It was his custom to visit the seacoast annually to keep a
lookout for departing passeres, although he was never able
to discover the summer short-winged birds of passage assem-

WHITE'S SELBORNE XV

bling for distant flight. The fact that he had frequently
noticed that swallows were seen later at Oxford than else-
where, led him to believe that this might be owing to the
vast mossy buildings of that place, or possibly to the many
waters surrounding it. He had observed these birds to cling
by their claws against the surface of the church walls before
hybernating, and he was incessantly studying their move-
ments in autumn in the neighboring waters for proof of his
more than half-suspected theory that they concealed them-
selves in the banks of pools and rivers during the winter.

Yet while ornithology was his favorite study, he was almost
equally at home in other branches of natural history, — the
plant, arboreal, insect and animal life that surrounded him,
as well as the complexion of the soils and etiology of the
weather, regarding all of which his observations are most
exact and comprehensive. It is only in ichthyology that we
find him less at home and unfamiliar with Dame Julyans and
" The Compleat Angler."

Many singular facts and anecdotes are related by him con-
cerning the customs, superstitions, history, phenomena, and
antiquities of the country. Among the quaint customs of
the time was that of renewing the arbors of Waldon, and
Brimstone Lodge in Wolmer Forest, which were constructed
of the boughs of oaks, these being renewed annually by the
keepers on the feast of St. Barnabas ; the farm called Black-
more being obliged to supply the material for the former,
while the farms of Greatham, in rotation, furnished for the
latter.^ He tells also of a minute insect, termed harvest-bug,
common in chalky districts, which was very troublesome during
late summer, getting into people's skins and raising humors
that itched intolerably, men often being so bitten by it as to
be thrown into fevers.^

No less strange are his accounts of the boy bee-eater, the
prevailing superstitions concerning the ash-tree, the sinking
of the Hanger at Hawkley, and the small hill ponds which
maintained a supply of water during the severest droughts,
when even large valley ponds ran dry. Indeed, whether he
is discoursing of the growth of an elephant's tusk, or the walk

1 Letter VII. 2 Letter XLIII.

I

xvi WHITE'S SELBORNE

of the gallincB ; of hills attracting clouds, or the association
of sounds ; of Mahommedans dusting themselves, or of long-
billed birds fattening during moderate frosts, his text is always
instructive and entertaining.

It was rightly judged by the discerning Selborne curate
that it is the repeated melting and freezing of the snow,
rather than the severity of the cold, that is fatal to vegeta-
tion, especially in the case of tender evergreens. On this
subject his remarks may be read with advantage to-day by
all who are interested in the planting of trees and shrubs.^
It may be added, however, that many species which are gener-
ally considered tender, or not hardy, may be acclimated by
proper protection during winter for a few seasons, until they
have become firmly established, and gradually inured to a
change of climate.

The shifting vane of the weather was ever attentively
regarded by White, the last letters of his picturesque mono-
graph, which are devoted to the meteorology and climatic
phenomena of the district, revealing him as an accomplished
Blasius in deciphering the handwriting of the sky and the
wayward moods of clouds and air-currents. It is to be re-
gretted that he did not carry out his intention of adding an
Annus Historico-naturalis, or " The Natural History of the
Twelve Months of the Year," which was to have comprised
many incidents and occurrences not included in his chronicle.

Thus, ever attentive to the doings of the natural world, and
satisfied with his lot and surroundings, Gilbert White fully
exemplified Sir Henry Wotton's definition of a happy life.
To say that he found Contentment in its entirety and knew
naught of vexation, however, were misleading. The sun may
not always shine, and by whom shall the asperity of the east
wind be stayed "i And who among mankind has ever yet dis-
covered the siren that the poets and philosophers since time
immemorial have sought to woo ? Even his gold was not
entirely without alloy ; and he, too, in a minor way, had his
trials and tribulations. The smoke from the heath-fires of
Wolmer annoyed him ; aphides, wasps, and honey-dews marred
the attractions of his garden ; and frosts at times cut down his

1 Letter CV.

WHITE'S SELBORNE xvii

pet bays and laurestines. In vain did he try to solve the
riddle of the great preponderance of females among the chaf-
finches in winter ; while he bewailed the fact that he had no
companion " to quicken his industry and sharpen his atten-
tion." Moreover, the occasional " turbulence " of the weather
in the spring interfered with his walks and investigations ; and
though the rasping voice of the katydid was absent, the din
of the field-crickets was so great in hot weather as " to make
the hills echo." Perhaps his greatest tribulation was con-
nected with his uncertainty of the hybernation of the swallow
kind, and his saddest refrain the regret of the poet, —

" Voiseau qui charvie le bocage,
Helas ! ne chante pas toujour s^'' —

existing conditions which even the wishing-stone on the neigh-
boring hillside was powerless to exorcise.

The hand of time has left comparatively little mark upon
the external scene at Selborne since White lived and recorded,
and the fairies were wont to dance nightly on Wolmer Common.
In the churchyard, the giant yew still casts its shade, and at
dusk the rooks chant their Aves as they wing their way to
the deep beechen woods of Tisted and Ropley. The old male
yew, then twenty-three feet in circumference, has increased
several feet in girth since White last sat beneath its "pillared
shade" and mused upon its symbol of immortality, — that
while " generation after generation might be gathered to their
fathers, it still proclaims to those who remain that all, like its
evergreen unchanging hue, were yet living in another world
that life which had been the object of their desire."^ The
church, which dates from the reign of Henry VII., has recently
been "restored"; and its irregular pews, " of all dimensions
and heights, patched up according to the fancy of the own-
ers," as is recorded in "The Antiquities of Selborne," have
been removed and replaced by low modern benches. Gilbert

^ The age of the Selborne yew is unknown. The Anlcerwyke yew, near Wind-
sor, under which Henry VIII. is said to have met Anna Boleyn, is supposed to be
upwards of one thousand years old; while, according to Decandolle, thirty centu-
ries must be assigned as the age of the patriarchal tree at Braburne, and from
twenty-five to twenty-six centuries to that at Fortingal.

XVlil WHITE'S SELBORNE

White's house in the village, known as " The Wakes," a
heritage from his uncle in 1763, — his

"rural, sheltered, unobscured retreat," —

yet remains, the old rooms being still left, though their arrange-
ment has been altered, and the whole has been considerably
enlarged. In the garden, " whose terrace commands so roman-
tic and picturesque a prospect that the first master in landscape
might deem it an object well worthy of his pencil," stands his
sun-dial, and in the paddock near the garden are the remains
of his summer-house.

Audubon and Wilson, together with Thoreau, Jefferies, and
other Idyllists of the Country-side, have rendered ornithology
and similar studies easier since the monograph of the illus-
trious Hampshire parson; but he must still be regarded as
the stepping-stone to careful observation, and the inspiration,
more or less, of the flocks of volumes that have succeeded his
which are concerned with ornithology and various branches
of natural history, more especially the less technical works
on out-of-door studies and out-of-door life. Restricted space
necessarily precludes a comparison of the " Natural History
of Selborne" with numerous works of other authorities on kin-
dred themes. And although the author's facts and observations
relate to a country whose fauna and characteristics differ
largely from our own, they will be found none the less inter-
esting; while so far as the manner of presentation is con-
cerned, his volume will always serve as a model on which it
is difficult to improve.

The name of Selborne has been immortalized by Gilbert
White ; and the visitor who accepts his olden " Invitation "
to climb the Hanger and view the beauties of its lovely pas-
toral surroundings, or who seeks the scene of his Echo in the
romantic path to Nore Hill, will intuitively recall the lines of
the " Faerie Queene " : —

" And every wood, and every valley wide,
He filled with Hylas' name, the nymphs eke Hylas crlde."

George H. Ellwanger.

Jiiliu;! UiiaaCol.iUi y.Y

ADVERTISEMENT TO ORIGINAL EDITION

THE Author of the following Letters takes the liberty,
with all proper deference, of laying before the public
his idea of pat'ocJiial history, which, he thinks, ought
to consist of natural productions and occurrences as well
as antiquities. He is also of opinion that if stationary men
would pay some attention to the districts on which they reside,
and would publish their thoughts respecting the objects that
surround them, from such materials might be drawn the
most complete county-histories, which are still wanting in
several parts of this kingdom, and in particular in the county
of Southampton.

And here he seizes the first opportunity, though a late one,
of returning his most grateful acknowledgments to the rev-
erend the President and the reverend and worthy the Fellows
of Magdalen College in the University of Oxford, for their
liberal behavior in permitting their archives to be searched by
a member of their own society, so far as the evidences therein
contained might respect the parish and Priory of Selborne.
To that gentleman, also, and his assistant, whose labors and
attention could only be equaled by the very kind manner in
which they were bestowed, many and great obligations are
also due.

Of the authenticity of the documents above-mentioned there
can be no doubt, since they consist of the identical deeds
and records that were removed to the College from the
Priory at the time of its dissolution ; and, being carefully
copied on the spot, may be depended on as genuine ; and,
never having been made public before, may gratify the curi-
osity of the antiquary, as well as establish the credit of the
history.

XIX

XX ADVERTISEMENT TO ORIGINAL EDITION

If the writer should at all appear to have induced any of
his readers to pay a more ready attention to the wonders of
the Creation, too frequently overlooked as common occur-
rences ; or if he should by any means, through his researches,
have lent a helping hand towards the enlargement of the
boundaries of historical and topographical knowledge ; or if
he should have thrown some small light upon ancient customs
and manners, and especially on those that were monastic ;
his purpose will be fully answered. But if he should not
have been successful in any of these, his intentions, yet there
remains this consolation behind — that these, his pursuits, by
keeping the body and mind employed, have, under Provi-
dence, contributed to much health and cheerfulness of spirits,
even to old age ; and, what still adds to his happiness, have
led him to the knowledge of a circle of gentlemen whose
intelligent communications, as they have afforded him much
pleasing information, so, could he flatter himself with a con-
tinuation of them, would they ever be deemed a matter of
singular satisfaction and improvement.

Sei.borne,
January \st, 1788.

CONTENTS

PAGE

The Natural History of Selborne 3

The Antiquities of Selborne 241

Observations on Various Parts of Nature . . • 329

THE

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE

LETTERS ADDRESSED TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQ.

LETTER I

THE parish of Selbdrne lies in the extreme eastern cor-
ner of the county of Hampshire, bordering on the county
of Sussex, and not far from the county of Surrey ; is
about fifty miles south-west of London, in latitude fifty-one, and
near mid-way between the towns of Alton and Petersfield. Be-
ing very large and extensive, it abuts on twelve parishes, two
of which are in Sussex, viz., Trotton and Rogate. If you be-
gin from the south and proceed westward, the adjacent parishes
are Emshot, Newton Valence, Faringdon, Harteley Mauduit,
Great Ward le ham, Kingsley, Hadleigh, Bramshot, Trotton,
Rogate, Lyffe, and Greatham. The soils of this district are
almost as various and diversified as the views and aspects.
The high part of the south-west consists of a vast hill of chalk,
rising three hundred feet above the village, and is divided into
a sheep-down, the high wood and a long hanging wood, called
The Hanger. The covert of this eminence is altogether beech,
the most lovely of all forest trees, whether we consider its
smooth rind or bark, its glossy foliage, or graceful pendulous
boughs.^ The down, or sheepwalk, is a pleasing park-like
spot, of about one mile by half that space, jutting out on the
verge of the hill-country, where it begins to break down into
the plains, and commanding a very engaging view, being an
assemblage of hill, dale, wood-lands, heath, and water. The

3

D. H. HILL LIBRARY
North Carolina State College

4 WHITE

prospect is bounded to the south-east and east by the vast
range of mountains called the Sussex Downs, by Guild-down
near Guildford, and by the Downs round Dorking, and Rye-
gate in Surrey, to the north-east, which altogether, with the
country beyond Alton and Farnham, form a noble and exten-
sive outline.

At the foot of this hill, one stage or step from the uplands,
lies the village, which consists of one single straggling street,
three-quarters of a mile in length, in a sheltered vale, and run-
ning parallel with The Hanger. The houses are divided from
the hill by a vein of stiff clay (good wheat-land), yet stand on
a rock of white stone, little in appearance removed from chalk ;
but seems so far from being calcareous, that it endures extreme
heat. Yet that the freestone still preserves somewhat that is
analogous to chalk, is plain from the beeches which descend as
low as those rocks extend, and no farther, and thrive as well
on them, where the ground is steep, as on the chalks.

The cart-way of the village divides, in a remarkable man-
ner, two very incongruous soils. To the south-west is a rank
clay, that requires the labor of years to render it mellow ;
while the gardens to the north-east, and small enclosures
behind, consist of a warm, forward, crumbling mould, called
black malm, which seems highly saturated with vegetable
and animal manure ; and these may perhaps have been the
original site of the town ; while the woods and coverts might
extend down to the opposite bank.^

At each end of the village, which runs from south-east to
north-west, arises a small rivulet : that at the north-west end
frequently fails; but the other is a fine perennial spring,
little influenced by drought or wet seasons, called Well-head.^
This breaks out of some high grounds joining to Nore Hill,
a noble chalk promontory, remarkable for sending forth two
streams into two different seas. The one to the south becomes
a branch of the Arun, running to Arundel, and so sailing into
the British Channel : the other to the north. The Selborne
stream makes one branch of the Wey; and, meeting the
Black-down stream at Hedleigh, and the Alton and Farnham
stream at Tilford-bridge, swells into a considerable river,
navigable at Godalming ; from whence it passes to Guildford,

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 5

and so into the Thames at Weybridge ; and thus at the Nore
into the German Ocean.

Our wells, at an average, run to about sixty-three feet, and
when sunk to that depth seldom fail ; but produce a fine lim-
pid water, soft to the taste, and much commended by those
who drink the pure element, but which does not lather well
with soap.

To the north-west, north and east of the village, is a range
of fair enclosures, consisting of what is called a white malm, a
sort of rotten or rubble stone, which, when turned up to the frost
and rain, moulders to pieces, and becomes manure to itself.'*

Still on to the north-east, and a step lower, is a kind of
white land, neither chalk nor clay, neither fit for pasture nor
for the plough, yet kindly for hops, which root deep in the
freestone, and have their poles and wood for charcoal growing
just at hand. The white soil produces the brightest hops.

As the parish still inclines down towards Wolmer-forest, at
the juncture of the clays and sand the soil becomes a wet,
sandy loam, remarkable for timber, and infamous for roads.
The oaks of Temple and Blackmoor stand high in the esti-
mation of purveyors, and have furnished much naval timber;
while the trees on the freestone grow large, but are what
workmen call shaky, and so brittle as often to fall to pieces
in sawing. Beyond the sandy loam the soil becomes a hungry
lean sand, till it mingles with the forest; and will produce
little without the assistance of lime and turnips.

Notes

* A noticeable feature about the beech is the peculiar absence of under-
wood beneath it. Thus the stem is seen in its full beauty. The decaying
beech-mast and leaves lying upon the ground are apparently inimical to
other vegetable life.

2 The north-east part of Selborne stands upon the Upper Greensand,
while to the south-west is the Chalk Marl, abruptly divided from each other
as mentioned by White. — G. Christopher Davies.

^ This spring produced, September loth, 1871, after a severe hot sum-
mer, and a preceding dry spring and winter, nine gallons of water in a
minute, which is 540 in an hour, and 12,960, or 216 hogsheads, in twenty-
four hours, or one natural day. At this time many of the wells failed, and
all the ponds in the vale were dry. — Gilbert White.

* This soil produces good wheat and clover. — G. W.

WHITE

LETTER II

In the court of Norton farmhouse, a manor farm to the north-
west of the village, on the white malms, stood within these
twenty years a broad-leaved elm, or wych hazel, iilmiis folio
latissimo scabro of Ray, which, though it had lost a consider-
able leading bough in the great storm in the year 1 703, equal
to a moderate tree, yet, when felled, contained eight loads of
timber ; and being too bulky for a carriage, was sawn off at
seven feet above the butt, where it measured near eight feet
in the diameter. This elm I mention to show to what a bulk
planted elms may attain ; as this tree must certainly have been
such from its situation.

In the centre of the village, and near the church, is a square
piece of ground surrounded by houses, and vulgarly called
" The Plestor." In the midst of this spot stood, in old times,
a vast oak, with a short squat body, and huge horizontal arms
extending almost to the extremity of the area. This venera-
ble tree, surrounded with stone steps, and seats above them,
was the delight of old and young, and a place of much resort
in summer evenings ; where the former sat in grave debate,
while the latter frolicked and danced before them. Long
might it have stood, had not the amazing tempest in 1703
overturned it at once, to the infinite regret of the inhabitants,
and the vicar, who bestowed several pounds in setting it in its
place again : but all his care could not avail ; the tree sprouted
for a time, then withered and died. This oak I mention to
show to what a bulk planted oaks also may arrive : and planted
this tree must certainly have been, as will appear from what
will be said farther concerning this area, when we enter on the
antiquities of Selborne.

On the Blackmoor estate there is a small wood called Losel's,
of a few acres, that was lately furnished with a set of oaks of
a peculiar growth and great value ; they were tall and taper
like firs, but standing near together had very small heads, only
a little brush without any large limbs. About twenty years
ago the bridge at the Toy, near Hampton Court, being much
decayed, some trees were wanted for the repairs that were fifty

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 7

feet long without bough, and would measure twelve inches
diameter at the little end. Twenty such trees did a purveyor
find in this little wood, with this advantage, that many of them
answered the description at sixty feet. These trees were sold
for twenty pounds apiece.

In the centre of this grove there stood an oak, which, though
shapely and tall on the whole, bulged out into a large excres*
cence about the middle of the stem. On this a pair of ravens
had fixed their residence for such a series of years, that the
oak was distinguished by the title of the Raven Tree. Many
were the attempts of the neighboring youths to get at this
eyry : the difficulty whetted their inclinations, and each was
ambitious of surmounting the arduous task. But, when they
arrived at the swelling, it jutted out so in their way, and was
so far beyond their grasp, that the most daring lads were awed,
and acknowledged the undertaking to be too hazardous : so
the ravens built on, nest upon nest, in perfect security, till the
fatal day arrived in which the wood was to be levelled. It
was in the month of February, when these birds usually sit.
The saw was applied to the butt, — the wedges were inserted
into the opening, — the woods echoed to the heavy blow of
the beetle or mall or mallet, — the tree nodded to its fall; but
still the dam sat on. At last, when it gave way, the bird was
flung from her nest; and, though her parental affection de-
served a better fate, was whipped down by the twigs, which
brought her dead to the ground.^

Note

^ The landrail, that shyest of birds, often sits upon its eggs on the ground
in the hayfield until it is slain by the scythe of the mowers. Instances in-
numerable of the tenacity with which birds will sit on their eggs when they
are nearly hatched may be cited. I once lifted a hen blackbird off her nest,
and she came back again when we had moved a few feet away. All birds
and animals are bold in the defence of their young, and it seems strange
that this affection should so completely vanish as it does when the young
are able to shift for themselves. — G. C. D.

8 WHITE

LETTER III

The fossil-shells of this district, and sorts of stone, such as
have fallen within my observation, must not be passed over
in silence. And first I must mention, as a great curiosity, a
specimen that was ploughed up in the chalky fields, near the
side of the Down, and given to me for the singularity of its
appearance, which, to an incurious eye, seems like a petrified
fish of about four inches long, the cardo passing for a head
and mouth. It is in reality a bivalve of the Linnaean Genus
of Mytilus, and the species of Crista Galli ; called by Lister,
Rastelliim; by Rumphius, Ostreiim plicatum minus ; by D'Ar-
genville, Auris Porci, s. Crista Galli ; and by those who make
collections. Cock's Comb.^ Though I applied to several such
in London, I never could meet with an entire specimen ; nor
could I ever find in books any engraving from a perfect one.
In the superb museum at Leicester House, permission was
given me to examine for this article ; and, though I was dis-
appointed as to the fossil, I was highly gratified with the sight
of several of the shells themselves in high preservation. This
bivalve is only known to inhabit the Indian Ocean, where it
fixes itself to a zoophyte, known by the name Gorgonia. The
curious foldings of the suture the one into the other, the alter-
nate flutings or grooves, and the curved form of my specimen
are much easier expressed by the pencil than by words.

Corniia Ammonis'^ are very common about this village. As
we were cutting an inclining path up the Hanger, the labor-
ers found them frequently on that steep, just under the soil,
in the chalk, and of a considerable size. In the lane above
Wall-head, in the way to Emshot, they abound in the bank in
a darkish sort of marl ; and are usually very small and soft :
but in Clay's Pond, a little farther on, at the end of the pit,
where the soil is dug out for manure, I have occasionally ob-
served them of large dimensions, perhaps fourteen or sixteen
inches in diameter. But as these did not consist of firm stone,
but were formed of a kind of terra lapidosa, or hardened clay,
as soon as they were exposed to the rains and frost they mould-
ered away. These seemed as if they were a very recent pro-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 9

duction. In the chalk-pit, at the north-west end of the Hanger,
large nautili are sometimes observed.

In the very thickest strata of our freestone, and at consider-
able depths, well-diggers often find large scallops or pectines,
having both shells deeply striated, and ridged and furrowed
alternately. They are highly impregnated with, if not wholly
composed of, the stone of the quarry.

Notes

^ This fossil is not what White supposes, but is a different species, be-
longing to the upper greensand, known as Ostrea carinata.

* The Ammonite is a very striking-looking fossil, and a common one.
When I was a small boy I used to delight in playing with a very large one
belonging to my father's collection, which would take to pieces, each sec-
tion of the shell being loose, showing the formation admirably. — G. C. D.

LETTER IV

As in a former letter the freestone of this place has been
only mentioned incidentally, I shall here become more par-
ticular.

This stone is in great request for hearth-stones, and the beds
of ovens : and in lining of lime-kilns it turns to good account;
for the workmen use sandy loam instead of mortar ; the sand
of which fluxes,^ and runs by the intense heat, and so cases
over the whole face of the kiln with a strong vitrified coat-
like glass, that it is well preserved from injuries of weather,
and endures thirty or forty years. When chiselled smooth, it
makes elegant fronts for houses, equal in color and grain to
Bath stone ; and superior in one respect, that, when seasoned,
it does not scale. Decent chimney-pieces are worked from it
of much closer and finer grain than Portland ; and rooms are
floored with it ; but it proves rather too soft for this purpose.
It is a freestone cutting in all directions ; yet has something of
a grain parallel with the horizon, and therefore should not be
surbedded, but laid in the same position that it grows in the
quarry .2 On the ground abroad this firestone will not succeed

10 WHITE

for pavements, because, probably some degrees of saltness pre-
vailing within it, the rain tears the slabs to pieces.^ Though
this stone is too hard to be acted on by vinegar, yet both the
white part, and even the blue rag, ferments strongly in mineral
acids. Though the white stone will not bear wet, yet in every
quarry at intervals there are thin strata of blue rag, which
resist rain and frost ; and are excellent for pitching of stables,
paths, and courts, and for building of dry walls against banks,
a valuable species of fencing much in use in this village, and
for mending of roads. This rag is rugged and stubborn, and
will not hew to a smooth face, but is very durable ; yet, as
these strata are shallow and lie deep, large quantities cannot
be procured but at considerable expense. Among the blue
rags turn up some blocks tinged with a stain of yellow or rust
color, which seem to be nearly as lasting as the blue; and
every now and then balls of a friable substance, like rust of
iron, called rust balls.

In Wolmer Forest I see but one sort of stone, called by
the workmen sand, or forest-stone. This is generally of the
color of rusty iron, and might probably be worked as iron
ore ; is very hard and heavy, and of a firm, compact texture,
and composed of a small roundish crystalline grit, cemented
together by a brown, terrene, ferruginous matter ; will not cut
without difficulty, nor easily strike fire with steel. Being often
found in broad flat pieces, it makes good pavement for paths
about houses, never becoming slippery in frost or rain ; is
excellent for dry walls, and is sometimes used in buildings.
In many parts of that waste it lies scattered on the surface
of the ground ; but is dug on Weaver's Down, a vast hill on
the eastern verge of that forest, where the pits are shallow
and the stratum thin. This stone is imperishable.

From a notion of rendering their work the more elegant,
and giving it a finish, masons chip this stone into small frag-
ments about the size of the head of a large nail, and then
stick the pieces into the wet mortar along the joints of their
freestone walls; this embellishment carries an odd appear-
ance, and has occasioned strangers sometimes to ask us
pleasantly, "whether we fastened our walls together with
tenpenny nails."

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE II

Notes

' There may probably be also in the chalk itself that is burnt for lime a
proportion of sand : for few chalks are so pure as to have none. — G. W.

'■2 To siirbed stone is to set it edgewise, contrary to the posture it had in
the quarry, says Dr. Plot, " Oxfordshire," p. "J"] . But sitrbeddiug diOt% not
succeed in our dry walls ; neither do we use it so in ovens, though he says
it is best for Teynton stone. — G. W.

8 " Firestone is full of salts, and has no sulphur : must be close-grained,
and have no interstices. Nothing supports fire like salts ; saltstone per-
ishes exposed to wet and frost." Plot's Staff., p. 152. — G. W.

LETTER V

Among the singularities of this place the two rocky hollow
lanes, the one to Alton, and the other to the forest, deserve
our attention. These roads, running through the malm lands,
are, by the traffic of ages, and the fretting of water, worn
down through the first stratum of our freestone, and partly
through the second ; so that they look more like water-courses
than roads ; and are bedded with naked rag for furlongs to-
gether. In many places they are reduced sixteen or eighteen
feet beneath the level of the fields ; and after floods, and in
frosts, exhibit very grotesque and wild appearances, from the
tangled roots that are twisted among the strata, and from the
torrents rushing down their broken sides ; and especially when
those cascades are frozen into icicles, hanging in all the fanci-
ful shapes of frost-work. These rugged gloomy scenes affright
the ladies when they peep down into them from the paths above,
and make timid horsemen shudder while they ride along them ;
but delight the naturalist with their various botany, and partic-
ularly with their curious filices with which they abound.

The manor of Selborne, was it strictly looked after, with all
its kindly aspects, and all its sloping coverts, would swarm
with game ; even now hares, partridges, and pheasants abound ;
and in old days woodcocks were as plentiful. There are few
quails, because they more affect open fields than enclosures ;
after harvest some few landrails are seen.

The parish of Selborne, by taking in so much of the forest,

12 WHITE

is a vast district. Those who tread the bounds are employed
part of three days in the business, and are of opinion that the
outline, in all its curves and indentings, does not comprise less
than thirty miles.

The village stands in a sheltered spot, secured by the
Hanger from the strong westerly winds. The air is soft, but
rather moist from the effluvia of so many trees ; yet perfectly
healthy and free from agues.

The quantity of rain that falls on it is very considerable, as
may be supposed in so woody and mountainous a district.^
As my experience of measuring the water is but of short date,
I am not qualified to give the mean quantity .^ I only know
that

Inch. Hund.

From May i, 1779, to the end of the year there fell . . 28 37 !

Jan. I, 1780, to Jan. i, 1781 27 32

Jan. I, 1781, to Jan. I, 1782 30 71

Jan. I, 1782, to Jan. I, 1783 50 26!

Jan. I, 1783, to Jan. I, 1784 33 71

Jan. I, 1784, to Jan. i, 1785 33 80

Jan. I, 1785, to Jan. I, 1786 31 55

Jan. I, 1786, to Jan. i, 1787 39 57

The village of Selborne, and large hamlet of Oakhanger,
with the single farms, and many scattered houses along the
verge of the forest, contain upwards of six hundred and
seventy inhabitants.^

We abound with poor ; many of whom are sober and indus-
trious, and live comfortably in good stone or brick cottages,
which are glazed, and have chambers above stairs ; mud build-
ings we have none. Besides the employment from husbandry,
the men work in hop-gardens, of which we have many ; and
fell and bark timber. In the spring and summer the women
weed the corn ; and enjoy a second harvest in September by
hop-picking. Formerly, in the dead months they availed them-
selves greatly by spinning wool, for making of barragons, a
genteel corded stuff, much in vogue at that time for summer
wear ; and chiefly manufactured at Alton, a neighboring town,
by some of the people called Quakers ; but from circumstances
this trade is at an end.* The inhabitants enjoy a good share
of health and longevity ; and the parish swarms with children.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE

n

Notes

^ Mr. Bell, who lives in the house which was White's, says that the
rainfall at Selborne now is much above the average, and White rightly
attributes this to the hilly and wooded nature of the district. — G. C. D.

- A very intelligent gentleman assures me (and he speaks from upwards
of forty years' experience), that the mean rain of any place cannot be as-
certained till a person has measured it for a very long period. "If I had
only measured the rain," says he, "for the four first years, from 1740 to
1743, I should have said the mean rain at Lyndon was 16J inches for the
year; if from 1740 to 1750, 18} inches. The mean rain before 1763 was
20'" inches, from 1763 and since, 251 inches, from 1770 to 1780, 26 inches.
If only 1773, 1774, and 1775 had been measured, Lyndon mean rain
would have been called 32 inches." — G. W.

* A State of the Parish of Selborne, taken October 4TH, 1783

The number of tenements or families, 136.
The number of inhabitants in the street is 313) Total 676; near five

In the rest of the parish 363 f inhabitants to each

■^ '') tenement.
In the time of the Rev. Gilbert White, Vicar, who died in 1727-8, the
number of inhabitants was computed at about 500.

Average of baptisms for 60 years

years inclus. i^^""' ^•°

From 17^0 to ) -nr , ,

1739, both ^-^^'^'^-^
years inclus. \^^"'' ^'^

12,9

15.3

From 1740 ^ j^ ^

to

1749 incl. )

From 1750

to
1759

F.1:l|'s.^

incl. ) ^- ^■

IS. 7

From 1760 1 j^^ )

1769 incl. P- ^'^j

1779 mcl. ) ^' )

Total of baptisms of Males . . 515
" " Females . 465 ^

Total of baptisms from 1720 to 1779, both inclusive, 60 years

640

980

Average of burials for 60 years

From 1720 to ) ,, , „

1729, both j.j^"'4.8 g

years inclus. ) ^^^- 5-1)

"^^0^0^1^3103 4.81

1739. both
years inclus,

JFem. 5,8j

10,6

From 1740

to

1749 incl,

From 1750

to
1759 incl.

1^.4.9)
(F.5,i(

4.6)
3,8f

i.4

10. o

From 1760 1 ^^g)
1769 incl. y- ^•5\

Total of burials of Males . • 31
" " Females . 3:

Total of burials from 1720 to 1779, l^o^h inclusive, 60 years

1779 incl

j F. 6, 2 I

640

Baptisms exceed Burials by more than one-third.
Baptisms of Males exceed Females by one-tenth, or one in ten.
Burials of Females exceed Males by one in thirty.
It appears that a child, born or bred in this parish, has an equal chance
to live above forty years.

14

WHITE

Twins thirteen times, many of whom dying young have lessened the
chance for life.

Chances for life in men and women appear to be equal.

A Table of the Baptisms, Burials, and Marriages, from January 2,
1761, TO December 25, 1780, in the Parish of Selborne

1761
1762
1763
1764
1765
1766
1767
1768
1769
1770
1771
1772

1773

1774

1775
1776

1777
1778
1779
1780

BAPTISMS

BURIALS

MAR

M.

F.

Tot.

M.

F.

Tot.

8

ID

18

2

4

6

3

7

8

IS

ID

14

24

6

8

10

18

3

4

7

S

II

9

20

10

8

18

6

12

6

18

9

7

16

6

9

13

22

10

6

16

4

14

5

19

6

5

II

2

7

6

13

2

5

7

6

9

14

23

6

5

II

2

10

13

23

4

7

II

3

10

6

16

3

4

7

4

II

10

21

6

10

16

3

8

5

13

7

5

12

3

6

13

19

2

8

10

I

20

7

27

13

8

21

6

II

10

21

4

6

10

6

8

13

21

7

3

10

4

7

13

20

3

4

7

S

14

8

22

5

6

II

s

8

9

17

II

4

IS

3

198

188

386

123

123

246

83

During this period of twenty years the births of males exceeded those
of females ...........

The burials of each sex were equal.

And the births exceeded the deaths

G. W.
^ Since the passage above was written, I am happy in being able to say

that the spinning employment is a little revived, to the no small comfort

of the industrious housewife. — G. W.

10

140

LETTER VI

Should I omit to describe with some exactness the forest of
Wolmer, of which three-fifths perhaps lie in this parish, my
account of Selborne would be very imperfect, as it is a district

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 5

abounding with many curious productions, both animal and
vegetable ; and has often afforded me much entertainment
both as a sportsman and as a naturalist.

The royal forest of Wolmer is a tract of land of about seven
miles in length, by two and a half in breadth, running nearly
from north to south, and is abutted on, to begin to the south,
and so to proceed eastward, by the parishes of Greatham,
Lysse, Rogate, and Trotton, in the county of Sussex; by
Bramshot, Hedleigh, and Kingsley. This royalty consists en-
tirely of sand covered with heath and fern ; but is somewhat
diversified with hills and dales, without having one standing
tree in the whole extent. In the bottoms, where the waters
stagnate, are many bogs, which formerly abounded with sub-
terraneous trees ; though Dr. Plot says positively,^ that " there
never were any fallen trees hidden in the mosses of the south-
ern counties." But he was mistaken : for I myself have seen
cottages on the verge of this wild district, whose timbers con-
sisted of a black hard wood, looking like oak, which the owners
assured me they procured from the bogs by probing the soil
with spits, or some such instruments : but the peat is so much
cut out, and the moors have been so well examined, that none
has been found of late.^ Besides the oak, I have also been
shown pieces of fossil wood of a paler color, and softer nature,
which the inhabitants called fir : but, upon a nice examination,
and trial by fire, I could discover nothing resinous in them ;
and therefore rather suppose that they were parts of a willow
or alder, or some such aquatic tree.

This lonely domain is a very agreeable haunt for many
sorts of wild fowls, which not only frequent it in the winter,
but breed there in the summer ; such as lapwings, snipes,
wild-ducks, and, as I have discovered within these few years,
teals. Partridges in vast plenty are bred in good seasons on
the verge of this forest, into which they love to make excur-
sions ; and in particular, in the dry summers of 1740 and 1741,
and some years after, they swarmed to such a degree that
parties of unreasonable sportsmen killed twenty and some-
times thirty brace in a day.

But there was a nobler species of game in this forest, now
extinct, which I have heard old people say abounded much

l6 WHITE

before shooting flying became so common, and that was the
heath-cock, black-game, or grouse. When I was a Httle boy I
recollect one coming now and then to my father's table. The
last pack remembered was killed about thirty-five years ago ;
and within these ten years one solitary greyhen was sprung by
some beagles in beating for a hare. The sportsmen cried out
" A hen pheasant ! " but a gentleman present, who had often
seen grouse in the north of England, assured me that it was
a greyhen.

Nor does the loss of our black-game prove the only gap in
the Fauna Selborniensis ; for another beautiful link in the
chain of beings is wanting, I mean the red deer, which toward
the beginning of this century amounted to about five hundred
head, and made a stately appearance. There is an old keeper,
now alive, named Adams, whose great grandfather (mentioned
in a perambulation taken in 1635), grandfather, father, and
self, enjoyed the head keepership of Wolmer Forest in succes-
sion for more than a hundred years. This person assures me,
that his father has often told him, that Queen Anne, as she
was journeying on the Portsmouth road, did not think the for-
est of Wolmer beneath her royal regard. For she came out
of the great road at Lippock, which is just by, and, reposing
herself on a bank smoothed for that purpose, lying about half
a mile to the east of Wolmer Pond, and still called Queen's
Bank, saw with great complacency and satisfaction the whole
herd of red deer brought by the keepers along the vale before
her, consisting then of about five hundred head. A sight this,
worthy the attention of the greatest sovereign ! But he farther
adds that, by means of the Waltham blacks or, to use his own
expression, as soon as they began blacking, they were reduced
to about fifty head, and so continued decreasing till the time
of the late Duke of Cumberland. It is now more than thirty
years ago that His Highness sent down a huntsman, and six
yeoman-prickers, in scarlet jackets laced with gold, attended
by the staghounds ; ordering them to take every deer in this
forest alive, and to convey them in carts to Windsor. In the
course of the summer they caught every stag, some of which
showed extraordinary diversion : but in the following winter,
when the hinds were also carried off, such fine chases were

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 7

exhibited as served the country people for matter of talk and
wonder for years afterwards. I saw myself one of the yeoman-
prickers single out a stag from the herd, and must confess that
it was the most curious feat of activity I ever beheld, superior
to anything in Mr. Astley's riding-school. The exertions made
by the horse and deer much exceeded all my expectations ;
though the former greatly excelled the latter in speed. When
the devoted deer was separated from his companions, they
gave him, by their watches, law, as they called it, for twenty
minutes ; when, sounding their horns, the stop-dogs were per-
mitted to pursue, and a most gallant scene ensued.

Notes

1 See his " History of Staffordshire." — G. W.

2 Old people have assured me, that on a winter's morning they have dis-
covered these trees, in the bogs, by the hoar frost, which lay longer over the
space where they are concealed than in the surrounding morass. Nor does
this seem to be a fanciful notion, but consistent with true philosophy. Dr.
Hales saith, " That the warmth of the earth, at some depth under ground,
has an influence in promoting a thaw, as well as the change of the weather
from a freezing to a thawing state, is manifest from this observation, viz.,
Nov. 29th, 1 73 1, a little snow having fallen in the night, it was, by eleven
the next morning, mostly melted away on the surface of the earth, except in
several places in Bushy Park, where there were drains dug and covered with
earth, on which the snow continued to lie, whether those drains were full
of water or dry ; as also where elm-pipes lay under ground : a plain proof
this, that those drains intercepted the warmth of the earth from ascending
from greater depths below them ; for the snow lay where the drain had more
than four feet depth of earth over it. It continued also to lie on thatch,
tiles, and the tops of walls." See Hale's " Haemastatics," p. 360. Query,
Might not such observations be reduced to domestic use, by promoting the
discovery of old obliterated drains and wells about houses ; and in Roman
stations and camps lead to the finding of pavements, baths and graves, and
other hidden relics of curious antiquity? — G. W.

LETTER VII

Though large herds of deer do much harm to the neigh-
borhood, yet the injury to the morals of the people is of more
moment than the loss of their crops. The temptation is irre-
sistible ; for most men are sportsmen by constitution : and
3

l8 WHITE

there is such an inherent spirit for hunting in human nature,
as scarce any inhibitions can restrain. Hence, towards the
beginning of this century all this country was wild about deer-
stealing. Unless he was a hunter, as they affected to call
themselves, no young person was allowed to be possessed of
manhood or gallantry. The Waltham blacks at length com-
mitted such enormities, that government was forced to interfere
with that severe and sanguinary act called the " Black Act," ^
which now comprehends more felonies than any law that ever
was framed before. And, therefore, a late Bishop of Win-
chester, when urged to re-stock Waltham Chase,^ refused, from
a motive worthy of a prelate, replying " that it had done mis-
chief enough already."

Our old race of deer-stealers is hardly extinct yet : it was but
a little while ago that, over their ale, they used to recount the
exploits of their youth ; such as watching the pregnant hind
to her lair, and, when the calf was dropped, paring its feet with
a penknife to the quick to prevent its escape, till it was large
and fat enough to be killed ; the shooting at one of their neigh-
bors with a bullet in a turnip-field by moonshine, mistaking
him for a deer ; and the losing a dog in the following extraor-
dinary manner: Some fellows, suspecting that a calf new-fallen
was deposited in a certain spot of thick fern, went, with a
lurcher, to surprise it ; when the parent-hind rushed out of the
brake, and, taking a vast spring with all her feet close together,
pitched upon the neck of the dog, and broke it short in two.^

Another temptation to idleness and sporting was a number
of rabbits, which possessed all the hillocks and dry places : but
these being inconvenient to the huntsmen, on account of their
burrows, when they came to take away the deer, they permitted
the country-people to destroy them all.

Such forests and wastes, when their allurements to irregu-
larities are removed, are of considerable service to neighbor-
hoods that verge upon them, by furnishing them with peat and
turf for their firing ; with fuel for the burning their lime ; and
with ashes for their grasses ; and by maintaining their geese
and their stock of young cattle at little or no expense.

The manor farm of the parish of Greatham has an admitted
claim, I see (by an old record taken from the Tower of Lon-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 19

don), of turning all live stock on the forest, at proper sea-
sons, " bidentibus exceptis." * The reason, I presume, why
sheep ^ are excluded, is, because, being such close grazers,
they would pick out all the finest grasses, and hinder the deer
from thriving.

Though (by statute 4 and 5 W. and Mary, c, 23) " to burn
on any waste, between Candlemas and Midsummer, any grig,
ling, heath and furze, goss or fern, is punishable with whipping
and confinement in the house of correction ; " yet, in this forest,
about March or April, according to the dryness of the season,
such vast heath-fires are lighted up, that they often get to a
masterless head, and, catching the hedges, have sometimes
been communicated to the underwoods, woods, and coppices,
where great damage has ensued. The plea for these burnings
is, that, when the old coat of heath, etc., is consumed, young
will sprout up, and afford much tender browse for cattle ; but,
where there is large old furze, the fire, following the roots,
consumes the very ground ; so that for hundreds of acres noth-
ing is to be seen but smother and desolation, the whole circuit
round looking like the cinders of a volcano ; and, the soil being
quite exhausted, no traces of vegetation are to be found for
years.^ These conflagrations, as they take place usually with
a northeast or east wind, much annoy this village with their
smoke, and often alarm the country ; and, once in particular,
I remember that a gentleman, who lives beyond Andover,
coming to my house, when he got on the downs between that
town and Winchester, at twenty-five miles' distance, was sur-
prised much with smoke and a hot smell of fire; and concluded
that Alresford was in flames; but, when he came to that town,
he then had apprehensions for the next village, and so on to
the end of his journey.

On two of the most conspicuous eminences of this forest
stand two arbors or bowers, made of the boughs of oak ; the
one called Waldon Lodge, the other Brimstone Lodge : these
the keepers renew annually on the feast of St. Barnabas, tak-
ing the old materials for a perquisite. The farm called Black-
moor, in this parish, is obliged to find the posts and brush-wood
for the former ; while the farms at Greatham, in rotation, fur-
nish for the latter; and are all enjoined to cut and deliver the

20 WHITE

materials at the spot. This custom I mention, because I look
upon it to be of very remote antiquity.

Notes

1 Statute 9 Geo. I. cap. 22. — G. W.

2 This chase remains unstocked to this day ; the bishop was Dr.
Hoadly. — G. W.

8 Deer will attack serpents by jumping on them with all four feet at once,
and I have seen sheep serve obnoxious objects in the same way. — G. C. D.

* For this privilege the owners of that estate used to pay to the king
annually seven bushels of oats. — G. W.

^ In the Holt, where a full stock of fallow-deer has been kept up till lately,
no sheep are admitted to this day. — G. W.

^ On the Welsh hills these conflagrations continually take place, and are
very splendid at night. It is often expedient to burn a patch of gorse or
heather for the sake of the sheep ; but when the fire gets beyond control,
as it sometimes does, the mischief done is enormous. The conical hill in
the Vale of Llangollen, known as Crow Castle, clothed on three sides with
fir plantations, once caught fire, and from base to summit was a mass of
flames, that lit up the country for miles by night, and shaded the valley
with its smoke by day. — G. C. D.

LETTER VIII

On the verge of the forest, as it is now circumscribed, are
three considerable lakes, two in Oakhanger, of which I have
nothing particular to say ; and one called Bin's, or Bean's
Pond, which is worthy the attention of a naturalist or a sports-
man. For, being crowded at the upper end with willows, and
with the carex cespitosa,^ it affords such a safe and pleasing
shelter to wild ducks, teals, snipes, etc., that they breed there.
In the winter this covert is also frequented by foxes, and some-
times by pheasants ; and the bogs produce many curious plants.
(For which consult Letter XLI. to Mr. Barrington.)

By a perambulation of Wolmer Forest and the Holt, made
in 1635, and the eleventh year of Charles I. (which now lies
before me), it appears that the limits of the former are much
circumscribed. For, to say nothing of the farther side, with
which I am not so well acquainted, the bounds on this side, in
old times, came into Binswood ; and extended to the ditch of

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 21

Ward le Ham Park, in which stands the curious mount called
King John's Hill, and Lodge Hill ; and to the verge of Hart-
ley Mauduit, called Mauduit Hatch; comprehending also
Short Heath, Oakhanger, and Oakwoods ; a large district, now-
private property, though once belonging to the royal domain.

It is remarkable that the term purlieu is never once men-
tioned in this long roll of parchment. It contains, besides the
perambulation, a rough estimate of the value of the timbers,
which were considerable, growing at that time in the district
of the Holt ; and enumerates the officers, superior and infe-
rior, of those joint forests, for the time being, and their osten-
sible fees and perquisites. In those days, as at present, there
were hardly any trees in Wolmer Forest.

Within the present limits of the forest are three considera-
ble lakes, Hogmer, Cranmer, and Wolmer ; all of which are
stocked with carp, tench, eels, and perch : but the fish do not
thrive well, because the water is hungry, and the bottoms are
a naked sand.

A circumstance respecting these ponds, though by no means
peculiar to them, I cannot pass over in silence ; and that is,
that instinct by which in summer all the kine, whether oxen,
cows, calves, or heifers, retire constantly to the water during
the hotter hours ; where, being more exempt from flies, and
inhaling the coolness of that element, some belly deep, and
some only to mid-leg, they ruminate and solace themselves
from about ten in the morning till four in the afternoon, and
then return to their feeding. During this great proportion of
the day they drop much dung, in which insects nestle ; and so
supply food for the fish, which would be poorly subsisted but
from this contingency. Thus Nature, who is a great econo-
mist, converts the recreation of one animal to the support of
another ! Thomson, who was a nice observer of natural occur-
rences, did not let this pleasing circumstance escape him. He
says, in his " Summer,"

"A various group the herds and flocks compose ;

on the grassy bank

Some ruminating lie ; while others stand
Half in the flood, and, often bending, sip
The circling surface."

22 WHITE

Wolmer Pond, so called, I suppose, for eminence' sake, is
a vast lake for this part of the world, containing, in its whole
circumference, 2,646 yards, or very near a mile and a half.
The length of the north-west and opposite side is about 704
yards, and the breadth of the south-west end about 456 yards.
This measurement, which I caused to be made with good ex-
actness, gives an area of about sixty-six acres, exclusive of a
large irregular arm at the north-east corner, which we did not
take into the reckoning.

On the face of this expanse of waters, and perfectly secure
from fowlers, lie all day long, in the winter season, vast flocks
of ducks, teals, and widgeons, of various denominations ; where
they preen and solace, and rest themselves, till towards sunset,
when they issue forth in little parties (for in their natural state
they are all birds of the night) to feed in the brooks and mead-
ows ; returning again with the dawn of the morning. Had
this lake an arm or two more, and were it planted round with
thick covert (for now it is perfectly naked), it might make a
valuable decoy.

Yet neither its extent, nor the clearness of its water, nor
the resort of various and curious fowls, nor its picturesque
groups of cattle, can render this meer so remarkable as the
great quantity of coins that were found in its bed about forty
years ago. But, as such discoveries more properly belong to
the antiquities of this place, I shall suppress all particulars for
the present, till I enter professedly on my series of letters
respecting the more remote history of this village and district.

Note

* I mean that sort which, rising into tall hassocks, is called by the for-
esters torrets ; a corruption, I suppose, of turrets. — G. W.

In the beginning of the summer of 1787, the royal forests of Wolmer and
Holt were measured by persons sent down by government. — G. W.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 23

LETTER IX

By way of supplement, I shall trouble you once more on
this subject, to inform you that Wolmer, with her sister forest
Ayles Holt, alias Alice Holt,^ as it is called in old records, is
held by grant from the crown for a term of years.

The grantees that the author remembers are Brigadier-Gen-
eral Emanuel Scroope Howe, and his lady, Ruperta, who was
a natural daughter of Prince Rupert by Margaret Hughes ; a
Mr. Mordaunt, of the Peterborough family, who married a
dowager Lady Pembroke ; Henry Bilson Legge and lady ;
and now Lord Stawell, their son.

The lady of General Howe lived to an advanced age, long
surviving her husband ; and, at her death, left behind her
many curious pieces of mechanism of her father's construct-
ing, who was a distinguished mechanic and artist,^ as well as
warrior ; and among the rest, a very complicated clock, lately
in possession of Mr. Elmer, the celebrated game painter at
Farnham, in the county of Surrey.

Though these two forests are only parted by a narrow range
of enclosures, yet no two soils can be more different ; for the
Holt consists of a strong loam, of a miry nature, carrying a
good turf, and abounding with oaks that grow to be large tim-
ber; while Wolmer is nothing but a hungry, sandy, barren
waste.

The former being all in the parish of Binsted, is about two
miles in extent from north to south, and near as much from
east to west ; and contains within it many wood-lands and
lawns, and the great lodge where the grantees reside, and a
smaller lodge called Goose Green ; and is abutted on by the
parishes of Kingsley, Frinsham, Farnham, and Bentley ; all of
which have right of common.

One thing is remarkable, that though the Holt has been of
old well stocked with fallow-deer, unrestrained by any pales
or fences more than a common hedge, yet they were never
seen within the limits of Wolmer ; nor were the red deer of
Wolmer ever known to haunt the thickets or glades of the
Holt

24 WHITE

At present the deer of the Holt are much thinned and re-
duced by the night hunters, who perpetually harass them in
spite of the efforts of numerous keepers, and the severe penal-
ties that have been put in force against them as often as they
have been detected, and rendered liable to the lash of the law.
Neither fines nor imprisonments can deter them ; so impossi-
ble is it to extinguish the spirit of sporting which seems to be
inherent in human nature.

General Howe turned out some German wild boars and
sows in his forests, to the great terror of the neighborhood,
and, at one time, a wild bull or buffalo ; but the country rose
upon them and destroyed them.

A very large fall of timber, consisting of about one thou-
sand oaks, has been cut this spring (viz., 1784) in the Holt
forest : one-fifth of which, it is said, belongs to the grantee,
Lord Stawell. He lays claim also to the lop and top ; but
the poor of the parishes of Binsted and Frinsham, Bentley
and Kingsley, assert that it belongs to them, and assembling
in a riotous manner, have actually taken it all away. One
man, who keeps a team, has carried home for his share forty
stacks of wood. Forty-five of these people his lordship has
served with actions. These trees, which were very sound and
in high perfection, were winter-cut, viz., in February and
March, before the bark would run. In old times the Holt
was estimated to be eighteen miles, computed measure from
water-carriage, viz., from the town of Chertsey, on the Thames;
but now it is not half that distance, since the Wey is made navi-
gable up to the town of Godalming in the county of Surrey.

Notes

1 " In Rot. Inquisit. de statu forest, in Scaccar. 36 Edw. III., it is called
Aisholt." — G. W.

In the same, "Tit. Woolmer and Aisholt Hantisc. Dominus Rex habet
unam capellam in haia sua de Kingesle." " Haia, sepes, sepimentum, parous ;
a Gall, haie and haye." Spelman's Glossary. — G. W.

2 This prince was the inventor of mezzotinto. — G. W.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 2$

LETTER X

Augitst ^h, 1767.

It has been my misfortune never to have had any neigh-
bors whose studies have led them towards the pursuit of nat-
ural knowledge ; so that, for want of a companion to quicken
my industry and sharpen my attention, I have made but slen-
der progress in a kind of information to which I have been
attached from my childhood.

As to swallows {Jiirundines nistic(2) being found in a torpid
state during the winter in the Isle of Wight or any other part
of this county, I never heard any such account worth attend-
ing to. But a clergyman, of an inquisitive turn, assures me, that
when he was a great boy, some workmen, in pulling down the
battlements of a church tower early in the spring, found two
or three swifts (Jiirundines apodes) among the rubbish, which
were at first appearance dead, but on being carried towards
the fire revived. He told me, that out of his great care to pre-
serve them, he put them in a paper bag, and hung them by
the kitchen fire, where they were suffocated.

Another intelligent person has informed me, that while he
was a schoolboy at Brighthelmstone, in Sussex, a great frag-
ment of the chalk cliff fell down one stormy winter on the
beach, and that many people found swallows among the rub-
bish ; but on my questioning him whether he saw any of those
birds himself, to my no small disappointment, he answered me
in the negative ; but that others assured him they did.

Young broods of swallows began to appear this year on
July nth, and young martins {Jiirundines iirbicce) were then
fledged in their nests. Both species will breed again once.
For I see by my fauna of last year, that young broods came
forth so late as September i8th. Are not these late hatchings
more in favor of hiding than migration } Nay, some young
martins remained in their nests last year so late as Septem-
ber 29th ; and yet they totally disappeared with us by the 5th
October.

How strange it is that the swift, which seems to live exactly
the same life with the swallow and house-martin, should leave
us before the middle of August invariably ! while the latter

26 WHITE

Stay often till the middle of October ; and once I saw numbers
of house-martins on the 7th November. The martins and red-
wing fieldfares were flying in sight together, an uncommon
assemblage of summer and winter birds !

A little yellow bird ^ (it is either a species of the alauda tri-
vialis, or rather perhaps of the motacilla trochihis) still con-
tinues to make a sibilous shivering noise in the tops of tall
woods. The stoparola of Ray (for which we have as yet no
name in these parts) is called in your zoology the fly-catcher.
There is one circumstance characteristic of this bird which
seems to have escaped observation, and that is, it takes its stand
on the top of some stake or post, from whence it springs forth
on its prey, catching a fly in the air, and hardly ever touching
the ground, but returning still to the same stand for many times
together.''^

I perceive there are more than one species of the motacilla
trochihis. Mr. Derham supposes, in " Ray's Philos. Letters,"
that he has discovered three. In these there is again an in-
stance of some very common birds that have as yet no English
name.

Mr. Stillingfleet makes a question whether the black-cap
{motacilla atvicapilld) be a bird of passage or not ^ : I think
there is no doubt of it : for, in April, in the first fine weather,
they come trooping all at once, into these parts, but are never
seen in the winter. They are delicate songsters.

Numbers of snipes breed every summer in some moory
ground on the verge of this parish. It is very amusing to see
the cock bird on wing at that time, and to hear his piping and
humming notes.*

I have had no opportunity yet of procuring any of those
mice which I mentioned to you in town. The person that
brought me the last says they are plenty in harvest, at which
time I will take care to get more ; and will endeavor to put
the matter out of doubt, whether it be a nondescript species
or not.

I suspect much there may be two species of water-rats.^ Ray
says, and Linnaeus after him, that the water-rat is web-footed
behind. Now I have discovered a rat on the banks of our little
stream that is not web-footed, and yet is an excellent swimmer

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 2/

and diver : it answers exactly to the vius aniphibius of Linnaeus
(see Syst. TVh'/.) which he says " natat ififossis et urinatjir." I
should be glad to procure one ^'plantis palmatis." Linnaeus
seems to be in a puzzle about his mus ampJiibuis, and to doubt
whether it differs from his imis terrestris ; which if it be, as he
allows, the ^^miis agrestis capite grandi brachyuros^' of Ray,
is widely different from the water-rat, both in size, make, and
manner of life.

As to the/^/<:^, which I mentioned in town, I shall take the
liberty to send it down to you into Wales ; presuming on your
candor, that you will excuse me if it should appear as familiar
to you as it is strange to me. Though mutilated " qualem dices
. . . antehac fiiisse, tales cinn sint reliqiiice !''

It haunted a marshy piece of ground in quest of wild-ducks
and snipes; but, when it was shot, had just knocked down a
rook, which it was tearing in pieces. I cannot make it answer
to any of our English hawks ; neither could I find any like it
at the curious exhibition of stuffed birds in Spring Gardens.
I found it nailed up at the end of a barn, which is the country-
man's museum.^

The parish I live in is a very abrupt, uneven country, full of
hills and woods, and therefore full of birds.

Notes

^ Possibly the Grasshopper Warbler. This little bird has a peculiar
sibilant warble, which, like the cry of the corncrake, is apparently ventrilo-
quous. The sound seems here, there, and everywhere, and it is only by the
closest observation and the greatest caution that a sight of the tiny songster
can be obtained. — G. C. D.

- In the verandah of my father's house in Shropshire, four or five pairs
of fly-catchers used to build, and there were other nests on a ledge in the
orchard wall, so that in the summer the standard roses and the gateposts
each had a fly-catcher using it as a raiding-point. The birds which rested
in the verandah took not the slightest notice of people passing and repass-
ing. Sparrows, wrens, and chaffinches also nested among the roses which
trailed up it. — G. C. D.

3 The Black-cap does migrate. — G. C. D.

* The humming of the snipe has puzzled many a naturalist to say how it
was made. It is also called bleating, and, in Norfolk, "lamming," because
the noise is something like that caused by a lamb. I have noticed great
numbers of snipe bleating on the Norfolk Roads, and I am satisfied that it
is made by the rapid vibration of the long feathers of the tail and wings.

28 WHITE

The sound is only made when the snipe is in the air and descending a little,
rapidly, in an oblique direction against the wind. — G. C. D.

5 There is only one species of water-rat, and strictly speaking it is not
a rat. It differs anatomically and in its mode of life from the rat. Its proper
name is the water-vole. Its feet are not webbed. Its food is entirely vege-
table, while the common rat, which is found in numbers by the waterside,
will eat fish or animal matter. Of the rat proper there are two species, the
original black English rat, which is exceedingly rare, and the Norway rat,
which is the one now so common. It has completely ousted the black
rat. — G. C. D.

^ This hawk was apparently a variety of the Peregrine Falcon. — G. C. D.

LETTER XI

Selborne, Septe7nber ()th, 1767.

It will not be without impatience that I shall wait for your
thoughts with regard to Vatfalco; as to its weight, breadth,
etc., I wish I had set them down at the time ; but, to the best
of my remembrance, it weighed two pounds and eight ounces,
and measured, from wing to wing, thirty-eight inches. Its cere
and feet were yellow, and the circle of its eyelids a bright yellow.
As it had been killed some days, and the eyes were sunk, I
could make no good observation on the color of the pupils and
the irides.

The most unusual birds I ever observed in these parts were
a pair of hoopoes {iipiipd)} which came several years ago in
the summer, and frequented an ornamented piece of ground,
which joins to my garden, for someweeks. They used to march
about in a stately manner, feeding in the walks, many times in
the day ; and seemed disposed to breed in my outlet ; but were
frighted and persecuted by idle boys, who would never let them
be at rest.

Three grossbeaks^ {loxia coccothranstes) appeared some
years ago in my fields, in the winter ; one of which I shot.
Since that, now and then, one is occasionally seen in the same
dead season.

A crossbill ^ {loxia curvirostrd) was killed last year in this
neighborhood.

Our streams, which are small, and rise only at the end of

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 29

the village, yield nothing but the bull's head or miller's thumb*
{gobiHs fluviatilis capitaUis), the trout {trutta fluviatilis), the
eel^ {angiiilla), the lampern^ {lavipcetra parva et Jiiiviatilis),
and the stickle-back " {pisciculus aadeattis).

We are twenty miles from the sea, and almost as many from
a great river, and therefore see but little of sea birds. As to
wild fowls, we have a few teems of ducks bred in the moors
where the snipes breed ; and multitudes of widgeons and teals
in hard weather frequent our lakes in the forest.

Having some acquaintance with a tame brown owl, I find
that it casts up the fur of mice, and the feathers of birds in
pellets, after the manner of hawks ; when full, like a dog, it
hides what it cannot eat.

The young of the barn-owl are not easily raised, as they
want a constant supply of fresh mice ; whereas the young of
the brown owl will eat indiscriminately all that is brought ;
snails, rats, kittens, puppies, magpies, and any kind of carrion
or offal.

The house-martins have eggs still, and squab young. The
last swift I observed was about the 21st August: it was a
straggler.

Red-starts, fly-catchers, white-throats, and regidi non crisiati,
still appear : but I have seen no black-caps lately.

I forgot to mention that I once saw, in Christ Church Col-
lege quadrangle in Oxford, on a very sunny warm morning, a
house-martin flying about, and settling on the parapet, so late
as the 20th November.

At present I know only two species of bats, the common
vespertilio imirhms and the vespertilio auribus.^

I was much entertained last summer with a tame bat, which
would take flies out of a person's hand. If you gave it any-
thing to eat, it brought its wings round before the mouth, hov-
ering and hiding its head in the manner of birds of prey when
they feed. The adroitness it showed in shearing off the wings
of the flies, which are always rejected, was worthy of observa-
tion, and pleased me much. Insects seemed to be most ac-
ceptable, though it did not refuse raw flesh when offered ; so
that the notion, that bats go down chimneys and gnaw men's
bacon, seems no improbable story. While I amused myself

30 WHITE

with this wonderful quadruped, I saw it several times confute
the vulgar opinion, that bats when down upon a fiat surface
cannot get on the wing again, by rising with great ease from
the floor. It ran, I observed, with more despatch than I was
aware of ; but in a most ridiculous and grotesque manner.

Bats drink on the wing, like swallows, by sipping the sur-
face, as they play over pools and streams. They love to fre-
quent waters, not only for the sake of drinking, but on account
of insects, which are found over them in the greatest plenty.
As I was going some years ago, pretty late, in a boat from
Richmond to Sunbury, on a warm summer's evening, I think
I saw myriads of bats between the two places ; the air swarmed
with them all along the Thames, so that hundreds were in sight
at a time. I am, etc.

Notes

^ One occasionally sees mention made in the scientific and natural his-
tory periodicals of the occurrence of the hoopoe {iipupa epops). Of course
it is generally shot, and no chance is given it of breeding. Its nest has
only rarely been found in England. — G. C. D.

2 The grossbeak {coccothraustes vulgaris), or as it is more commonly
called, the hawfinch, is not so rare as is generally supposed. Its shyness
prevents its being easily observed. — G. C. D.

3 The crossbill may occasionally be seen, in small flocks, in districts
where the larch is plentiful. With its peculiar curved mandibles, it ex-
tracts the seeds from the fir-cones. The birds vary greatly in size and
color, according to age and sex. They are 3'ellow, green, red, or brown at
different times, so if it were not for their crossed bills, it would be rather
hard to distinguish them. They breed in Norway and Sweden, and very
occasionally in England. — G. C. D.

^ We used, when I was a boy, to catch great numbers of bull-heads to
bait our eel lines with. They were found under every flat stone in the
Shropshire streams, in company with the loach, also an excellent bait.
— G. CD.

^ It is now well known that there are three kinds of eels which inhabit our
rivers and pools, — the snig, and the broad-nosed and sharp-nosed species.
The habits of eels are very peculiar. Nothing certain is known about their
breeding, but it is believed that the young are born alive. In the autumn
the eels descend the rivers in vast numbers, and go either to sea or to the
brackish waters, where they breed. In the spring the little eels, or elvers,
ascend the rivers in columns so dense that they may be scooped out by the
bucketful. — G. CD.

® In the Dee at Llangollen, lamperns were very numerous. They hold
on to stones by means of their round sucker-like mouths, and can move very
heavy ones. — G. C D.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 3 1

' There are six kinds of sticklebacks. Every one knows the common
three-finned one. One kind builds a fiest among the weeds, and guards it
with the utmost vigilance. — G. C. D.

** There seem to be about twenty species of British bats. Four or five
species are tolerably common. The squeak made by the bat is so \ try fine,
that while to some ears it is loud, by others it cannot be heard. I once,
when a boy, was exploring a hollow tree after owls' nests, when the smell
from one particular hole was so dreadful that we put some lighted paper
down to see what would come out ; and to our astonishment dozens of large,
reddish bats flew out, and dashed madly about in the bright sunlight. The
bat has more vermin upon it than any other creature of its size. It seems
needless to state that the bat is an animal, and not a bird or an insect ; but
I saw it gravely stated in the columns of a local journal by two correspond-
ents that it was either of the two latter. — G. C. D.

LETTER XII

November /\th, 1767.

Sir, — It gave me no small satisfaction to hear that ih^falco
turned out an uncommon one. I must confess I should have
been better pleased to have heard that I had sent you a bird
that you had never seen before ; but that, I find, would be a
difficult task.

I have procured some of the mice mentioned in my former
letters, a young one and a female with young, both of which
I have preserved in brandy. From the color, shape, size, and
manner of nesting, I make no doubt but that the species is
nondescript. They are much smaller, and more slender, than
the nms domestiais medius of Ray ; and have more of the squir-
rel or dormouse color ; their belly is white, a straight line along
their sides divides the shades of their back and belly. They
never enter into houses ; are carried into ricks and barns with
the sheaves ; abound in harvest ; and build their nests amidst
the straws of the corn above the ground, and sometimes in
thistles. They breed as many as eight at a litter, in a little
round nest composed of the blades of grass or wheat.^

One of these nests I procured this autumn, most artificially
platted, and composed of the blades of wheat, perfectly round,
and about the size of a cricket-ball ; with the aperture so in-
geniously closed, that there was no discovering to what part

32 WHITE

it belonged. It was so compact and well filled, that it would
roll across the table without being discomposed, though it con-
tained eight little mice that were naked and blind. As this
nest was perfectly full, how could the dam come at her litter
respectively so as to administer a teat to each ? Perhaps she
opens different places for that purpose, adjusting them again
when the business is over ; but she could not possibly be con-
tained herself in the ball with her young, which moreover
would be daily increasing in bulk. This wonderful procreant
cradle, an elegant instance of the efforts of instinct, was found
in a wheat-field suspended in the head of a thistle.

A gentleman, curious in birds, wrote me word that his ser-
vant had shot one last January, in that severe weather, which
he believed would puzzle me. I called to see it this summer,
not knowing what to expect, but the moment I took it in hand,
I pronounced it the male garriihis bo hernials or German silk-
tail, from the five peculiar crimson tags or points which it carries
at the ends of five of the short remiges. It cannot, I suppose,
with any propriety, be called an English bird ; and yet I see,
by Ray's " Philosophical Letters," that great flocks of them,
feeding on haws, appeared in this kingdom in the winter of
1685.

The mention of haws puts me in mind that there is a total
failure of that wild fruit, so conducive to the support of many
of the winged nation. For the same severe weather, late in
the spring, which cut off all the produce of the more tender
and curious trees, destroyed also that of the more hardy and
common.

Some birds, haunting with the missel-thrushes, and feeding
on the berries of the yew tree, which answered to the descrip-
tion of the merula torqiiata, or ring-ousel, were lately seen in
this neighborhood. I employed some people to procure me a
specimen, but without success. (See Letter VIII.)

Query. — Might not canary birds be naturalized to this cli-
mate, provided their eggs were put, in the spring, into the nests
of some of their congeners, as goldfinches, greenfinches, etc. }
Before winter perhaps they might be hardened, and able to
shift for themselves.

About ten years ago I used to spend some weeks yearly at

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 33

Sunbury, which is one of those pleasant villages lying on the
Thames, near Hampton Court. In the autumn, I could not
help being much amused with those myriads of the swallow
kind which assemble in those parts. But what struck me most
was, that, from the time they began to congregate, forsaking
the chimneys and houses, they roosted every night in the osier-
beds of the aits of that river.^ Now this resorting towards that
element, at that season of the year, seems to give some coun-
tenance to the northern opinion (strange as it is) of their re-
tiring under water. A Swedish naturalist is so much persuaded
of that fact, that he talks, in his calendar of Flora, as familiarly
of the swallow's going under water in the beginning of Sep-
tember, as he would of his poultry going to roost a little before
sunset.

An observing gentleman in London writes me word that he
saw a house-martin, on the twenty-third of last October, flying
in and out of its nest in the Borough. And I myself, on the
twenty-ninth of last October (as I was travelling through Ox-
ford), saw four or five swallows hovering round and settling
on the roof of the county hospital.

Now is it likely that these poor little birds (which perhaps
had not been hatched but a few weeks) should, at that late
season of the year, and from so midland a county, attempt a
voyage to Goree or Senegal, almost as far as the equator ? ^

I acquiesce entirely in your opinion — that, though most of
the swallow kind may migrate, yet that some do stay behind
and hide with us during the winter.

As to the short-winged, soft-billed birds, which come troop-
ing in such numbers in the spring, I am at a loss even what
to suspect about them. I watched them narrowly this year, and
saw them abound till about Michaelmas, when they appeared
no longer. Subsist they cannot openly among us, and yet
elude the eyes of the inquisitive : and, as to their hiding, no
man pretends to have found any of them in a torpid state in
the winter. But with regard to their migration, what difficulties
attend that supposition ! that such feeble, bad fliers (who the
summer long never flit but from hedge to hedge) should be able
to traverse vast seas and continents in order to enjoy milder
seasons amidst the regions of Africa !
4

34 WHITE

Notes

^ The harvest mouse is the smallest of British animals. Unlike its rela-
tives, it builds its nest on the stalks of grass or corn at a little distance from
the ground. The nest is globular in shape, made of vi^oven grass, and has
a small entrance like that of a wren's. It is tolerably common in some of
the southern counties, but it is not easily found. — G. C. D.

2 There was a pool in Shropshire where I used to fish for roach, and I
was always struck with the number of swallows which roosted on the willow
bushes fringing the banks. One could almost take them in one's hand. At
Acle, in Norfolk, one August, the swallows roosted on the telegraph wires
in such extraordinary numbers that they formed continuous black festoons
as far as the eye could reach. — G. C. D.

* See Adanson's "Voyage to Senegal." — G. W.

LETTER XIII

Selborne, Jan. 22ttd, 1768.

Sir, — As in one of your former letters you expressed the
more satisfaction from my correspondence on account of my liv-
ing in the most southerly county ; so now I may return the
compliment, and expect to have my curiosity gratified by your
living much more to the North.

For many years past I have observed that towards Christ-
mas vast flocks of chaffinches have appeared in the fields ;
many more, I used to think, than could be hatched in any one
neighborhood. But, when I came to observe them more nar-
rowly, I was amazed to find that they seemed to me to be almost
all hens. I communicated my suspicions to some intelligent
neighbors, who, after taking pains about the matter, declared
that they also thought them mostly females, — at least fifty to
one. This extraordinary occurrence brought to my mind the
remark of Linnaeus, that " before winter all their hen chaf-
finches migrate through Holland into Italy." Now I want to
know, from some curious person in the north, whether there
are any large flocks of these finches with them in the winter,
and of which sex they mostly consist .? For from such intelli-
gence, one might be able to judge whether our female flocks
migrate from the other end of the island, or whether they come
over to us from the continent.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 35

We have, in the winter, vast flocks of the common linnets ;
more, I think, than can be bred in any one district. These, I
observe, when the spring advances, assemble on some tree in
the sunshine, and join all in a gentle sort of chirping, as if
they were about to break up their winter quarters and betake
themselves to their proper summer homes. It is well known,
at least, that the swallows and the fieldfares do congregate
with a gentle twittering before they make their respective
departure.

You may depend on it that the bunting, Emberiza miliaria,
does not leave this county in the winter. In January, 1767, I
saw several dozen of them, in the midst of a severe frost,
among the bushes on the downs near Andover : in our wood-
land enclosed district it is a rare bird.

Wagtails, both white and yellow, are with us all the winter.
Quails crowd to our southern coast, and are often killed in
numbers by people that go on purpose.

Mr. Stillingfleet, in his Tracts, says that " if the wheatear
{cenantke) does not quit England, it certainly shifts places ;
for about harvest they are not to be found, where there was
before great plenty of them." This well accounts for the
vast quantities that are caught about that time on the south
downs near Lewes, where they are esteemed a delicacy. There
have been shepherds, I have been credibly informed, that have
made many pounds in a season by catching them in traps.
And though such multitudes are taken, I never saw (and I am
well acquainted with those parts) above two or three at a time,
for they are never gregarious. They may perhaps migrate
in general ; and, for that purpose, draw towards the coast
of Sussex in autumn : but that they do not all withdraw I
am sure ; because I see a few stragglers in many counties,
at all times of the year, especially about warrens and stone
quarries.

I have no acquaintance, at present, among the gentlemen of
the navy ; but have written to a friend, who was a sea-chaplain
in the late war, desiring him to look into his minutes, with
respect to birds that settled on their rigging during their
voyage up or down the Channel. What Hasselquist says on
that subject is remarkable; there were little short-winged birds

36 WHITE

frequently coming on board his ship all the way from our Chan-
nel quite up to the Levant, especially before squally weather.

What you suggest, with regard to Spain, is highly probable.
The winters of Andalusia are so mild, that, in all likeUhood,
the soft-billed birds that leave us at that season may find insects
sufficient to support them there.

Some young man, possessed of fortune, health, and leisure,
should make an autumnal voyage into that kingdom ; and
should spend a year there, investigating the natural history of
that vast country. Mr. Willughby ^ passed through that king-
dom on such an errand ; but he seems to have skirted along
in a superficial manner and an ill-humor, being much disgusted
at the rude dissolute manners of the people.

I have no friend left now at Sunbury to apply to about the
swallows roosting on the aits of the Thames : nor can I hear
any more about those birds which I suspected were Merulce
torqiiatce.

As to the small mice, I have farther to remark, that though
they hang their nests for breeding up amidst the straws of the
standing corn, above the ground ; yet I find that, in the winter,
they burrow deep in the earth, and make warm beds of grass :
but their grand rendezvous seems to be in corn-ricks, into
which they are carried at harvest. A neighbor housed an oat-
rick lately, under the thatch of which were assembled nearly
a hundred, most of which were taken, and some I saw. I
measured them ; and found that, from nose to tail, they were
just two inches and a quarter, and their tails just two inches
long. Two of them, in a scale, weighed down just one copper
halfpenny, which is about the third of an ounce avoirdupois : so
that I suppose they are the smallest quadrupeds in this island.
A full-grown Mus tnediiis domesticus weighs, I find, one ounce
lumping weight, which is more than six times as much as the
mouse above ; and measures from nose to rump four inches
and a quarter, and the same in its tail. We have had a very
severe frost and deep snow this month. My thermometer was
one day fourteen degrees and a half below the freezing-
point, within doors. The tender evergreens were injured pretty
much. It was very providential that the air was still, and the
ground well covered with snow, else vegetation in general

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 3/

must have suffered prodigiously. There is reason to believe
that some days were more severe than any since the year
1739-40. I am, etc., etc.

Note

^ See Ray's "Travels," p. 466. — G. W.

LETTER XIV

Selborne, March i2ih, 1768.

Dear Sir, — If some curious gentleman would procure the
head of a fallow-deer, and have it dissected, he would find it
furnished with two spiracula, or breathing places, besides the
nostrils ; probably analogous to the pwicta lachryinalia in the
human head. When deer are thirsty they plunge their noses,
like some horses, very deep under water, while in the act of
drinking, and continue them in that situation for a consider-
able time : but, to obviate any inconveniency, they can open
two vents, one at the inner corner of each eye, having a com-
munication with the nose. Here seems to be an extraordinary
provision of nature worthy our attention ; and which has not,
that I know of, been noticed by any naturalist. For it looks as
if these creatures would not be suffocated, though both their
mouths and nostrils were stopped. This curious formation of
the head may be of singular service to beasts of chase, by
affording them free respiration : and no doubt these additional
nostrils are thrown open when they are hard run. Mr. Ray
observed that at Malta, the owners slit up the nostrils of such
asses as were hard worked : for they, being naturally straight
or small, did not admit air sufficient to serve them when they
travelled, or labored, in that hot climate. And we know that
grooms, and gentlemen of the turf, think large nostrils neces-
sary, and a perfection, in hunters and running horses.

Oppian, the Greek poet, by the following line, seems to have
had some notion that stags have four spiracula :

" TcTpaSu/xoi ptVes, ttiov/ocs (avoir] 61 SuidAoi."
" Quadrifidas nares, quadruplices ad respirationem canales."

Opp. Cyn. Lib. ii. 1. 181.

38 WHITE

Writers, copying from one another, make Aristotle say that
goats breathe at their ears ; whereas he asserts just the con-
trary : — " ^ AXKfiai(ov yap ovk a\r]0r] Xeyei, (f)d/x€vo<i avairveiv Ta<;
alyd<i Kara ra a>Ta." "Alcmaeon does not advance what is true,
when he avers that goats breathe through their ears." — " His-
tory of Animals." Book I., chap, xi.i

Note

^ Naturalists seem now agreed that the curious slits referred to in the
foregoing chapter are not and cannot be used for breathing, but for some
.other. sense of which we can but guess the nature. — G. C. D.

LETTER XV

Selborne, March loth, 1768.

Dear Sir, — Some intelligent country people have a notion
that we have in these parts a species of the genus mustelhmin,
besides the weasel, stoat, ferret, and polecat ; a little reddish
beast, not much bigger than a field-mouse, but much longer,
which they call a cane. This piece of intelligence can be little
depended on ; but farther inquiry may be made.^

A gentleman in this neighborhood had two milkwhite rooks
in one nest. A booby of a carter, finding them before they
were able to fly, threw them down and destroyed them, to the
regret of the owner, who would have been glad to have pre-
served such a curiosity in his rookery. I saw the birds myself
nailed against the end of a barn, and was surprised to find that
their bills, legs, feet, and claws were milkwhite.

A shepherd saw, as he thought, some white larks on a
down above my house this winter : were not these the Em-
beriza nivalis, the snow-flake of the Brit. Zool. } No doubt
they were.

A few years ago I saw a cock bullfinch in a cage, which had
been caught in the fields after it was come to its full colors.
In about a year it began to look dingy ; and, blackening every
succeeding year, it became coal-black at the end of four. Its
chief food was hempseed. Such influence has food on the
color of animals ! The pied and mottled colors of domesticated

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 39

animals are supposed to be owing to high, various, and unusual
food.

I had remarked, for years, that the root of the cuckoo-
pint {arian) was frequently scratched out of the dry banks of
hedges, and eaten in severe snowy weather. After observing,
with some exactness, myself, and getting others to do the same,
we found it was the thrush kind that searched it out. The
root of the arian is remarkably warm and pungent.

Our flocks of female chaffinches have not yet forsaken us.
The blackbirds and thrushes are very much thinned down by
that fierce weather in January.

In the middle of February I discovered, in my tall hedges,
a little bird that raised my curiosity : it was of that yellow-
green color that belongs to the salicaria kind, and, I think, was
soft-billed. It was no pants ; and was too long and too big
for the golden-crowned wren, appearing most like the largest
willow-wren. It hung sometimes with its back downwards,
but never continuing one moment in the same place. I shot
at it, but it was so desultory that I missed my aim.

I wonder that the stone-curlew, Charadriiiscedicnefmis, should
be mentioned by the writers as a rare bird : it abounds in all
the champaign parts of Hampshire and Sussex, and breeds, I
think, all the summer, having young ones, I know, very late
in the autumn. Already they begin clamoring in the evening.
They cannot, I think, with any propriety, be called, as they
are by Mr. Ray, "circa aquas versantes ; " for with us, by day
at least, they haunt only the most dry, open, upland fields and
sheep-walks, far removed from water : what they may do in
the night I cannot say. Worms are their usual food, but they
also eat toads and frogs.

I can show you some good specimens of my new mice.
Linnaeus perhaps would call the species Mus miJiiniics.

Note

^ The cane is simply a local name for the weasel. It is called mouse-
hunter in Norfolk. A peculiarity of the weasel is its curiosity. If you
startle it and it runs into a hole, wait a few moments, and it will probably
come out again to look at you in a very impertinent kind of way. — G. C. D.

40 WHITE

LETTER XVI

Selborne, April \Zth, 1768.

Dear Sir, — The history of the stone-curlew, Charadriiis
oedicnemtis, is as follows. It lays its eggs, usually two, never
more than three, on the bare ground, without any nest, in the
field ; so that the countryman, in stirring his fallows, often
destroys them. The young run immediately from the ^g^
like partridges, etc., and are withdrawn to some flinty field by
the dam, where they skulk among the stones, which are their
best security ; for their feathers are so exactly of the color of
our gray spotted flints, that the most exact observer, unless
he catches the eye of the young bird, may be eluded. The
eggs are short and round ; of a dirty white, spotted with dark
bloody blotches. Though I might not be able, just when I
pleased, to procure you a bird, yet I could show you them al-
most any day ; and any evening you may hear them round the
village, for they make a clamor which may be heard a mile.
(Edicnemus is a most apt and expressive name for them,
since their legs seem swollen like those of a gouty man. After
harvest I have shot them before the pointers in turnip-fields.

I make no doubt but there are three species of the willow-
wrens ; 1 two I know perfectly, but have not been able yet to
procure the third. No two birds can differ more in their notes,
and that constantly, than those two that I am acquainted with ;
for the one has a joyous, easy, laughing note, the other a harsh
loud chirp. The former is every way larger, and three-quar-
ters of an inch longer, and weighs two drams and a half, while
the latter weighs but two ; so the songster is one-fifth heavier
than the chirper. The chirper (being the first summer-bird
of passage that is heard, the wryneck sometimes excepted)
begins his two notes in the middle of March, and continues
them through the spring and summer till the end of August,
as appears by my journals. The legs of the larger of these
two are flesh-colored ; of the less black.

The grasshopper-lark began his sibilous note in my fields
last Saturday. Nothing can be more amusing than the whis-
per of this little bird, which seems to be close by though at a

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 4I

hundred yards distance ; and when close at your ear, is scarce
any louder than when a great way off. Had I not been a little
acquainted with insects, and known that the grasshopper kind
is not yet hatched, I should have hardly believed but that it
had been a locusta whispering in the bushes. The country
people laugh when you tell them that it is the note of a bird.
It is a most artful creature, skulking in the thickest part of a
bush ; and will sing at a yard distance, provided it be con-
cealed. I was obliged to get a person to go on the other side
of the hedge where it haunted, and then it would run, creep-
ing like a mouse, before us for a hundred yards together,
through the bottom of the thorns ; yet it would not come into
fair sight ; but in a morning early, and when undisturbed, it
sings on the top of a twig, gaping and shivering with its wings.
Mr. Ray himself had no knowledge of this bird, but received
his account from Mr. Johnson, who apparently confounds it
with the regidi non cvistati, from which it is very distinct.
See Ray's " Philos. Letters," p. 108.

The fly-catcher {stoparola) has not yet appeared ; it usually
breeds in my vine. The redstart begins to sing, its note is
short and imperfect, but is continued till about the middle of
June. The willow-wrens (the smaller sort) are horrid pests in
a garden, destroying the peas, cherries, currants, etc. ; and are
so tame that a gun will not scare them.

A List of the summer Birds of Passage discovered in this
Neighborhood, ranged somewhat in the order in which they

APPEAR

LINN^I NOMINA

Smallest willow-wren, Motacilla trochilus.

Wryneck, Jynxtorqtdlla.

House-swallow, Hirutido rustica.

Martin, Hirundo Jirbica.

Sand-martin, Hirtindo riparia.

Cuckoo, Cucuhis canorus.

Nightingale, Motacilla luscinia.

Black-cap, Motacilla atricapilla.

Whitethroat, Motacilla sylvia.

Middle willow-wren, Motacilla trochilus.

Swift, Hirutido apus.

Stone-curlew? Charadrius cedicnemus?

Turtle-dove ? Turtur aldrovandi ?

Grasshopper-lark, Alauda trivialis. .

42 WHITE

LINN^I NOMINA

Landrail, Rallus crex.

Largest willow-wren, Motacilla trochilus.

Redstart, Motacilla phcenicurus.

Goat-sucker, or fern-owl, Caprivtulgus eiiropceus.

Fly-catcher, Mtiscicapa grisola.

My countrymen talk much of a bird that makes a clatter
with its bill against a dead bough, or some old pales, calling
it a jar-bird. I procured one to be shot in the very fact; it
proved to be the Sitta eiiropcBa (the nuthatch).^ Mr. Ray says
that the less spotted woodpecker does the same. This noise
may be heard a furlong or more.

Now is the only time to ascertain the short-winged summer
birds ; for, when the leaf is out, there is no making any re-
marks on such a restless tribe ; and when once the young
begin to appear it is all confusion : there is no distinction of
genus, species, or sex.

In breeding time snipes play over the moors, piping and
humming ; they always hum as they are descending. Is not
their hum ventriloquous like that of the turkey .'' Some sus-
pect it is made by their wings.

This morning I saw the golden-crowned wren, whose crown

glitters like burnished gold.^ It often hangs like a titmouse,

with its back downwards.

Yours, etc., etc.
Notes

1 White probably means the willow-wren and chifF-chafF which are
common, and the wood-wren which is rare. — G CD.

2 The nuthatch builds in holes in trees, and if the opening is too large,
it builds it up with mud, leaving only sufficient room for its own egress and
ingress. — G. C. D.

2 The golden-crested wren suspends its deep purse-like nest beneath
some thick fir branch, and lays a number of tiny yellow-brown eggs, like
green-peas in size. All the winter through this wren and the long-tailed
tit frequented the hedgerows and coppices in Shropshire, and were frequent
victims to a school-boy's love of chevying. — G. C. D.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 43

LETTER XVII

Selborne, /««tf 18M, 1768.

Dear Sir, — On Wednesday last arrived your agreeable
letter of June lOth. It gives me great satisfaction to find
that you pursue these studies still with such vigor, and are in
such forwardness with regard to reptiles and fishes.

The reptiles, few as they are, I am not acquainted with, so
well as I could wish, with regard to their natural history. There
is a degree of dubiousness and obscurity attending the propa-
gation of this class of animals, something analogous to that of
the cryptogamia in the sexual system of plants : and the case
is the same with regard to some of the fishes ; as the eel, etc.^

The method in which toads procreate and bring forth seems
to be very much in the dark. Some authors say that they are
viviparous : and yet Ray classes them among his oviparous
animals ; and is silent with regard to the manner of their
bringing forth. Perhaps they may be eocu y^kv wotokol, e^co Se
^(ooTOKoi, as is known to be the case with the viper.

The copulation of frogs (or at least the appearance of it ;
for Swammerdam proves that the male has no penis vitrans)
is notorious to everybody : because we see them sticking upon
each other's backs for a month together in the spring : and
yet I never saw, or read of toads being observed in the same
situation. It is strange that the matter with regard to the
venom of toads has not been yet settled. That they are not
noxious to some animals is plain : for ducks, buzzards, owls,
stone-curlews, and snakes, eat them, to my knowledge, with
impunity. And I well remember the time, but was not eye-
witness to the fact (though numbers of persons were) when
a quack, at this village, ate a toad to make the country-people
stare ; afterwards he drank oil.^

I have been informed also, from undoubted authority, that
some ladies (ladies you will say of peculiar taste) took a fancy
to a toad, which they nourished summer after summer, for
many years, till he grew to a monstrous size, with the mag-
gots which turn to flesh-flies. The reptile used to come forth
every evening from a hole under the garden-steps ; and was

44 WHITE

taken up, after supper, on the table to be fed. But at last a
tame raven, kenning him as he put forth his head, gave him
such a severe stroke with his horny beak as put out one eye.
After this accident the creature languished for some time and
died.

I need not remind a gentleman of your extensive reading
of the excellent account there is from Mr. Derham, in Ray's
"Wisdom of God in the Creation" (p. 365), concerning the
migration of frogs from their breeding ponds. In this account
he at once subverts that foolish opinion of their dropping from
the clouds in rain ; showing that it is from the grateful cool-
ness and moisture of those showers that they are tempted to
set out on their travels, which they defer till those fall. Frogs
are as yet in their tadpole state ; but, in a few weeks, our lanes,
paths, fields, will swarm for a few days with myriads of those
emigrants, no larger than my little finger nail. Swammerdam
gives a most accurate account of the method and situation in
which the male impregnates the spawn of the female. How
wonderful is the economy of Providence with regard to the
limbs of so vile a reptile ! While it is an aquatic it has a fish-
like tail, and no legs ; as soon as the legs sprout, the tail drops
off as useless, and the animal betakes itself to the land !

Merret, I trust, is widely mistaken when he advances that
the Rana arborea is an English reptile ; it abounds in Ger-
many and Switzerland.^

It is to be remembered that the Salainandra aquatica of Ray
(the water-newt or eft) will frequently bite at the angler's bait,
and is often caught on his hook. I used to take it for granted
that the Salaniandra aquatica was hatched, lived, and died in
the water. But John Ellis, Esq., F.R.S. (the coralline Ellis),
asserts, in a letter to the Royal Society, dated June 5th, 1766,
in his account of the nmd ingnana, an amphibious bipes from
South Carolina, that the water-eft, or newt, is only the larva
of the land-eft, as tadpoles are of frogs.* Lest I should be
suspected to misunderstand his meaning, I shall give it in his
own words. Speaking of the opercula or coverings to the gills
of the mud inguana, he proceeds to say that, " the form of these
pennated coverings approaches very near to what I have some
time ago observed in the lava or aquatic state of our English

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 45

lacerta, known by the name of eft, or newt ; which serve them
for coverings to their gills, and for fins to swim with while in
this state ; and which they lose, as well as the fins of their
tails, when they change their state and become land animals,
as I have observed, by keeping them alive for some time
myself."

Linnaeus, in his "Systema Naturae," hints at what Mr. Ellis
advances more than once.

Providence has been so indulgent to us as to allow of but
one venomous reptile of the serpent kind in these kingdoms,
and that is the viper. As you propose the good of mankind
to be an object of your publications, you will not omit to
mention common salad-oil as a sovereign remedy against the
bite of the viper. As to the blind worm {Anguis fragilis,
so-called because it snaps in sunder with a small blow), I have
found, on examination, that it is perfectly innocuous.^ A
neighboring yeoman (to whom I am indebted for some good
hints) killed and opened a female viper about the 27th May :
he found her filled with a chain of eleven eggs, about the size
of those of a blackbird ; but none of them were advanced so
far towards a state of maturity as to contain any rudiments
of young. Though they are oviparous, yet they are vivipa-
rous also, hatching their young within their bellies, and then
bringing them forth. Whereas snakes lay chains of eggs
every summer in my melon beds, in spite of all that my peo-
ple can do to prevent them ; which eggs do not hatch till the
spring following, as I have often experienced. Several intel-
ligent folks assure me that they have seen the viper open her
mouth and admit her helpless young down her throat on sud-
den surprises, just as the female opossum does her brood into
the pouch under her belly, upon the like emergencies ; and yet
the London viper-catchers insist on it, to Mr. Barrington, that
no such thing ever happens. The serpent kind eat, I believe,
but once in a year; or rather, but only just at one season of
the year. Country-people talk much of a water-snake, but, I
am pretty sure, without any reason ; for the common snake
{Coluber natrix) delights much to sport in the water, perhaps
with a view to procure frogs and other food.^

I cannot well guess how you are to make out your twelve

46 WHITE

species of reptiles, unless it be by the various species, or rather
varieties, of our lacerti, of which Ray enumerates five. I have
not had opportunity of ascertaining these; but remember well
to have seen, formerly, several beautiful green lacerti on the
sunny sandbanks near Farnham, in Surrey ; and Ray admits
there are such in Ireland.

Notes

^ Toads lay eggs as frogs do. Every dweller in the country will be famil-
iar with the masses of jelly-like substance in the ditches which constitutes
the spawn of frogs. That of toads forms long strings instead of masses.
— G. C. D.

'^ There seems to be little doubt that the secretion which exudes from the
tubercles on the toad's skin is very offensive, and might irritate a delicate
skin. Dogs will not mouth them a second time. — G. C. D.

3 This pretty green frog, which lives on a tree, and is sometimes kept as
a pet, is not considered a native species. Mr. J. G. Wood says he saw a
colony of them in a hole in an apple-tree at Marston, near Oxford ; but
they must have been introduced there, or strayed from some one who kept
them. — G. C. D.

* There is but one species of newt, which goes through all its changes in
the water. The male has a beautiful waving crest along its back and tail.
When young it has gills ; but when it reaches the perfect state it has to rise
constantly to the surface to take in a supply of air. It is possible that by
the term land-eft. White may refer to the lizard, which belongs to a diflferent
family. Most country people of the lower order are dreadfully afraid of
newts or effets, and think their bite is deadly. As a fact, however, they are
quite harmless. — G. CD.

^ The blind-worm or slow-worm does not need a blow to induce it to cast
off its tail. A sudden fright is sufficient. While you are looking at the tail
wriggling and jumping about, the body quietly makes its escape. — G. C. D.

*• The common snake takes readily to the water, and swims — sometimes
altogether beneath it, and sometimes with the head and neck above. I have
very often seen them doing this ; and although I knew they were harmless,
I did not like them diving close by me when I was swimming. There is
no English species of "water-snake." — G. C. D.

LETTER XVIII

Selborne, July 2jth, 1768.

Dear Sir, — I received your obliging and communicative
letter of June 28th, while I was on a visit at a gentleman's
house, where I had neither books to turn to, nor leisure to

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 47

sit down, to return you an answer to many queries, which I
wanted to resolve in the best manner that I am able.

A person, by my order, has searched our brooks, but could
find no such fish as the Gasterostetts pjingiti?is^; he found the
Gasterostetis aaileatiis in plenty. This morning, in a basket,
I packed a little earthen pot full of wet moss, and in it some
sticklebacks, male and female ; the females big with spawn :
some lamperns ; some bull's heads ; but I could procure no
minnows. This basket will be in Fleet Street by eight this
evening ; so I hope Mazel will have them fresh and fair to-
morrow morning. I gave some directions, in a letter, to what
particulars the engraver should be attentive.

Finding, while I was on a visit, that I was within a reason-
able distance of Ambresbury, I sent a servant over to that
town, and procured several living specimens of loaches, which
he brought, safe and brisk, in a glass decanter. They were
taken in the gullies that were cut for watering the meadows.
From these fishes (which measured from two to four inches
in length) I took the following description : " The loach, in
its general aspect, has a pellucid appearance ; its back is mot-
tled with irregular collections of small black dots, not reaching
much below the liiiea lateralis, as are the back and tail fins ;
a black line runs from each eye down to the nose ; its belly is
of a silvery white ; the upper jaw projects beyond the lower,
and is surrounded with six feelers, three on each side ; its pec-
toral fins are large, its ventral much smaller ; the fin behind
its anus small ; its dorsal-fin large, containing eight spines ; its
tail, where it joins to the tail-fin, remarkably broad, without
any taperness, so as to be characteristic of this genus ; the
tail-fin is broad, and square at the end. From the breadth
and muscular strength of the tail it appears to be an active
nimble fish."

In my visit I was not very far from Hungerford, and did
not forget to make some inquiries concerning the wonderful
method of curing cancers by means of toads. Several intelli-
gent persons, both gentry and clergy, do I find give a great
deal of credit to what is asserted in the papers, and I myself
dined with a clergyman who seemed to be persuaded that what
is related is matter of fact ; but, when I came to attend to his

48 WHITE

account, I thought I discerned circumstances which did not a
little invalidate the woman's story of the manner in which she
came by her skill. She says of herself " that, laboring under
a virulent cancer, she went to some church where there was
a vast crowd ; on going into a pew, she was accosted by a
strange clergyman, who, after expressing compassion for her
situation, told her that if she would make such an application
of living toads as is mentioned she would be well." Now is
it likely that this unknown gentleman should express so much
tenderness for this single sufferer, and not feel any for the
many thousands that daily languish under this terrible dis-
order .'' Would he not have made use of this invaluable nos-
trum for his own emolument ; or at least, by some means of
publication or other, have found a method of making it public
for the good of mankind ? In short, this woman (as it appears
to me) having set up for a cancer-doctress, finds it expedient
to amuse the country with this dark and mysterious relation.
The water-eft has not, that I can discern, the least appear-
ance of any gills ; for want of which it is continually rising to
the surface of the water to take in fresh air. I opened a big-
bellied one indeed, and found it full of spawn. Not that this
circumstance at all invalidates the assertion that they are larvce ;
for the larvce of insects are full of eggs, which they exclude the
instant they enter their last state. The water-eft is continually
climbing over the brims of the vessel, within which we keep it
in water, and wandering away ; and people every summer see
numbers crawling out of the pools where they are hatched, up
the dry banks. There are varieties of them, differing in color ;
and some have fins up their tail and back, and some have not.

Note

^ The Gasterosteies pungitius is the ten-spined stickleback. The other
is the common one with three spines. — G. C. D.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 49

LETTER XIX

Selborne, August ijth, 1768.

Dear Sir, — I have now, past dispute, made out three dis-
tinct species of the willow-wrens {inotacillcB trocJiili) which con-
stantly and invariably use distinct notes. But at the same time
I am obliged to confess that I know nothing of your willow-
lark. In my letter of April i8th, I had told you peremptorily
that I knew your willow-lark, but had not seen it then ; but
when I came to procure it, it proved in all respects a very
motacilla trochibis, only that it is a size larger than the two
others, and the yellow-green of the whole upper part of the
body is more vivid, and the belly of a clearer white. I have
specimens of the three sorts now lying before me, and can dis-
cern that there are three gradations of sizes, and that the least
has black legs, and the other two flesh-colored ones. The yel-
lowest bird is considerably the largest, and has its quill-feathers
and secondary feathers tipped with white, which the others have
not. This last haunts only the tops of trees in high beechen
woods, and makes a sibilous grasshopper-like noise, now and
then, at short intervals, shivering a little with its wings when
it sings ; and is, I make no doubt now, the regulns non cristatus
of Ray, which he says " cantat voce stridtild lociistce." Yet
this great ornithologist never suspected that there were three
species.

LETTER XX

Selborne, October Zth, 1768.

It is I find in zoology as it is in botany ; all nature is so
full that that district produces the greatest variety which is
the most examined. Several birds, which are said to belong
to the north only, are it seems often in the south. I have dis-
covered this summer three species of birds with us, which
writers mention as only to be seen in the northern counties.
The first that was brought me (on the 14th May), was the
sandpiper, tringa hypoleiiciis : it was a cock bird, and haunted
5

50 WHITE

the banks of some ponds near the village ; and, as it had a
companion, doubtless intended to have bred near that water.
Besides, the owner has told me since, that on recollection, he
has seen some of the same birds round his ponds in former
summers.

The next bird that I procured (on the 2ist May) was a male
red-backed butcher-bird, laniiis colliirio. My neighbor, who
shot it, says that it might easily have escaped his notice, had
not the outcries and chattering of the whitethroats and other
small birds drawn his attention to the bush where it was ; its
craw was filled with the legs and wings of beetles.

The next rare birds (which were procured for me last week)
were some ring-ousels, tiirdi torquati}

This week twelve months a gentleman from London, being
with us, was amusing himself with a gun, and found, he told
us, on an old yew hedge where there were berries, some birds
like blackbirds, with rings of white round their necks : a neigh-
boring farmer also at the same time observed the same ; but,
as no specimens were procured, little notice was taken. I men-
tioned this circumstance to you in my letter of November 4th,
I 'joj (you, however, paid but small regard to what I said, as I
had not seen these birds myself) ; but last week the aforesaid
farmer, seeing a large flock, twenty or thirty of these birds,
shot two cocks and two hens, and says, on recollection, that
he remembers to have observed these birds again last spring,
about Lady-day, as it were on their return to the north. Now
perhaps these ousels are not the ousels of the north of Eng-
land, but belong to the more northern parts of Europe ; and
may retire before the excessive rigor of the frosts in those
parts, and return to breed in the spring, when the cold abates.
If this be the case, here is discovered a new bird of winter
passage, concerning whose migrations the writers are silent ;
but if these birds should prove the ousels of the north of Eng-
land, then here is a migration disclosed within our own king-
dom never before remarked. It does not yet appear whether
they retire beyond the bounds of our island to the south ; but
it is niost probable that they usually do, or else one cannot
suppose that they would have continued so long unnoticed in
the southern countries. The ousel is larger than a blackbird,

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 5 1

and feeds on haws ; but last autumn (when there were no haws)
it fed on yew-berries : in the spring it feeds on ivy-berries,
which ripen only at that season, in March and April.

I must not omit to tell you (as you have been so lately on the
stud)'' of reptiles) that my people, every now and then of late,
draw up with a bucket of water from my well, which is sixty-
three feet deep, a large black warty lizard with a fin-tail and
yellow belly. How they first came down at that depth, and
how they were ever to have got out thence without help, is more
than I am able to say.

My thanks are due to you for your trouble and care in the
examination of a buck's head. As far as your discoveries reach
at present, they seem much to corroborate my suspicions ; and

I hope Mr. may find reason to give his decision in my

favor ; and then, I think, we may advance this extraordinary
provision of nature as a new instance of the wisdom of God
in the creation.

As yet I have not quite done with my history of the oedicne-
niiis, or stone-curlew ; for I shall desire a gentleman in Sus-
sex (near whose house these birds congregate in vast flocks in
the autumn) to observe nicely when they leave him (if they do
leave him), and when they return again in the spring : I was
with this gentleman lately, and saw several single birds.

Note

^ The ring-ousel was common on the Eglwyseg Rocks bordering the
Vale of Llangollen. It appears to make a partial migration to the south
of England in the autumn. — G. C. D.

LETTER XXI

Selborne, Nov. i%th, 1768.
Dear Sir, — With regard to the cedicnemus, or stone-curlew,
I intend to write very soon to my friend near Chichester, in
whose neighborhood these birds seem most to abound ; and
shall urge him to take particular notice when they begin to con-
gregate, and afterwards to watch them most narrowly whether
they do not withdraw themselves during the dead of the winter.

52 WHITE

When I have obtained information with respect to this circum-
stance, I shall have finished my history of the stone-curlew,
which I hope will prove to your satisfaction, as it will be, I
trust, very near the truth. This gentleman, as he occupies a
large farm of his own, and is abroad early and late, will be a
very proper spy upon the motions of these birds ; and besides,
as I have prevailed on him to buy the Naturalist's Journal (with
which he is much delighted), I shall expect that he will be very
exact in his dates. It is very extraordinary, as you observe,
that a bird so common with us should never struggle to you.

And here will be the properest place to mention, while I think
of it, an anecdote which the above-mentioned gentleman told me
when I was last at his house; which was that, in a warren join-
ing to his outlet, many daws {corvi monedu/a')hm\t every year in
the rabbit-burrows under ground. The way he and his brothers
used to take their nests, while they were boys, was by listening
at the mouths of the holes ; and, if they heard the young ones
'.cry, they twisted the nest out with a forked stick. Some water-
fowls (viz., the puffins) breed, I know, in that manner; but I
should never have suspected the daws of building in holes on
the flat ground.^

Another very unlikely spot is made use of by daws as a place
to breed in, and that is Stonehenge. These birds deposit their
nests in the interstices between the upright and the impost
stones of that amazing work of antiquity : which circumstance
alone speaks the prodigious height of the upright stones, that
they should be tall enough to secure those nests from the annoy-
ance of shepherd-boys, who are always idling round that place.

One of my neighbors last Saturday, November 26th, saw a
martin in a sheltered bottom : the sun shone warm, and the
bird was hawking briskly after flies. I am now perfectly satis-
fied that they do not all leave this island in the winter.

You judge very right, I think, in speaking with reserve and
caution concerning the cures done by toads : for, let people
advance what they will on such subjects, yet there is such a
propensity in mankind towards deceiving and being deceived,
that one cannot safely relate anything from common report,
especially in print, without expressing some degree of doubt
and suspicion.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 53

Your approbation, with regard to my new discovery of the
migration of the ring-ousel, gives me satisfaction ; and I find
you concur with me in suspecting that they are foreign birds
which visit us. You will be sure, I hope, not to omit to make
inquiry whether your ring-ousels leave your rocks in the
autumn. What puzzles me most, is the very short stay they
make with us; for in about three weeks they are all gone. I
shall be very curious to remark whether they will call on us
at their return in the spring, as they did last year.

I want to be better informed with regard to ichthyology. If
fortune had settled me near the seaside, or near some great
river, my natural propensity would soon have urged me to have
made myself acquainted with their productions : but as I have
lived mostly in inland parts, and in an upland district, my
knowledge of fishes extends little farther than to those common
sorts which our brooks and lakes produce.

I am, etc.

Note

^ At Craigyrhiw, a limestone cliff near Oswestry, on the Welsh border,
where the jackdaws bred by the thousand, numbers of them made their nests
in the rabbit holes at the foot of the rocks. I often used to find a stock-
dove's nest in a rabbit hole there, too. We would sit and watch them from
a crag, until we saw a bird leave or enter. On the Norfolk warrens, too,
stock-doves breed in the rabbit holes. — G. C. D.

LETTER XXII

Selborne,/^;/. 2nd, 1769.

Dear Sir, — As to the peculiarity of jackdaws building with
us under the ground in rabbit-burrows, you have, in part, hit
upon the reason ; for, in reality, there are hardly any towers or
steeples in all this country. And perhaps, Norfolk excepted,
Hampshire and Sussex are as meanly furnished with churches
as almost any counties in the kingdom. We have many livings
of two or three hundred pounds a year, whose houses of wor-
ship make little better appearance than dovecots. When I
first saw Northamptonshire, Cambridgeshire, and Huntingdon-
shire, and the fens of Lincolnshire, I was amazed at the number

54 WHITE

of spires which presented themselves in every point of view.
As an admirer of prospects, I have reason to lament this
want in my own country ; for such objects are very necessary
ingredients in an elegant landscape.

What you mention with respect to reclaimed toads raises my
curiosity. An ancient author, though no naturalist, has well
remarked that " every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of ser-
pents, and things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed,
of mankind."

It is a satisfaction to me to find that a green lizard has actu-
ally been procured for you in Devonshire ; because it corrobo-
rates my discovery, which I made many years ago, of the same
sort, on a sunny sandbank near Farnham, in Surrey. I am
well acquainted with the South Hams of Devonshire ; and can
suppose that district, from its southerly situation, to be a proper
habitation for such animals in their best colors.

Since the ring-ousels of your vast mountains do certainly not
forsake them against winter, our suspicions that those which
visit this neighborhood about Michaelmas are not English birds,
but driven from the more northern parts of Europe by the frosts,
are still more reasonable ; and it will be worth your pains to
endeavor to trace from whence they come, and to inquire why
they make so very short a stay.

In your account of your error with regard to the two
species of herons, you incidentally gave me great entertain-
ment in your description of the heronry at Cressi Hall; which
is a curiosity I never could manage to see. Fourscore nests
of such a bird on one tree is a rarity which I would ride half
as many miles to have a sight of. Pray be sure to tell me in
your next whose seat Cressi Hall is, and near what town it
lies. I have often thought that those vast extents of fens
have never been sufficiently explored. If half a dozen gentle-
men, furnished with a good strength of water-spaniels, were
to beat them over for a week, they would certainly find more
species.

There is no bird, I believe, whose manners I have studied
more than that of the capriimdgus (the goat-sucker), as it is a
wonderful and curious creature ; but I have always found that
though sometimes it may chatter as it flies, as I know it does,

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 55

yet in general it utters its jarring note sitting on a bough; and
I have for many a half hour watched it as it sat with its under
mandible quivering, and particularly this summer. It perches
usually on a bare twig, with its head lower than its tail, in
an attitude well expressed by your draughtsman in the folio
" British Zoology." ^ This bird is most punctual in beginning
its song exactly at the close of day ; so exactly that I have
known it strike up more than once or twice just at the report
of the Portsmouth evening gun, which we can hear when the
weather is still. It appears to me past all doubt that its notes
are formed by organic impulse, by the powers of the parts of
its windpipe, formed for sound, just as cats purr. You will
credit me, I hope, when I assure you that, as my neighbors
were assembled in an hermitage on the side of a steep hill
where we drink tea, one of these churn-owls came and settled
on the cross of that little straw edifice and began to chatter,
and continued his note for many minutes ; and we were all
struck with wonder to find that the organs of that little ani-
mal, when put in motion, gave a sensible vibration to the
whole building ! This bird also sometimes makes a small
squeak, repeated four or five times ; and I have observed
that to happen when the cock has been pursuing the hen in
a toying way through the boughs of a tree.

It would not be at all strange if your bat, which you have
procured, should prove a new one, since five species have
been found in a neighboring kingdom. The great sort that
I mentioned is certainly a nondescript ; I saw but one this
summer, and that I had no opportunity of taking.

Your account of the Indian grass was entertaining. I am
no angler myself ; but inquiring of those that are, what they
supposed that part of their tackle to be made of .-" — they re-
plied, " Of the intestines of a silkworm." ^

Though I must not pretend to great skill in entomology,
yet I cannot say that I am ignorant of that kind of knowl-
edge ; I may now and then perhaps be able to furnish you
with a little information.

The vast rains ceased with us much about the same time as
with you, and since we have had delicate weather. Mr. Bar-
ker, who has measured the rain for more than thirty years.

56 WHITE

says, in a late letter, that more has fallen this year than in
any he ever attended to; though from July 1763 to January
1764, more fell than in any seven months of this year.

Notes

^ The goat-sucker or nightjar perches lengthwise on a bough instead of
across it as other birds do. The eggs, which it lays on the ground, in an
apology for a nest, are most beautifully marbled. — G. C. D.

'^ The gut used by anglers is made from the silkworm, and is the substance
from which the silk would be spun if the caterpillar were allowed to continue
its existence. The Indian grass is of very little use for fishing, as it is brittle.
— G. C. D.

LETTER XXIII

Selborne, Feb. 2%th, lySg.

Dear Sir, — It is not improbable that the Guernsey lizard
and our green lizards may be specifically the same ; all that I
know is, that, when some years ago many Guernsey lizards
were turned loose in Pembroke College garden, in the Univer-
sity of Oxford, they lived a great while, and seemed to enjoy
themselves very well, but never bred. Whether this circum-
stance will prove anything either way I shall not pretend to
say.

I return you thanks for your account of Cressi Hall ; but
recollect, not without regret, that in June 1746 I was visiting
for a week together at Spalding, without ever being told that
such a curiosity was just at hand. Pray send me word in your
next what sort of tree it is that contains such a quantity of
herons' nests ; and whether the heronry consists of a whole
grove of wood, or only of a few trees.

It gave me satisfaction to find we accorded so well about
the caprimulgus ; all I contended for was to prove that it often
chatters sitting as well as flying ; and therefore the noise was
voluntary, and from organic impulse, and not from the resist-
ance of the air against the hollow of its mouth and throat.

If ever I saw anything like actual migration, it was last
Michaelmas Day. I was travelling, and out early in the morn-
ing ; at first there was a vast fog ; but, by the time that I was

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 5/

got seven or eight miles from home towards the coast, the sun
broke out into a delicate warm day. We were then on a large
heath or common, and I could discern, as the mist began to
break away, great numbers of swallows {Jiiriuidmes riisticce)
clustering on the stunted shrubs and bushes, as if they had
roosted there all night. As soon as the air became clear and
pleasant they were all on the wing at once ; and, by a placid
and easy flight, proceeded on southward towards the sea ;
after this I did not see any more flocks, only now and then a
straggler.

I cannot agree with those persons that assert that the swal-
low kind disappear some and some, gradually, as they come,
for the bulk of them seem to withdraw at once ; only some
stragglers stay behind a long while, and do never, there is the
greatest reason to believe, leave this island. Swallows seem
to lay themselves up, and to come forth in a warm day, as
bats do continually of a warm evening, after they have disap-
peared for weeks. For a very respectable gentleman assured
me that, as he was walking with some friends under Merton
Wall on a remarkably hot noon, either in the last week in
December or the first week in January, he espied three or
four swallows huddled together on the moulding of one of
the windows of that college. I have frequently remarked that
swallows are seen later at Oxford than elsewhere ; is it owing
to the vast massy buildings of that place, to the many waters
round it, or to what else .''

When I used to rise in the morning last autumn, and see
the swallows and martins clustering on the chimneys and
thatch of the neighboring cottages, I could not help being
touched with a secret delight, mixed with some degree of mor-
tification ; with delight, to observe with how much ardor and
punctuality those poor little birds obeyed the strong impulse
towards migration, or hiding, imprinted on their minds by
their great Creator ; and with some degree of mortification,
when I reflected that, after all our pains and inquiries, we are
yet not quite certain to what regions they do migrate ; and are
still farther embarrassed to find that some do not actually mi-
grate at all.

These reflections made so strong an impression on my im-

58 WHITE

agination, that they became productive of a composition that
may perhaps amuse you for a quarter of an hour when next I
have the honor of writing to you.

LETTER XXIV

Selborne, May 2gth, 1769.

Dear Sir, — The scarabcBus fullo I know very well, having
seen it in collections ; but have never been able to discover
one wild in its natural state. Mr. Banks told me he thought
it might be found on the seacoast.

On the 1 3th April I went to the sheep-down, where the ring-
oiisels have been observed to make their appearance at spring
and fall, in their way perhaps to the north or south ; and was
much pleased to see these birds about the usual spot. We shot
a cock and a hen ; they were plump and in high condition. The
hen had but very small rudiments of eggs within her, which
proves they are late breeders ; whereas those species of the
thrush kind that remain with us the whole year have fledged
young before that time. In their crops was nothing very dis-
tinguishable, but somewhat that seemed like blades of vege-
tables nearly digested. In autumn they feed on haws and
yew-berries, and in the spring on ivy-berries. I dressed one
of these birds, and found it juicy and well flavored. It is re-
markable that they make but a few days' stay in their spring
visit, but rest near a fortnight at Michaelmas. These birds,
from the observations of three springs and two autumns, are
most punctual in their return ; and exhibit a new migration
unnoticed by the writers, who supposed they never were to
be seen in any southern countries.

One of my neighbors lately brought me a new salicaria,
which at first I suspected might have proved your willow-lark,
but on a nicer examination, it answered much better to the
description of that species which you shot at Revesby, in
Lincolnshire. My bird I describe thus : " It is a size less than
the grasshopper-lark ; the head, back, and coverts of the
wings, of J, dusky brown, without those dark spots of the

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 59

grasshopper-lark ; over each eye is a milk-white stroke ;
the chin and throat are white, and the under parts of a yel-
lowish white ; the rump is tawny, and the feathers of the tail
sharp-pointed ; the bill is dusky and sharp, and the legs are
dusky ; the hinder claw long and crooked." The person that
shot it says that it sung so like a reed-sparrow that he took it
for one ; and that it sings all night : but this account merits
farther inquiry. For my part, I suspect it is a second sort
of locustela, hinted at by Dr. Derham in Ray's Letters : see
p. 108. He also procured me a grasshopper-lark.

The question that you put with regard to those genera of
animals that are peculiar to America, viz., how they came there,
and whence } is too puzzling for me to answer ; and yet so
obvious as often to have struck me with wonder. If one looks
into the writers on that subject little satisfaction is to be found.
Ingenious men will readily advance plausible arguments to
support whatever theory they shall choose to maintain ; but
then the misfortune is, every one's hypothesis is each as good
as another's, since they are all founded on conjecture. The
late writers of this sort, in whom may be seen all the argu-
ments of those that have gone before, as I remember, stock
America from the western coast of Africa and the south of
Europe ; and then break down the Isthmus that bridged over
the Atlantic. But this is making use of a violent piece of
machinery ; it is a difficulty worthy of the interposition of a
god! ^'' Increduhis odi''

TO THOMAS PENNANT, ESQUIRE

THE NATURALIST'S SUMMER-EVENING WALK

equidem credo, quia sit divinitus illis

Ingenium. ViRG. Georg.

When day declining sheds a milder gleam.
What time the may-fly ^ haunts the pool or stream ;
When the still owl skims round the grassy mead.
What time the timorous hare limps forth to feed ;
Then be the time to steal adown the vale.
And listen to the vagrant ^ cuckoo's tale ;

60 WHITE

To hear the clamorous ^ curlew call his mate,
Or the soft quail his tender pain relate ;
To see the swallow sweep the darkening plain
Belated, to support her infant train ;
To mark the swift in rapid giddy ring
Dash round the steeple, unsubdued of wing :
Amusive birds ! — say where your hid retreat
When the frost rages and the tempests beat ;
Whence your return, by such nice instinct led,
When spring, soft season, lifts her bloomy head ?
Such baffled searches mock man's prying pride.
The God of Nature is your secret guide !

While deepening shades obscure the face of day,
To yonder bench leaf-sheltered let us stray.
Till blended objects fail the swimming sight,
And all the fading landscape sinks in night ;
To hear the drowsy dor come brushing by
With buzzing wing, or the shrill * cricket cry ;
To see the feeding bat glance through the wood ;
To catch the distant falling of the flood ;
While o'er the cliff th' awakened churn-owl hung
Through the still gloom protracts his chattering song ;
While high in air, and poised upon his wings.
Unseen, the soft enamored ^ woodlark sings :
These, Nature's works, the curious mind employ.
Inspire a soothing melancholy joy :
As fancy warms, a pleasing kind of pain
Steals o'er the cheek, and thrills the creeping vein !

Each rural sight, each sound, each smell, combine ;
The tinkling sheep-bell or the breath of kine ;
The new-mown hay that scents the swelling breeze,
Or cottage-chimney smoking through the trees.

The chilling night-dews fall : — away, retire !
For see, the glow-worm lights her amorous fire ! ^
Thus, ere night's veil had half obscured the sky,
Th' impatient damsel hung her lamp on high :
True to the signal, by love's meteor led,
Leander hastened to his Hero's bed."

I am, etc.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 6l

Notes

^ The angler's may-fly, the ephemera vulgata Linn., comes forth from its
aurelia state, and emerges out of the water about six in the evening, and dies
about eleven at night, determining the date of its fly state in about five or
six hours. They usually begin to appear about the 4th June, and continue
in succession for near a fortnight. See Siva/nmerdani, Derhaifi, Scopoli,
etc. — G. W.

'^ Vagrant cuckoo ; so called because, being tied down by no incubation
or attendance about the nutrition of its young, it wanders without control.
— G. W.

8 Charadritcs cedicnetntis. — G. W.

* Grylliis campestris. — G. W.

° In hot summer nights woodlarks soar to a prodigious height, and hang
singing in the air. — G. W.

^ The light of the female glow-worm (as she often crawls up the stalk of
a grass to make herself more conspicuous) is a signal to the male, which is a
slender dusky scarabceus. — G. W.

" See the story of Hero and Leander. — G. W.

LETTER XXV

Selborne, Atig. loth, 1769.

Dear Sir, — It gives me satisfaction to find that my account
of the ousel migration pleases you. You put a very shrewd
question when you ask me how I know that their autumnal
migration is southward .-" Was not candor and openness the
very life of natural history, I should pass over this query just
as a sly commentator does over a crabbed passage in a classic ;
but common ingenuousness obliges me to confess, not without
some degree of shame, that I only reasoned in that case from
analogy. For as all other autumnal birds migrate from the
northward to us, to partake of our milder winters, and return
to the northward again when the rigorous cold abates, so I
concluded that the ring-ousels did the same, as well as their
congeners the fieldfares ; and especially as ring-ousels are
known to haunt cold mountainous countries : but I have good
reason to suspect since that they may come to us from the
westward ; because I hear from very good authority, that they
breed on Dartmoor ; and that they forsake that wild district

62 WHITE

about the time that our visitors appear, and do not return till
late in the spring.

I have taken a great deal of pains about your salicaria and
mine, with a white stroke over its eye and a tawny rump.^ I
have surveyed it alive and dead, and have procured several
specimens, and am perfectly persuaded myself (and trust you
will soon become convinced of the same) that it is no more nor
less than th.& passer arundinacetis minor oi Ray. This bird, by
some means or other, seems to be entirely omitted in the " British
Zoology ; " and one reason probably was because it is so strangely
classed in Ray, who ranges it among his picis affines. It ought
no doubt to have gone among his aviculcB caiidd imicolore, and
among your slender-billed small birds of the same division.
Linnaeus might with great propriety have put it into his genus
of motacilla; and niotacilla salicaria of h.\&fajma snecica seems
to come the nearest to it. It is no uncommon bird, haunting the
sides of ponds and rivers where there is covert, and the reeds
and sedges of moors. The country-people in some places call
it the sedge-bird. It sings incessantly night and day during
the breeding time, imitating the note of a sparrow, a swallow, a
skylark ; and has a strange hurrying manner in its song. My
specimens correspond most minutely to the description of your
fen salicaria shot near Revesby. Mr. Ray has given an ex-
cellent characteristic of it when he says, *^ Rostrum et pedes in
hdc avicidd inn lib majores s?int qiidni pro corporis rationey See
letter, May 29th, 1769. (Preceding letter, XXIV.)

I have got you the ^g% of an oedicnemiis, or stone-curlew,
which was picked up in a fallow on the naked ground ; there
were two, but the finder inadvertently crushed one with his
foot before he saw them.

When I wrote to you last year on reptiles, I wish I had not
forgot to mention the faculty that snakes have of stinking se
defendendo. I knew a gentleman who kept a tame snake,
which was in its person as sweet as any animal while in good
humor and unalarmed ; but as soon as a stranger, or a dog or
cat, came in, it fell to hissing, and filled the room with such
nauseous effluvia as rendered it hardly supportable. Thus the
squnck, or stonck, of Ray's " Synop. Quadr." is an innocuous
and sweet animal ; but, when pressed hard by dogs and men.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 6$

it can eject such a most pestilent and fetid smell and excre-
ment, that nothing can be more horrible.

A gentleman sent me lately a fine specimen of the lanius
viinor cinerascens cum viaculd in scapiilis albd. Rail ; which is
a bird that, at the time of your publishing your two first vol-
umes of " British Zoology," I find you had not seen. You
have described it well from Edwards's drawing.

Note

^ The bird referred to is the sedge-warbler. White says it sings like a
reed-sparrow. The reed-sparrow has no song, but the reed-wren, or reed-
warbler, has, and White must mean this species by the term reed-sparrow. —
G. C. D.

LETTER XXVI

Selborne, December Si/t, 1769.

Dear Sir, — I was much gratified by your communicative
letter on your return from Scotland, where you spent some
considerable time, and gave yourself good room to examine
the natural curiosities of that extensive kingdom, both those of
the islands, as well as those of the highlands. The usual bane
of such expeditions is hurry, because men seldom allot them-
selves half the time they should do ; but, fixing on a day for
their return, post from place to place, rather as if they were on
a journey that required despatch, than as philosophers investi-
gating the works of nature. You must have made, no doubt,
many discoveries, and laid up a good fund of materials for a
future edition of the " British Zoology ; " and will have no rea-
son to repent that you have bestowed so much pains on a part
of Great Britain that perhaps was never so well examined
before.

It has always been matter of wonder to me that fieldfares,
which are so congenerous to thrushes and blackbirds, should
never choose to breed in England ; but that they should not
think even the highlands cold and northerly, and sequestered
enough, is a circumstance still more strange and wonderful.
The ring-ousel, you find, stays in Scotland the whole year
round ; so that we have reason to conclude that those migrat-

64 WHITE

ors that visit us for a short space every autumn do not come
from thence.

And here, I think, will be the proper place to mention that
those birds were most punctual again in their migration this
autumn, appearing, as before, about the 30th September ; but
their flocks were larger than common, and their stay protracted
somewhat beyond the usual time. If they came to spend the
whole winter with us, as some of their congeners do, and then
left us, as they do, in spring, I should not be so much struck
with the occurrence, since it would be similar to that of the
other winter birds of passage ; but when I see them for a fort-
night at Michaelmas, and again for about a week in the middle
of April, I am seized with wonder, and long to be informed
whence these travellers come, and whither they go, since they
seem to use our hills merely as an inn or baiting place.

Your account of the greater brambling, or snow-fleck, is
very amusing ; and strange it is that such a short-winged bird
should delight in such perilous voyages over the northern
ocean ! Some country-people in the winter time have every
now and then told me that they have seen two or three white
larks on our downs, but, on considering the matter, I begin to
suspect that these are some stragglers of the birds we are talk-
ing of, which sometimes perhaps may rove so far to the south-
ward.

It pleases me to find that white hares are so frequent on the
Scottish mountains, and especially as you inform me that it is
a distinct species ; for the quadrupeds of Britain are so few,
that every new species is a great acquisition.

The eagle-owl, could it be proved to belong to us, is so
majestic a bird, that it would grace onr fatma much. I never
was informed before where wild-geese are known to breed.

You admit, I find, that I have proved your fen salicaria to
be the lesser reed-sparrow of Ray ; and I think you may be se-
cure that I am right, for I took very particular pains to clear
up that matter, and had some fair specimens ; but, as they
were not well preserved, they are decayed already. You will,
no doubt, insert it in its proper place in your next edition.
Your additional plates will much improve your work.

De Buffon, I know, has described the water shrew-mouse;

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 6$

but still I am pleased to find you have discovered it in Lincoln-
shire, for the reason I have given in the article of the white
hare.

As a neighbor was lately ploughing a dry, chalky field, far
removed from any water, he turned out a water-rat, that was
curiously lain up in a hybernaculum artificially formed of grass
and leaves. At one end of the burrow lay above a gallon of
potatoes regularly stowed, on which it was to have supported
itself for the winter. But the difficulty with me is how this
avtphibius mus came to fix its winter station at such a distance
from the water. Was it determined in its choice of that place
by the m.ere accident of finding the potatoes which were
planted there ; or is it the constant practice of the aquatic rat
to forsake the neighborhood of the water in the colder months }

Though I delight very little in analogous reasoning, know-
ing how fallacious it is with respect to natural history ; yet, in
the following instance, I cannot help being inclined to think
it may conduce towards the explanation of a difficulty that I
have mentioned before, with respect to the invariable early re-
treat of the liiriindo apiis, or swift, so many weeks before its
congeners ; and that not only with us, but also in Andalusia,
where they also begin to retire about the beginning of August.

The great large bat (which by the bye is at present a nonde-
script in England, and what I have never been able yet to pro-
cure) retires or migrates very early in the summer; it also
ranges very high for its food, feeding in a different region of
the air; and that is the reason I never could procure one.
Now this is exactly the case with the swifts ; for they take
their food in a more exalted region than the other species, and
are very seldom seen hawking for flies near the ground, or over
the surface of the water. From hence I would conclude that
these hirwidmes and the larger bats are supported by some
sorts of high-flying gnats, scarabs, ox phalcencB, that are of short
continuance ; and that the short stay of these strangers is reg-
ulated by the defect of their food.

By my journal it appears that curlews clamored on to
October 31st; since which I have not seen nor heard any.
Swallows were observed on to November 3rd.

66 WHITE

LETTER XXVII

Selborne, Fed. 22nd, 1770.

Dear Sir, — Hedgehogs abound in my gardens and fields.
The manner in which they eat the roots of the plantain in my
grass-walks is very curious ; with their upper mandible, which
is much longer than their lower, they bore under the plant, and
so eat the root off upwards, leaving the tuft of leaves untouched.
In this respect they are serviceable, as they destroy a very
troublesome weed ; but they deface the walks in some measure
by digging little round holes. It appears, by the dung that they
drop upon the turf, that beetles are no inconsiderable part of
their food.^ In June last I procured a litter of four or five young
hedgehogs, which appeared to be about five or six days old :
they, I find, like puppies, are born blind, and could not see when
they came to my hands. No doubt their spines are soft and flex-
ible at the time of their birth, or else the poor dam would have
but a bad time of it in the critical moment of parturition, but
it is plain they soon harden ; for these little pigs had such stiff
prickles on their backs and sides as would easily have fetched
blood, had they not been handled with caution. Their spines
are quite white at this age ; and they have little hanging ears,
which I do not remember to be discernible in the old ones.
They can, in part, at this age draw their skin down over their
faces ; but are not able to contract themselves into a ball, as they
do, for the sake of defence, when full grown. The reason, I sup-
pose, is, because the curious muscle that enables the creature
to roll itself up in a ball was not then arrived at its full tone
and firmness. Hedgehogs make a deep and warm /ij'dernac-
nlmn with leaves and moss, in which they conceal themselves
for the winter ; but I never could find that they stored in any
winter provision, as some quadrupeds certainly do.

I have discovered an anecdote with respect to the fieldfare
{tiirdiis pilaris), which I think is particular enough ; this bird,
though it sits on trees in the day-time, and procures the great-
est part of its food from white-thorn hedges ; yea, moreover,
builds on very high trees, as may be seen by \\vq. fauna sttecica ;
yet always appears with us to roost on the ground. They are

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 6/

seen to come in flocks just before it is dark, and to settle and
nestle among the heath on our f orest.^ And besides, the larkers
in dragging their nets by night, frequently catch them in the
wheat stubbles ; while the bat-fowlers, who take many red-
wings in the hedges, never entangle any of this species. Why
these birds, in the matter of roosting, should differ from all their
congeners, and from themselves also with respect to their pro-
ceedings by day, is a fact for which I am by no means able to
account.

1 have somewhat to inform you of concerning the moose-
deer ; but in general foreign animals fall seldom in my way;
my little intelligence is confined to the narrow sphere of my
own observations at home.

Notes

^ Hedgehogs are indiscriminate feeders upon flesh or vegetables, insects
or eggs. It is persistently asserted by country-people, and as persistently
denied by naturalists, that the hedgehog will suck the teats of sleeping cows.
That it is occasionally up to mischief the following note copied from the
Field oi 'hls.y 24th, 1879, '^^'i^^ show: —

" Some few days ago a farmer had an ewe caught in some brambles, and
when he went to see his sheep in the morning, he found that something
had eaten the ewe's udder off. Of course he killed the sheep at once, and,
as he was taking it home in the cart, I thought it was a strange case, and
got up into the cart and examined the part that had been bitten. I saw the
marks of small teeth on the skin, and told the farmer I thought it was a
hedgehog. I set some traps where the blood had been spilt on the ground,
and strewed some small portions of half-decayed liver round about the traps
for one or two nights. About the third night the portions of Hverwere all
gone. I left the traps set, and strewed more liver, and this morning I had
got a very large hedgehog, a little over 2 lb. weight. I skinned him, and
examined the stomach, and found in it some soft dark-brown pulpy substance,
mixed with a small quantity of wool.

"W. R. SMITH, Gamekeeper,

" Okehamptotu N. Devon.''''

— G. C. D.

2 The fieldfare and redwing nest among the pines and firs of Norway and
Sweden, and arrive in England in large flocks in the wunter. — G. C. D.

68 WHITE

LETTER XXVIII

Selborne, March, 1770.

On Michaelmas day 1768 I managed to get a sight of the
female moose belonging to the Duke of Richmond, at Good-
wood ; but was greatly disappointed, when I arrived at the spot,
to find that it died, after having appeared in a languishing way
for some time on the morning before. However, understand-
ing that it was not stripped, I proceeded to examine this rare
quadruped ; I found it in an old greenhouse, slung under the
belly and chin by ropes, and in a standing posture ; but, though
it had been dead for so short a time, it was in so putrid a state
that the stench was hardly supportable. The grand distinction
between this deer, and any other species that I have ever met
with, consisted in the strange length of its legs ; on which it
was tilted up much in the manner of the birds of the grallcB
order. I measured it, as they do a horse, and found that,
from the ground to the withers it was just five feet four
inches ; which height answers exactly to sixteen hands, a
growth that few horses arrive at : but then, with this length
of legs, its neck was remarkably short, no more than twelve
inches ; so that, by straddling with one foot forward and the
other backward, it grazed on the plain ground, with the great-
est difficulty, between its legs ; the ears were vast and lopping,
and as long as the neck ; the head was about twenty inches
long, and ass-like ; and had such a redundancy of upper lip
as I never saw before, with huge nostrils. This lip, travellers
say, is esteemed a dainty dish in North America. It is very
reasonable to suppose that this creature supports itself chiefly
by browsing of trees, and by wading after water plants ; tow-
ards which way of livelihood the length of legs and great lip
must contribute much. I have read somewhere that it delights
in eating the nympJicea, or water-lily. From the fore-feet to the
belly behind the shoulder it measured three feet and eight
inches : the length of the legs before and behind consisted a
great deal in the tibia, which was strangely long ; but, in my
haste to get out of the stench, I forgot to measure that joint
exactly. Its scut seemed to be about an inch long ; the color

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 69

was a grizzly black ; the mane about four inches long ; the
fore-hoofs were upright and shapely, the hind flat and splayed.
The spring before it was only two years old, so that most prob-
ably it was not then come to its growth. What a vast tall beast
must a full-grown stag be ! I have been told some arrive at ten
feet and a half ! This poor creature had at first a female com-
panion of the same species, which died the spring before. In
the same garden was a young stag, or red deer, between whom
and this moose it was hoped that there might have been a breed ;
but their inequality of height must have always been a bar to
any commerce of the amorous kind. I should have been glad
to have examined the teeth, tongue, lips, hoofs, etc., minutely ;
but the putrefaction precluded all farther curiosity. This ani-
mal, the keeper told me, seemed to enjoy itself best in the ex-
treme frost of the former winter. In the house they showed
me the horn of a male moose, which had no front antlers, but
only a broad palm with some snags on the edge. The noble
owner of the dead moose proposed to make a skeleton of her
bones.

Please to let me hear if my female moose corresponds with
that you saw ; and whether you think still that the American
moose and European elk are the same creature.

I am, with the greatest esteem, etc.

LETTER XXIX

Selborne, May 12th, 1770.

Dear Sir, — Last month we had such a series of cold tur-
bulent weather, such a constant succession of frost, and snow,
and hail, and tempest, that the regular migration or appear-
ance of the summer birds was much interrupted. Some did
not show themselves (at least were not heard) till weeks after
their usual time ; as the black-cap and whitethroat ; and some
have not been heard yet, as the grasshopper-lark and largest
willow-wren. As to the fly-catcher, I have not seen it ; it is
indeed one of the latest, but should appear about this time :
and yet, amidst all this meteorous strife and war of the ale-

70 WHITE

ments, two swallows discovered themselves as long ago as
April nth, in frost and snow; but they withdrew quickly,
and were not visible again for many days. House-martins,
which are always more backward than swallows, were not
observed till May came in.

Among the monogamous birds several are to be found, after
pairing time, single, and of each sex ; but whether this state
of celibacy is matter of choice or necessity, is not so easy dis-
coverable. When the house-sparrows deprive my martins of
their nests, as soon as I cause one to be shot the other, be it
cock or hen, presently procures a mate, and so for several
times following.

I have known a dove-house infested by a pair of white owls,
which made great havoc among the young pigeons : one of
the owls was shot as soon as possible ; but the survivor readily
found a mate, and the mischief went on. After some time
the new pair were both destroyed, and the annoyance ceased.

Another instance I remember of a sportsman, whose zeal
for the increase of his game being greater than his humanity,
after pairing time he always shot the cock bird of every couple
of partridges upon his grounds ; supposing that the rivalry of
many males interrupted the breed : he used to say, that, though
he had widowed the same hen several times, yet he found she
was still provided with a fresh paramour, that did not take her
away from her usual haunt.

Again ; I knew a lover of setting, an old sportsman, who
has often told me that soon after harvest he has frequently
taken small coveys of partridges, consisting of cock birds
alone ; these he pleasantly used to call old bachelors.

There is a propensity belonging to common house-cats that
is very remarkable ; I mean their violent fondness for fish,
which appears to be their most favorite food : and yet nature
in this instance seems to have planted in them an appetite
that, unassisted, they know not how to gratify : for of all quad-
rupeds cats are the least disposed towards water; and will
not, when they can avoid it, deign to wet a foot, much less to
plunge into that element.

Quadrupeds that prey on fish are amphibious : such is the
otter, which by nature is so well formed for diving, that it

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 71

makes great havoc among the inhabitants of the waters. Not
supposing that we had any of those beasts in our shallow
brooks, I was much pleased to see a male otter, brought to
me, weighing twenty-one pounds, that had been shot on the
bank of our stream below the Priory, where the rivulet divides
the parish of Selborne from Harteley Wood.^

Note

1 Shy as the otter is, a pair made their home in a hole under some stone-
work on the banks of the canal at Llangollen, within six yards of several
cottages.

LETTER XXX

Selborne, Aug. ist, 1770.

Dear Sir, — The French, I think, in general are strangely
prolix in their natural history. What Linnaeus says with re-
spect to insects holds good in every other branch : " Verbositas
prcEsentis sceaili, calami tas art is. '^

Pray how do you approve of Scopoli's new work "i As I
admire his " Entomologia," I long to see it.

I forgot to mention in my last letter (and had not room to
insert in the former) that the male moose, in rutting time,
swims from island to island, in the lakes and rivers of North
America, in pursuit of the females. My friend, the chaplain,
saw one killed in the water as it was on that errand in the
river St. Lawrence : it was a monstrous beast, he told me ;
but he did not take the dimensions.

When I was last in town our friend Mr. Barrington most
obligingly carried me to see many curious sights. As you
were then writing to him about horns, he carried me to see
many strange and wonderful specimens. There is, I remem-
ber, at Lord Pembroke's at Wilton, a horn room furnished
with more than thirty different pairs ; but I have not seen that
house lately.

Mr, Barrington showed me many astonishing collections of
stuffed and living birds from all quarters of the world. After
I had studied over the latter for a time, I remarked that every
species almost that came from distant regions, such as South

72 WHITE

America, the coast of Guinea, etc., were thick-billed birds of
the loxia and friiigilla genera ; and no viotacillcB, or niusci-
capce, were to be met with. When I came to consider, the
reason was obvious enough ; for the hard-billed birds subsist
on seeds which are easily carried on board ; while the soft-
billed birds, which are supported by worms and insects, or,
what is a succeda?ieum for them, fresh raw meat, can meet with
neither in long and tedious voyages. It is from this defect of
food that our collections (curious as they are) are defective,
and we are deprived of some of the most delicate and lively
genera.

I am, etc.

LETTER XXXI

Selborne, Sept. i^h, 1770.

Dear Sir, — You saw, I find, the ring-ousels again among
their native crags ; and are farther assured that they continue
resident in those cold regions the whole year. From whence
then do our ring-ousels migrate so regularly every September,
and make their appearance again, as if in their return, every
April? They are more early this year than common, for some
were seen at the usual hill on the fourth of this month.

An observing Devonshire gentleman tells me that they fre-
quent some parts of Dartmoor, and breed there ; but leave
those haunts about the end of September, or beginning of
October, and return again about the end of March.

Another intelligent person assures me that they breed in
great abundance all over the peak of Derby, and are called
there tor-ousels ; withdraw in October and November, and re-
turn in spring. This information seems to throw some light
on my new migration.

Scopoli's new work (which I have just procured) has its
merit in ascertaining many of the birds of the Tyrol and Car-
niola. Monographers, come from whence they may, have, I
think, fair pretence to challenge some regard and approba-
tion from the lovers of natural history ; for, as no man can
alone investigate the works of nature, these partial writers

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 73

may, each in their department, be more accurate in their dis-
coveries, and freer from errors, than more general writers;
and so by degrees may pave the way to an universal correct
natural history. Not that Scopoli is so circumstantial and
attentive to the life and conversation of his birds as I could
wish : he advances some false facts ; as when he says of the
hirundo urbica that '^ pullos extra nidiim non nittrit.'" This
assertion I know to be wrong from repeated observation this
summer ; for house-martins do feed their young flying, though
it must be acknowledged not so commonly as the house-swal-
low ; and the feat is done in so quick a manner as not to be
perceptible to indifferent observers. He also advances some
(I was going to say) improbable facts ; as when he says of
the woodcock that '' pullos rostro portat fugiens ab hoste."
But candor forbids me to say absolutely that any fact is false,
because I have never been witness to such a fact. I have
only to remark that the long unwieldy bill of the woodcock is
perhaps the worst adapted of any among the winged creation
for such a feat of natural affection.^

I am, etc.
Note

1 It is a fact that the woodcock does cairy its young. The legs and beak
are both employed in holding the young one to the parent's breast as it
flies. — G. CD.

LETTER XXXII

Selborne, October 29/^, 1770.

Dear Sir, — After an ineffectual search in Linnaeus, Bris-
son, etc., I begin to suspect that I discern my hroih.Qr & hirimdo
hyberna in Scopoli' s new discovered hu'imdo rupestris, p. 167.
His description of "Supra imiri7ia, siibtiis albida ; rectrices
macicld ovali alba in latere interno ; pedes nudi, nigri ; rostrum
7iigrum ; remiges obscuriores quam phinice dorsales ; rectrices
reniigibus concolores ; caudd emarginatd, nee forcipatd ;'' agrees
very well with the bird in question : but when he comes to
advance that it is " statura hirundinis urbiccs,'' and that " defi-
nitio hirundinis iiparice Linncei Imic quoque convemtt," he in

74 WHITE

some measure invalidates all he has said ; at least he shows
at once that he compares them to these species merely from
memory : for I have compared the birds themselves, and find
they differ widely in every circumstance of shape, size, and
color. However, as you will have a specimen, I shall be glad
to hear what your judgment is in the matter.

Whether my brother is forestalled in his nondescript or not,
he will have the credit of first discovering that they spend their
winters under the warm and sheltry shores of Gibraltar and
Barbary.

Scopoli's characters of his ordines and genera are clear,
just, and expressive, and much in the spirit of Linnaeus.
These few remarks are the result of my first perusal of Sco-
poli's "Annus Primus."

The bane of our science is the comparing one animal to
the other by memory : for want of caution in this particular
Scopoli falls into errors : he is not so full with regard to the
manners of his indigenous birds as might be wished, as you
justly observe : his Latin is easy, elegant, and expressive, and
very superior to Kramer's.^

I am pleased to see that my description of the moose cor-
responds so well with yours.

I am, etc.
Note

^ See his "Elenchus Vegetabilium et Animalium per Austriam Inferiorem,
etc." — G. W.

LETTER XXXIII

Selborne, Nov. 26th, 1770.

Dear Sir, — I was much pleased to see, among the collec-
tion of birds from Gibraltar, some of those short-winged Eng-
lish summer birds of passage, concerning whose departure we
have made so much inquiry. Now if these birds are found
in Andalusia to migrate to and from Barbary, it may easily be
supposed that those that come to us may migrate back to the
continent, and spend their winters in some of the warmer
parts of Europe. This is certain, that many soft-billed birds
that come to Gibraltar appear there only in spring and autumn.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 75

seeming to advance in pairs towards the northward, for the
sake of breeding during the summer months ; and retiring in
parties and broods towards the south at the decline of the
year ; so that the rock of Gibraltar is the great rendezvous,
and place of observation, from whence they take their de-
parture each way towards Europe or Africa. It is therefore
no mean discovery, I think, to find that our small short-winged
summer birds of passage are to be seen spring and autumn
on the very skirts of Europe ; it is presumptive proof of their
emigrations.

Scopoli seems to me to have found the hirundo melba, the
great Gibraltar swift, in the Tyrol, without knowing it. For
what is his hirundo alpina but the afore-mentioned bird in
other words } Says he " Omnia prioris " (meaning the swift) ;
'^ sed pectus albnm ; paiilo major prioreT I do not suppose
this to be a new species. It is true also of the melba, that
" nidificat in excelsis Alpiiim rupibusy Vid. Annum Primnni.

My Sussex friend, a man of observation and good sense,
but no naturalist, to whom I applied on account of the stone-
curlew, cedicjiemns, sends me the following account : " In look-
ing over my Naturalist's Journal for the month of April, I find
the stone-curlews are first mentioned on the seventeenth and
eighteenth, which date seems to me rather late. They live
with us all the spring and summer, and at the beginning of
autumn prepare to take leave by getting together in flocks.
They seem to me a bird of passage that may travel into some
dry hilly country south of us, probably Spain, because of the
abundance of sheep-walks in that country ; for they spend
their summers with us in such districts. This conjecture I
hazard, as I have never met with any one that has seen them
in England in the winter. I believe they are not fond of going
near the water, but feed on earthworms, that are common on
sheep-walks and downs. They breed on fallows and lay-fields
abounding with gray mossy flints, which much resemble their
young in color ; among which they skulk and conceal them-
selves. They make no nest, but lay their eggs on the bare
ground, producing in common but two at a time. There is
reason to think their young run soon after they are hatched ;
and that the old ones do not feed them, but only lead them

76 WHITE

about at the time of feeding, which for the most part is in the
night." Thus far, my friend.

In the manners of this bird you see there is something very
analogous to the bustard, whom it also somewhat resembles
in aspect and make, and in the structure of its feet.

For a long time I have desired my relation to look out for
these birds in Andalusia ; and now he writes me word that,
for the first time, he saw one dead in the market on the 3rd
September.

When the cedicnemtis flies it stretches out its legs straight
behind, like a heron.

I am, etc.

LETTER XXXIV

Selborne, March 2,0th, 1771.

Dear Sir, — There is an insect with us, especially on chalky
districts, which is very troublesome and teasing all the latter
end of the summer, getting into people's skins, especially
those of women and children, and raising tumors which itch
intolerably. This animal (which we call a harvest bug) is very
minute, scarce discernible to the naked eye ; of a bright scar-
let color, and of the genus of Acarus. They are to be met
with in gardens on kidney-beans, or any legumens, but pre-
vail only in the hot months of summer. Warreners, as some
have assured me, are much infested by them on chalky downs ;
where these insects swarm sometimes to so infinite a degree
as to discolor their nets, and to give them a reddish cast, while
the men are so bitten as to be thrown into fevers.

There is a small long shining fly in these parts very trouble-
some to the housewife, by getting into the chimneys, and lay-
ing its eggs in the bacon while it is drying ; these eggs produce
maggots called jumpers, which, harboring in the gammons and
best parts of the hogs, eat down to the bone, and make great
waste. This fly I suspect to be a variety of the imisca putris
of Linnaeus ; it is to be seen in the summer in farm-kitchens
on the bacon-racks and about the mantel-pieces, and on the
ceilings.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE TJ

The insect that infests turnips and many crops in the garden
(destroying often whole fields while in their seedling leaves) is
an animal that wants to be better known. The country-people
here call it the turnip-fly and black-dolphin ; but I know it to
be one of the coleoptera; the " c/nysoniela oleracea, saltatoria,
femoTibiis posticis crassissimis." In very hot summers they
abound to an amazing degree, and, as you walk in a field or in
a garden, make a pattering like rain, by jumping on the leaves
of the turnips or cabbages.

There is an oestrus, known in these parts to every plough-
boy; which, because it is omitted by Linnaeus, is also passed
over by late writers ; and that is the cnrvicaiida of old Mouset,
mentioned by Derham in his " Physico-Theology," p. 250; an
insect worthy of remark for depositing its eggs as it flies in so
dexterous a manner on the single hairs of the legs and flanks
of grass-horses. But then Derham is mistaken when he ad-
vances that this oestrus is the parent of that wonderful star-
tailed maggot which he mentions afterwards ; for more modern
entomologists have discovered that singular production to be
derived from the ^g,^, or the musca chamceleon ; see Geoffroy,
t. xvii. f. 4.

A full history of noxious insects hurtful in the field, garden,
and house, suggesting all the known and likely means of de-
stroying them, would be allowed by the public to be a most use-
ful and important work. What knowledge there is of this sort
lies scattered, and wants to be collected ; great improvements
would soon follow of course. A knowledge of the properties,
economy, propagation, and in short of the life and conversa-
tion of these animals is a necessary step to lead us to some
method of preventing their depredations.

As far as I am a judge, nothing would recommend ento-
mology more than some neat plates that should well express
the generic distinctions of insects according to Linnaeus ; for
I am well assured that many people would study insects, could
they set out with a more adequate notion of those distinctions
than can be conveyed at first by words alone.

78 WHITE

LETTER XXXV

Selborne, 1 77 1.

Dear Sir, — Happening to make a visit to my neighbor's
peacocks, I could not help observing that the trains of those
magnificent birds appear by no means to be their tails ; those
long feathers growing not from their uropygiiim, but all up their
backs. A range of short brown stiff feathers, about six inches
long, fixed in the uropygiiim, is the real tail, and serves as the
fulcrum to prop the train, which is long and top-heavy, when
set on end. When the train is up, nothing appears of the bird
before but his head and neck ; but this would not be the case
were those long feathers fixed only in the rump, as may be
seen by the turkey cock when in a strutting attitude. By a
strong muscular vibration these birds can make the shafts of
their long feathers clatter like the swords of a sword dancer ;
they then trample very quick with their feet, and run back-
wards towards the females.

I should tell you that I have got an uncommon calculus
csgogropila, taken out of the stomach of a fat ox ; it is per-
fectly round, and about the size of a large Seville orange;
such are, I think, usually flat.

LETTER XXXVI

Sept. 1771.

Dear Sir, — The summer through I have seen but two of
that large species of bat which I call vespertilio altivolans,
from its manner of feeding high in the air ; I procured one of
them, and found it to be a male ; and made no doubt, as they
accompanied together, that the other was a female ; but, hap-
pening in an evening or two to procure the other likewise, I
was somewhat disappointed, when it appeared to be also of
the same sex. This circumstance, and the great scarcity of
this sort, at least in these parts, occasions some suspicions in
my mind whether it is really a species, or whether it may not
be the male part of the more known species, one of which

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 79

may supply many females ; as is known to be the case in
sheep and some other quadrupeds. But this doubt can only
be cleared by a farther examination, and some attention to the
sex, of more specimens: all that I know at present is, that my
two were amply furnished with the parts of generation, much
resembling those of a boar.

In the extent of their wings they measured fourteen inches
and a half ; and four inches and a half from the nose to the
tip of the tail ; their heads were large, their nostrils bilobated,
their shoulders broad and muscular ; and their whole bodies
fleshy and plump. Nothing could be more sleek and soft than
their fur, which was of a bright chestnut color ; their maws
were full of food, but so macerated that the quality could not
be distinguished ; their livers, kidneys, and hearts were large,
and their bowels covered with fat. They weighed each, when
entire, full one ounce and one drachm. Within the ear there
was somewhat of a peculiar structure that I did not under-
stand perfectly ! but refer it to the observation of the curious
anatomist. These creatures sent forth a very rancid and
offensive smell.

LETTER XXXVII

Selborne, 1 77 1.

Dear Sir, — On the 12th July I had a fair opportunity of
contemplating the motions of the caprimulgns, or fern-owl, as
it was playing round a large oak that swarmed with scarabcsi
solstitiales, or fern-chafers. The powers of its wing were
wonderful, exceeding, if possible, the various evolutions and
quick turns of the swallow genus. But the circumstance that
pleased me most was, that I saw it distinctly, more than once,
put out its short leg while on the wing, and, by a bend of the
head, deliver somewhat into its mouth. If it takes any part
of its prey with its foot, as I have now the greatest reason to
suppose it does these chafers, I no longer wonder at the use
of its middle toe, which is curiously furnished with a serrated
claw.

Swallows and martins, the bulk of them I mean, have for-

80 WHITE

saken us sooner this year than usual ; for on September 22nd
they rendezvoused in a neighbor's walnut-tree, where it
seemed probable they had taken up their lodging for the
night. At the dawn of the day, which was foggy, they arose
all together in infinite numbers, occasioning such a rushing
from the strokes of their wings against the hazy air, as might
be heard to a considerable distance : since that no flock has
appeared, only a few stragglers.

Some swifts stayed late, till the 22nd August — a rare in-
stance ! for they usually withdraw within the first week.

On September 24th three or four ring-ousels appeared in
my fields for the first time this season ; how punctual are these
visitors in their autumnal and spring migrations !

LETTER XXXVIII

Selborne, March i^ih, 1773.

Dear Sir, — By my journal for last autumn it appears that
the house-martins bred very late, and stayed very late in these
parts; for, on the ist October, I saw young martins in their
nest nearly fledged; and again on the 21st October, we had
at the next house a nest full of young martins just ready to
fly; and the old ones were hawking for insects with great
alertness. The next morning the brood forsook their nest,
and were flying round the village. From this day I never saw
one of the swallow kind till November 3rd; when twenty, or
perhaps thirty, house-martins were playing all day long by the
side of the hanging wood, and over my field. Did these small
weak birds, some of which were nestling twelve days ago, shift
their quarters at this late season of the year to the other side
of the northern tropic .? Or rather, is it not more probable
that the next church, ruin, chalk-cliff, steep covert, or perhaps
sandbank, lake or pool (as a more northern naturalist would
say), may become their hybernacuhcm, and afford them a ready
and obvious retreat }

We now begin to expect our vernal migration of ring-ousels
every week. Persons worthy of credit assure me that ring-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 8 1

ousels were seen at Christmas 1770 in the forest of Bere, on
the southern verge of this county. Hence we may conclude
that their migrations are only internal, and not extended to the
continent southward, if they do at first come at all from the
northern parts of this island only, and not from the north of
Europe. Come from whence they will, it is plain, from the
fearless disregard that they show for men or guns, that they
have been little accustomed to places of much resort. Navi-
gators mention that in the Isle of Ascension, and other such
desolate districts, birds are so little acquainted with the human
form that they settle on men's shoulders ; and have no more
dread of a sailor than they would have of a goat that was
grazing.^ A young man at Lewes, in Sussex, assured me that
about seven years ago ring-ousels abounded so about that
town in the autumn that he killed sixteen himself in one after-
noon ; he added further, that some had appeared since in every
autumn ; but he could not find that any had been observed
before the season in which he shot so many. I myself have
found these birds in little parties in the autumn cantoned all
along the Sussex Downs, wherever there were shrubs and
bushes, from Chichester to Lewes ; particularly in the autumn

of 1770.

I am, etc.
Note

1 Even in England birds often show great confidence in man. One even-
ing last summer I was sitting in Jesmond Dene, Newcastle-on-Tyne, when
a robin hopped close by me ; and as I kept perfectly still, it inspected me
closely, flew on to my boot, on to the seat by my side, and closely inspected
my hand, then hopped on to my knee, and finally on to my shoulder. — G. C. D.

LETTER XXXIX

Selborne, Nov. ()th, 1773.

Dear Sir, — As you desire me to send you such observa-
tions as may occur, I take the liberty of making the following
remarks, that you may, according as you think me right or
wrong, admit or reject what I here advance, in your intended
new edition of the " British Zoology."
7

82 WHITE

The osprey was shot about a year ago at Frinsham Pond, a
great lake at about six miles from hence, while it was sitting
on the handle of a plough and devouring a fish : it used to pre-
cipitate itself into the water, and so take its prey by surprise.

A great ash-colored butcher-bird was shot last winter in
Tisted Park, and a red-backed butcher-bird [shrike] at Sel-
borne : they are rarce aves in this country.^

Crows go in pairs all the year round.

Cornish choughs abound, and breed on Beechy Head, and
on all the cliffs of the Sussex coast.

The common wild pigeon, or stock-dove,^ is a bird of pas-
sage in the south of England, seldom appearing till towards
the end of November ; is usually the latest winter bird of pas-
sage. Before our beechen woods were so much destroyed we
had myriads of them, reaching in strings for a mile together
as they went out in a morning to feed. They leave us early
in spring : where do they breed }

The people of Hampshire and Sussex call the missel-bird
the storm-cock, because it sings early in the spring in blowing
showery weather ; its song often commences with the year :
with us it builds much in orchards.

A gentleman assures me he has taken the nests of ring-ousels
on Dartmoor : they build in banks on the sides of streams.

Titlarks not only sing sweetly as they sit on trees, but also
as they play and toy about on the wing ; and particularly while
they are descending, and sometimes they stand on the ground.

Adanson's testimony seems to me to be a very poor evidence
that European swallows migrate during our winter to Senegal :
he does not talk at all like an ornithologist ; and probably saw
only the swallows of that country, which I know build within
Governor O'Hara's hall against the roof. Had he known
European swallows, would he not have mentioned the species ?

The house-swallow washes by dropping into the water as it
flies : this species appears commonly about a week before the
house-martin, and about ten or twelve days before the swift.

In 1772 there were young house-martins in their nest till
October 23rd.

The swift appears about ten or twelve days later than the
house-swallow, viz., about the 24th or 26th April.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 83

Whin-chats and stone-chatters stay with us the whole year.^

Some wheat-ears continue with us the winter through.

Wagtails, all sorts, remain with us all the winter.*

Bullfinches, when fed on hempseed, often become wholly
black.

We have vast flocks of female chaffinches all the winter,
with hardly any males among them.

When you say that in breeding time the cock snips make a
bleating noise, and I a drumming (perhaps I should rather
have said a humming), I suspect we mean the same thing.
However, while they are playing about on the wing they
certainly make a loud piping with their mouths : but whether
that bleating or humming is ventriloquous, or proceeds from
the motion of their wings, I cannot say ; but this I know, that
when this noise happens the bird is always descending, and
his wings are violently agitated.

Soon after the lapwings have done breeding they congre-
gate, and, leaving the moors and marshes, betake themselves
to downs and sheep-walks.

Two years ago last spring the little auk was found alive and
unhurt, but fluttering and unable to rise, in a lane a few miles
from Alresford, where there is a great lake : it was kept
awhile, but died.

I saw young teals taken alive in the ponds of Wolmer Forest
in the beginning of July last, along with flappers, or young
wild-ducks.

Speaking of the swift, that page says "its drink the dew;"
whereas it should be "it drinks on the wing;" for all the
swallow kind sip their water as they sweep over the face of
pools or rivers: like Virgil's bees, they drink flying ; ''flinnina
smnma libant.'" In this method of drinking perhaps this
genus may be peculiar.

Of the sedge-bird be pleased to say it sings most part of the
night ; its notes are hurrying, but not unpleasing, and imita-
tive of several birds ; as the sparrow, swallow, skylark. When
it happens to be silent in the night, by throwing a stone or
clod into the bushes where it sits you immediately set it
a singing ; or in other words, though it slumbers sometimes,
yet as soon as it is awakened it reassumes its song.

84 WHITE

Notes

1 The red-backed butcher-bird, or shrike, is common enough in some dis-
tricts. I found several nests one year in some thorn-trees in a small field
in Norfolk. The shrike has a habit of impaling the beetles or other small
live creatures it feeds upon, on the thorns, to await its convenience for eat-
ing them, and some spots have quite the appearance of a well-stocked larder.
— G. C. D.

2 The stock-dove is not the common wild pigeon. The pigeons usually
found in England are the ring-dove, which makes its nests on trees, and is
called the cushat, or in Shropshire the qiiice, the stock-dove, which breeds
in holes in trees, and also in rabbit holes ; the rock-dove, and the pretty
little turtle-dove, which builds so slight a nest in a tree or big bush that the
small white eggs can be seen through it from below. — G. C. D.

3 Whin-chats migrate, but stone-chats do not as a rule. — G. C. D.

* The yellow-wagtail migrates, but the pied and gray wagtails do not. —
G. C. D.

LETTER XL

Selborne, Sept. 2nd, 1774.

Dear Sir, — Before your letter arrived, and of my own
accord, I had been remarking and comparing the tails of the
male and female swallow, and this ere any young broods ap-
peared ; so that there was no danger of confounding the dams
with their pulli: and besides, as they were then always in
pairs, and busied in the employ of nidification, there could be
no room for mistaking the sexes, nor the individuals of differ-
ent chimneys the one for the other. From all my observations,
it constantly appeared that each sex has the long feathers in
its tail that give it that forked shape; with this difference,
that they are longer in the tail of the male than in that of the
female.

Nightingales, when their young first come abroad, and are
helpless, make a plaintive and jarring noise ; and also a snap-
ping or cracking, pursuing people along the hedges as they
walk: these last sounds seem intended for menace and de-
fiance.

The grasshopper-lark chirps all night in the height of
summer.

Swans turn white the second year, and breed the third.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 85

Weasels prey on moles, as appears by their being some-
times caught in mole-traps.

Sparrow-hawks sometimes breed in old crows' nests, and
the kestril in churches and ruins.

There are supposed to be two sorts of eels in the island
of Ely. The threads sometimes discovered in eels are per-
haps their young: the generation of eels is very dark and
mysterious.

Hen harriers breed on the ground, and seem never to settle
on trees.

When redstarts shake their tails they move them horizon-
tally, as dogs do when they fawn : the tail of a wagtail, when
in motion, bobs up and down like that of a jaded horse.

Hedge-sparrows have a remarkable flirt with their wings in
breeding time ; as soon as frosty mornings come they make a
very piping plaintive noise.

Many birds which become silent about midsummer reassume
their notes again in September; as the thrush, blackbird,
woodlark, willow-wren, etc. ; hence August is by much the
most mute month, the spring, summer, and autumn through.
Are birds induced to sing again because the temperament of
autumn resembles that of spring .-"

Linnaeus ranges plants geographically ; palms inhabit the
tropics, grasses the temperate zones, and mosses and lichens
the polar circles ; no doubt animals may be classed in the
same manner with propriety.

House-sparrows build under eaves in the spring; as the
weather becomes hotter they get out for coolness, and nest
in plum-trees and apple-trees. These birds have been known
sometimes to build in rooks' nests, and sometimes in the forks
of boughs under rooks' nests.

As my neighbor was housing a rick he observed that his
dogs devoured all the little red mice that they could catch,
but rejected the common mice ; and that his cats ate the
common mice, refusing the red.

Redbreasts sing all through the spring, summer, and au-
tumn. The reason that they are called autumn songsters is,
because in the two first seasons their voices are drowned and
lost in the general chorus ; in the latter their song becomes

86 WHITE

distinguishable. Many songsters of the autumn seem to be
the young cock redbreasts of that year : notwithstanding the
prejudices in their favor, they do much mischief in gardens
to the summer-fruits.-^

The titmouse, which early in February begins to make two
quaint notes, like the whetting of a saw, is the marsh titmouse ;
the great titmouse sings with three cheerful joyous notes, and
begins about the same time.

Wrens sing all the winter through, frost excepted.

House-martins came remarkably late this year both in Hamp-
shire and Devonshire : is this circumstance for or against either
hiding or migration ?

Most birds drink sipping at intervals ; but pigeons take a
long-continued draught, like quadrupeds.

Notwithstanding what I have said in a former letter, no
gray crows were ever known to breed on Dartmoor ; it was
my mistake.

The appearance and flying of the Scarabcsus solstitialis, or
fern-chafer, commence with the month of July, and cease about
the end of it. These scarabs are the constant food of CapH-
■niidgi, or fern-owls, through that period. They abound on the
chalky downs and in some sandy districts, but not in the clays.

In the garden of the Black Bear inn in the town of Reading,
is a stream or canal running under the stables and out into the
fields on the other side of the road : in this water are many
carps, which lie rolling about in sight, being fed by travellers,
who amuse themselves by tossing them bread ; but as soon as
the weather grows at all severe, these fishes are no longer seen,
because they retire under the stables, where they remain till
the return of spring. Do they lie in a torpid state .'' If they
do not, how are they supported .-' ^

The note of the whitethroat, which is continually repeated,
and often attended with odd gesticulations on the wing, is harsh
and displeasing. These birds seem of a pugnacious disposi-
tion ; for they sing with an erected crest and attitudes of rivalry
and defiance ; are shy and wild in breeding time, avoiding neigh-
borhoods, and haunting lonely lanes and commons ; nay, even
the very tops of the Sussex Downs, where there are bushes
and covert ; but in July and August they bring their broods

From col Chi. Acad. Sciences.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 8/

into gardens and orchards, and make great havoc among the
summer-fruits.

The blackcap has in common a full, sweet, deep, loud, and
wild pipe ; yet that strain is of short continuance, and his
motions are desultory ; but when that bird sits calmly and en-
gages in song in earnest, he pours forth very sweet, but in-
ward melody, and expresses great variety of soft and gentle
modulations, superior perhaps to those of any of our warblers,
the nightingale excepted.

Blackcaps mostly haunt orchards and gardens ; while they
warble their throats are wonderfully distended.

The song of the redstart is superior, though somewhat like
that of the whitethroat ; some birds have a few more notes
than others. Sitting very placidly on the top of a tall tree in
a village, the cock sings from morning to night : he affects
neighborhoods, and avoids solitude, and loves to build in or-
chards and about houses ; with us he perches on the vane of
a tall maypole.

The fly-catcher is of all our summer birds the most mute
and the most familiar ; it also appears the last of any. It
builds in a vine, or a sweetbrier, against the wall of a house,
or in the hole of a wall, or on the end of a beam or plate, and
often close to the post of a door where people are going in
and out all day long. This bird does not make the least pre-
tension to song, but uses a little inward wailing note when it
thinks its young in danger from cats or other annoyances ; it
breeds but once, and retires early.

Selborne parish alone can and has exhibited at times more
than half the birds that are ever seen in all Sweden ; the for-
mer has produced more than one hundred and twenty species,
the latter only two hundred and twenty-one. Let me add also
that it has shown near half the species that were ever known
in Great Britain.

On a retrospect, I observe that my long letter carries with
it a quaint and magisterial air, and is very sententious ; but
when I recollect that you requested stricture and anecdote, I
hope you will pardon the didactic manner for the sake of the
information it may happen to contain.

88 WHITE

Notes

1 They eat also the berries of the ivy, the honeysuckle, and the Euonymus
eiiropceus, or spindle-tree. — G. W.

2 Carp, tench, and eels retire into the mud, if it is soft enough, in the very
cold weather, but cannot be said to become torpid, like a tortoise does. Fish
can do for a long time with very little food, and the mud itself is full of eat-
able (in the fish view) things even in the winter. — G. C. D.

LETTER XLI

It is matter of curious inquiry to trace out how those species
of soft-billed birds that continue with us the winter through,
subsist during the dead months. The imbecility of birds seems
not to be the only reason why they shun the rigor of our win-
ters ; for the robust wryneck (so much resembling the hardy
race of woodpeckers) migrates, while the feeble little golden-
crowned wren, that shadow of a bird, braves our severest frosts
without availing himself of houses or villages, to which most
of our winter birds crowd in distressful seasons, while this
keeps aloof in fields and woods ; but perhaps this may be the
reason why they may often perish, and why they are almost
as rare as any bird we know.

I have no reason to doubt but that the soft-billed birds, which
winter with us, subsist chiefly on insects in their aurelia state.
All the species of wagtails in severe weather haunt shallow
streams near the spring heads, where they never freeze ; and,
by wading, pick out the aurelias of the genus of Phryganece, etc.

Hedge-sparrows frequent sinks and gutters in hard weather,
where they pick up crumbs and other sweepings ; and in mild
weather they procure worms, which are stirring every month
in the year, as any one may see that will only be at the trouble
of taking a candle to a grass-plot on any mild winter's night.
Redbreasts and wrens in the winter haunt out-houses, stables,
and barns, where they find spiders and flies that have laid them-
selves up during the cold season. But the grand support of
the soft-billed birds in winter is that infinite profusion of au-
reha of the Lepidoptera oi'do, which is fastened to the twigs of
trees and their trunks ; to the pales and walls of gardens and

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 89

buildings ; and is found in every cranny and cleft of rock or
rubbish, and even in the ground itself.

Every species of titmouse winters with us ; they have what
I call a kind of intermediate bill between the hard and the soft,
between the Linnaean genera of Fringilla and Motacilla. One
species alone spends its whole time in the woods and fields,
never retreating for succor in the severest seasons to houses
and neighborhoods ; and that is the delicate long-tailed tit-
mouse, which is almost as minute as the golden-crowned wren ;
but the blue titmouse or nun {Parus ccBruleus), the coal-mouse
{Parus titer), the great black-headed titmouse {Fringillago),
and the marsh titmouse {Parus paliistris\ all resort at times
to buildings, and in hard weather particularly. The great
titmouse, driven by stress of weather, much frequents houses ;
and, in deep snows, I have seen this bird, while it hung with
its back downwards (to my no small delight and admiration),
draw straws lengthwise from out the eaves of thatched houses,
in order to pull out the flies that \vere concealed between them,
and that in such numbers that they quite defaced the thatch,
and gave it a ragged appearance.

The blue titmouse, or nun, is a great frequenter of houses,
and a general devourer. Besides insects, it is very fond of
flesh ; for it frequently picks bones on dunghills : it is a vast
admirer of suet, and haunts butchers' shops. When a boy, I
have known twenty in a morning caught with snap mouse-
traps, baited with tallow or suet. It will also pick holes in
apples left on the ground, and be well entertained with the
seeds on the head of a sunflower. The blue, marsh, and great
titmice will, in very severe weather, carry away barley and oat-
straws from the sides of ricks.

How the wheat-ear and whin-chat support themselves in
winter cannot be so easily ascertained, since they spend their
time on wild heaths and warrens ; the former especially, where
there are stone quarries : most probably it is that their main-
tenance arises from the aurelice of the Lepidoptera ordo, which
furnish them with a plentiful table in the wilderness.

I am, etc.

90 WHITE

LETTER XLII

Selborne, March ()th, 1775.

Dear Sir, — Some future faunist, a man of fortune, will, I
hope, extend his visits to the kingdom of Ireland; anew field
and a country little known to the naturalist. He will not, it
is to be wished, undertake that tour unaccompanied by a
botanist, because the mountains have scarcely been sufficiently
examined ; and the southerly counties of so mild an island
may possibly afford some plants little to be expected within
the British dominions. A person of a thinking turn of mind
will draw many just remarks from the modern improvements
of that country, both in arts and agriculture, where premiums
obtained long before they were heard of with us. The man-
ners of the wild natives, their superstitions, their prejudices,
their sordid way of life, will extort from him many useful re-
flections. He should also take with him an able draughtsman ;
for he must by no means pass over the noble castles and seats,
the extensive and picturesque lakes and waterfalls, and the
lofty stupendous mountains, so little known, and so engaging
to the imagination when described and exhibited in a lively
manner ; such a work would be well received.

As I have seen no modern map of Scotland, I cannot pre-
tend to say how accurate or particular any such may be ; but
this I know, that the best old maps of that kingdom are very
defective.

The great obvious defect that I have remarked in all maps
of Scotland that have fallen in my way is a want of a colored
line, or stroke, that shall exactly define the just limits of that
district called the Highlands. Moreover, all the great avenues
to that mountainous and romantic country want to be well
distinguished. The military roads formed by General Wade
are so great and Roman-like an undertaking that they well
merit attention. My old map, Moll's Map, takes notice of
Fort William, but could not mention the other forts that have
been erected long since; therefore a good representation of
the chain of forts should not be omitted.

The celebrated zigzag up the Coryarich must not be passed

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 91

over. Moll takes notice of Hamilton and Drumlanrig, and
such capital houses ; but a new survey, no doubt, should
represent every seat and castle remarkable for any great
event, or celebrated for its paintings, etc. Lord Breadalbane's
seat and beautiful /<?//Vy are too curious and extraordinary to
be omitted.

The seat of the Earl of Eglingtoun, near Glasgow, is
worthy of notice. The pine plantations of that nobleman are
very grand and extensive indeed.

I am, etc.

LETTER XLIII

A PAIR of honey-buzzards, Buteo opivoriis, sive Vespivorus
Rati, built them a large shallow nest, composed of twigs and
lined with dead beechen leaves upon a tall slender beech near
the middle of Selborne Hanger, in the summer of 1780. In
the middle of the month of June a bold boy climbed this tree,
though standing on so steep and dizzy a situation, and brought
down an egg, the only one in the nest, which had been sat on
for some time, and contained the embryo of a young bird.
The egg was smaller, and not so round as those of the com-
mon buzzard ; was dotted at each end with small red spots,
and surrounded in the middle with a broad bloody zone.

The hen bird was shot, and answered exactly to Mr. Ray's
description of that species ; had a black cere, short thick legs,
and a long tail. When on the wing this species may be easily
distinguished from the common buzzard by its hawk-like ap-
pearance, small head, wings not so blunt, and longer tail.
This specimen contained in its craw some limbs of frogs and
many gray snails without shells. The irides of the eyes of this
bird were of a beautiful bright yellow color.

About the lOth July in the same summer a pair of sparrow-
hawks bred in an old crow's nest on a low beech in the same
hanger ; and as their brood, which was numerous, began to
grow up, became so daring and ravenous, that they were a
terror to all the dames in the village that had chickens or
ducklings under their care. A boy climbed the tree, and found

92 WHITE

the young so fledged that they all escaped from him ; but dis-
covered that a good house had been kept : the larder was well-
stored with provisions ; for he brought down a young blackbird,
jay, and house-martin, all clean picked, and some half devoured.
The old birds had been observed to make sad havoc for some
days among the new-flown swallows and martins, which, being
but lately out of their nests, had not acquired those powers
and command of wing that enable them, when more mature,
to set such enemies at defiance.

LETTER XLIV

Selborne, Nov. 2,0th, 1780.

Dear Sir, — Every incident that occasions a renewal of our
correspondence will ever be pleasing and agreeable to me.

As to the wild wood-pigeon, the (Enas, or Vinago, of Ray,
I am much of your mind ; and see no reason for making it the
origin of the common house-dove : but suppose those that
have advanced that opinion may have been misled by another
appellation, often given to the (Enas, which is that of stock-
dove.

Unless the stock-dove in the winter varies greatly in manners
from itself in summer, no species seems more unlikely to be
domesticated, and to make a house-dove. We very rarely see
the latter settle on trees at all, nor does it ever haunt the
woods ; but the former as long as it stays with us, from No-
vember perhaps to February, lives the same wild life with the
ring-dove, Palumbiis torqiiatiis ; frequents coppices and groves,
supports itself chiefly by mast, and delights to roost in the
tallest beeches. Could it be known in what manner stock-
doves build, the doubt would be settled with me at once, pro-
vided they construct their nests on trees, like the ring-dove, as
I much suspect they do.

You received, you say, last spring a stock-dove from Sussex ;
and are informed that they sometimes breed in that county.
But why did not your correspondent determine the place of
its nidification, whether on rocks, cliffs, or trees .'' If he was

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 93

not an adroit ornithologist I should doubt the fact, because
people with us perpetually confound the stock-dove with the
ring-dove.

For my own part, I readily concur with you in supposing
that house-doves are derived from the small blue rock-pigeon,
for many reasons. In the first place the wild stock-dove is
manifestly larger than the common house-dove, against the
usual rule of domestication, which generally enlarges the breed.
Again, those two remarkable black spots on the remiges of
each wing of the stock-dove, which are so characteristic of the
species, would not, one should think, be totally lost by its be-
ing reclaimed ; but would often break out among its descend-
ants. But what is worth a hundred arguments is, the instance
you give in Sir Roger Mostyn's house-doves in Caernarvon-
shire ; which, though tempted by plenty of food and gentle
treatment, can never be prevailed on to inhabit their cote for
any time ; but, as soon as they begin to breed, betake them-
selves to the fastnesses of Ormshead, and deposit their young
in safety amidst the inaccessible caverns and precipices of that
stupendous promontory.

" Naturam expellas furca . . . tamen usque recurret."

I have consulted a sportsman, now in his seventy-eighth year,
who tells me that fifty or sixty years back, when the beechen
woods were much more extensive than at present, the number
of wood-pigeons was astonishing ; that he has often killed near
twenty in a day : and that with a long wild-fowl piece he has
shot seven or eight at a time on the wing as they came wheel-
ing over his head : he moreover adds, which I was not aware
of, that often there were among them little parties of small
blue doves, which he calls rockiers. The food of these num-
berless emigrants was beech-mast and some acorns ; and par-
ticularly barley, which they collected in the stubbles. But of
late years, since the vast increase of turnips, that vegetable
has furnished a great part of their support in hard weather ;
and the holes they pick in these roots greatly damage the crop.
From this food their flesh has contracted a rancidness which
occasions them to be rejected by nicer judges of eating, who
thought them before a delicate dish. They were shot not only

94 WHITE

as they were feeding in the fields, and especially in snowy
weather, but also at the close of the evening, by men who lay
in ambush among the woods and groves to kill them as they
came in to roost.^ These are the principal circumstances re-
lating to this wonderful internal migration, which with us takes
place towards the end of November, and ceases early in the
spring. Last winter we had in Selborne high wood about a
hundred of these doves ; but in former times the flocks were
so vast, not only with us but all the district round, that on
mornings and evenings they traversed the air, like rooks, in
strings, reaching for a mile together. When they thus ren-
dezvoused here by thousands, if they happened to be suddenly
roused from their roost-trees on an evening, —

'• Their rising all at once was like the sound
Of thunder heard remote."

It will by no means be foreign to the present purpose to add,
that I had a relation in this neighborhood who made it a prac-
tice, for a time, whenever he could procure the eggs of a ring-
dove, to place them under a pair of doves that were sitting in
his own pigeon-house; hoping thereby, if he could bring about
a coalition, to enlarge his breed, and teach his own doves to
beat out into the woods, and to support themselves by mast ;
the plan was plausible, but something always interrupted the
success ; for though the birds were usually hatched, and some-
times grew to half their size, yet none ever arrived at maturity.
I myself have seen these foundlings in their nest displaying a
strange ferocity of nature, so as scarcely to bear to be looked
at, and snapping with their bills by way of menace. In short,
they always died, perhaps for want of proper sustenance : but
the owner thought that by their fierce and wild demeanor they
frighted their foster mothers, and so were starved.

Virgil, as a familiar occurrence, by way of simile, describes
a dove haunting the cavern of a rock, in such engaging num-
bers, that I cannot refrain from quoting the passage : and John
Dryden has rendered it so happily in our language, that with-
out farther excuse I shall add his translation also : —

" Qualis speluncA subito commota Columba,
Cui domus, et dulces latebroso in pumice nidi,

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 95

Fertur in arva volans, plausumque exterrita pennis,
Dat tecto ingentem — mox aere lapsa quieto,
Radit iter liquidum, celeres neque commovet alas."

" As when a dove her rocky hold forsakes,
Roused, in a fright her sounding wings she shakes ;
The cavern rings with clattering : — out she flies,
And leaves her callow care, and cleaves the skies :
At first she flutters : — but at length she springs
To smoother flight, and shoots upon her wings."

I am, etc.
Note

^ Some old sportsmen say that the main part of these flocks used to
withdraw as soon as the heavy Christmas frosts were over. — G. W.

LETTERS TO THE HON. DAINES BARRINGTON

/

LETTER I

SELBORNE,y««^ 30/^, 1769.

Dear Sir, — When I was in town last month I partly en-
gaged that I would sometimes do myself the honor to write
to you on the subject of natural history ; and I am the more
ready to fulfil my promise, because I see you are a gentle-
man of great candor, and one that will make allowances ;
especially where the writer professes to be an outdoor natu-
ralist, one that takes his observations from the subject itself,
and not from the writings of others.

The following is a List of the Summer Birds of Pas-
sage WHICH I have discovered IN THIS NEIGHBORHOOD,
RANGED SOMEWHAT IN THE ORDER IN WHICH THEY AP-
PEAR :

RAII NOMINA USUALLY APPEARS ABOUT

,,,,., 7- • -7- •// S The middle of March :

1. Wryneck, Jy^ix, sive Torqmlla. ) u l t

2. Smallest willow- ? d / • ^ ^ S March 23rd : chirps till

\ Re^ulus non crtstatus . < « . l
wren, ) i September.

3. Swallow, Hirnndo dotnestica. April 13.

4. Martin, Hirttndo rust tea. Ditto.

96

WHITE

5. Sand-martin,

6. Blackcap,

7. Nightingale,

8. Cuckoo,

9. Middle willow-wren,

10. Whitethroat,

11. Redstart,

12. Stone-curlew,

13. Turtle-dove,

14. Grasshopper-lark, r

15. Swift,

16. Less reed-sparrow, [

RAII NOMINA

Hirundo riparia.
Atricapilla.
Lnsciiiia.
Citcuhis.

Reguliis 7wn cristatus.

FicedulcE affinis.

R nil cilia.

QLdicnenms .
Turtur.

Alajtda miimna locnstce

voce.

Hirundo aptis.
Passer arundinaceits

17. Landrail,

18. Largest willow-
wren.

19. Goat-sucker, or
fern-owl,

20. Fly-catcher,

^ vtinor.
Ortygouietra.

>■ Regiihis non cristatus.

Capri7imlgus.

Stoparola.

USUALLY APPEARS ABOUT

April 13.

Ditto : a sweet wild note.

Beginning of April.

Middle of April.
5 Ditto : a sweet plaintive
{ note.

j Ditto : mean note ; sings
\ on till September.
S Ditto : a more agreeable
\ song.

j End of March : loud,
i nocturnal whistle.

r Middle April: a small

< sibilous note, till the
( end of July.

About April 27th.
(A sweet polyglot, but
hurrying; it has the
notes of many birds.
A loud, harsh note, crex,
crex.

r Cantat voce stridulii lo-
j custcB ; end of April,
I on the tops of high
t beeches.
( Beginning of May : chat-

< ters by night with a
( singular noise.

' May i2th : a very mute
bird ; this is the latest
summer bird of pas-

This assemblage of curious and amusing birds belongs to ten
several genera of the Linn^an system; and are all of the
oj-do of passeres save the^//;ir and Qicuhis, which are pices,
and the Charadrms {(Edicnemtis) and Ralhis {Ortygometrd),
which are grallcB.

These birds, as they stand numerically, belong to the fol-
lowing Linnaean genera : —

I) Jynx.

2, 6, 7, 9, 10, II, 16, 18, Motacilla.
7)1 4} 5' ^St Hirundo.

13. Coluffiba.

17. Ralhis.

19. Caprirnulgus.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE

97

8,

12,

Cuculus.
Charadrius.

14. Alaitda.
20. Muscicapa.

Most soft-billed birds live on insects, and not on grain and
seeds ; and therefore at the end of summer they retire : but
the following soft-billed birds, though insect eaters, stay with
us the year round : —

C These frequent houses ; and
\ haunt out-buildings in the
{ winter: eat spiders.
j Haunt sinks for crumbs and
\ other sweepings.
These frequent shallow
rivulets near the spring
heads, where they never
freeze : eat the aureliae of
Phryganea. The small-
est birds that walk.
Some of these are to be
seen with us the winter
through.

This is the smallest British
bird : haunts the tops of
tall trees ; stays the win-
ter through.

RAII NOMINA

Redbreast,
Wren,

Rttbeada.
Passer troglodytes

Hedge-sparrow,

Curruca.

White-wagtail,
Yellow-wagtail,
Gray-wagtail,

Motacilla alba.
Motacilla flava.
Motacilla ciiierea.

Wheat-ear,

CEnanthe.

Whin-chat,
Stone-chatter,

CEnanthe secunda
CEtianthe tertia.

Golden-crowned wren, Regulus cristatus.

A List of the Winter Birds of Passage round this

NEIGHBORHOOD, RANGED SOMEWHAT IN THE ORDER IN
WHICH THEY APPEAR :

1 . Ring-ousel,

2. Redwing,

3. Fieldfare,

4. Royston-crow,

5. Woodcock,

8

RAII NOMINA

Merula torquata.

Turdiis iliacus.
Tiirdiis pilaris.
Cor nix cinerea.
Scolopax.

r This is a new migration,
which I have lately dis-
covered about Michael-

I mas week, and again

I about the 14th March.
About old Michaelmas.

( Though a percher by day,

\ roosts on the ground.
Most frequent on downs.

( Appears about old Michael-

1 mas.

98

WHITE

RAII NOMINA

6.

Snipe,

Gallinago minor.

7-

Jack-snipe,

Gallinago minima.

8.

Wood-pigeon,

CEnas.

9-

lO.

Wild-swan,

Wild-goose,

Cygnus ferns.
Anser ferns.

II.

12.

Wild-duck,
Pochard,

Anas torquata tninor
Anas fera fusca.

13-

14.

Widgeon,
Teal, breeds with

us in Wolmer

Forest,

Penelope.
- Querquednla.

IS-

Grossbeak,

Coccothraustes.

16.

Crossbill,

Loxia.

17-

Silk-tail,

Garruhis bohemicns.

Some snipes constantly
breed with us.

Seldom appears till late ;

not in such plenty as

formerly.
On some large waters.

' On our lakes and streams.

r These are only wanderers
I that appear occasionally,
and are not observant of
any regular migration.

The birds, as they stand numerically, belong to the follow-
ing Linnaean genera : —

I, 2, 3, Tnrdus.

4, Corviis.

5, 6, 7, Scolopax.
8, Cohajiba.

9, 10, II, 12, 13, 14, Anas.
15, 16, Loxia.

17, Ampelis.

Birds that sing in the night are but few : —

Nightingale,

Woodlark,

Less reed-sparrow, ■]

RAII NOMINA

Lnscinia,

Alanda arbor ea.
Passer arundinaceus
minor.

5 " In shadiest covert hid."
( — Milton.

Suspended in mid air.

[■ Among reeds and willows.

I should now proceed to such birds as continue to sing
after midsummer, but, as they are rather numerous, they
would exceed the bounds of this paper : besides, as this is
now the season for remarking on that subject, I am willing to
repeat my observations on some birds concerning the con-
tinuation of whose song I seem at present to have some
doubt.

I am, etc.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE

99

LETTER II

Selborne, Nov. 2nd, 1769.

Dear Sir, — When I did myself the honor to write to you
about the end of last June on the subject of natural history,
I sent you a list of the summer birds of passage which I have
observed in this neighborhood ; and also a list of the winter
birds of passage : I mentioned besides those soft-billed birds
that stay with us the winter through in the south of England,
and those that are remarkable for singing in the night.

According to my proposal, I shall now proceed to such
birds (singing birds strictly so called) as continue in full song
till after midsummer ; and shall range them somewhat in the
order in which they first begin to open as the spring advances :

1. Woodlark,

2. Song-thrush,

3. Wren,

4. Redbreast,

5. Hedge-sparrow,

RAII NOMINA

Alatida arbor ea.

Turdus simpliciter
diet lis.

Passer troglodytes .

Rubeada.

Currtica.

6. Yellow-hammer, Ember iza flava.

7. Skylark,

8. Swallow,

9. Blackcap,

10. Titlark,

11. Blackbird,

12. Whitethroat,

13. Goldfinch,

Alauda vidgaris.
Hirundo dotnestica.
Atricapilla.

Alaitda pratorum.

Merula vulgaris.

Ficedidce affinis.
Car due lis.

(In January, and continues
< to sing through all the
( summer and autumn.
( In February and on to
} August; reassume their
( song in autumn.
( All the year, hard frost
\ excepted.

Ditto.
5 Early in February to July
\ loth.

( Early in February, and on
■I through July to August

( 2ISt.

5 In February and on to

( October.
From April to September.

5 Beginning of April to

\ July 13th.

5 From middle of April to

1 July 1 6th.
Sometimes in February
and March, and so on to
July 23rd ; reassumes
in autumn.

( In April, and on to July

1 23rd.

5 April, and through to Sep-

\ tember i6th.

100

WHITE

RAII NOMINA

14. Greenfinch, Chloris. Onto July and August 2nd.

15. Less reed-spar- \ Passer arundinaceus (May, on to beginning of

row,

j minor.

16. Common linnet, Linaria vulgaris.

I July.

r Breeds and whistles on till
August ; reassumes its
note when they begin to
congregate in October,
and again early before
the flocks separate.

Birds that cease to be in full song, and are usually silent at
or before midsummer : —

17. Middle willow-

wren,

18. Redstart,

19. Chaffinch,
•20. Nightingale,

RAII NOMINA

\ Regulus non cristatus. \ ^^^^i^ °f J""^ ' '^^g^"^
S (in April.

Ricticilla.
Fringilla.

Luscinia.

Ditto: begins in May.
( Beginning of June ; sings
( first in February.
5 Middle of June ; sings
( first in April.

Birds that sing for a short time, and very early in the spring :

21. Missel-bird,

RAII NOMINA

Tiirdiis viscivoriis.

22. Great titmouse,
or ox-eye,

> Fringillago.

(-January 2nd, 1770, in Feb-
ruary. Is called in
Hampshire and Sussex
the storm-cock, because
its song is supposed
to forebode windy wet
weather ; it is the larg-
est singing bird we have.
In Februar}', March, and
April ; reassumes for a
short time in September.

Birds that have somewhat of a note or song, and yet are
hardly to be called singing birds : —

RAII NOMINA

23. Golden-crowned 7 n ^ / ■ . .
•^ Y Regulus cristatus.

wren, >

24. Marsh-titmouse, Parus palustris.

Its note as minute as its
person ; frequents the
tops of high oaks and
firs ; the smallest British
bird.
( Haunts great woods : two
( harsh sharp notes.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE

lOI

RAII NOMINA

e 1, -11 D / ■ J J S Sinojs in March, and on

25. Small willow-wren, Regtiltis non crtstatns. -j '^ '

26. Largest ditto,

Ditto.

„ , , , > Alauda minitna voce

27. Grasshopper-lark, I ^^^^^^^^

28. Martin,

29. Bullfinch,

30. Bunting,

Hirundo agrestis.
Pyrrhula.
Ember iza alba.

to September.
( Cant at voce striduld lo-
\ custcE ; from end of
( April to August.
( Chirps all night, from the
-| middle of April to the
( end of July.
j All the breeding time ;
1 from May to September.

5 From the end of January
I to July.

All singing birds, and those that have any pretensions to
song, not only in Britain, but perhaps the world through,
come under the Linnaean ordo of Passeres.

The above-mentioned birds, as they stand numerically,
belong to the following Linnaean genera : —

1, 7, 10, 27, Alauda.

2, II, 21, Turdus.

3,4,5,9, 12, 15, 17, [^^^^,,7/^.
18, 20, 23, 25, 26, s

6, 30, Emberiza.

8, 28, Hiruttdo.

13, 16, 19, Fringilla.
22, 24, Partis.

14, 29, Loxia.

Birds that sing as they fly are but few : —

RAII NOMINA

Skylark,

Alauda vulgaris.

Titlark,

Alauda pratorutn.

Woodlark,

Alauda arbor ea.

Blackbird,

Merula.

Whitethroat,

Ficedula affinis.

Swallow,

Hirundo domestica.

Wren,

Passer troglodytes.

( Rising, suspended, and

\ falling.

( In its descent ; also sitting

-; on trees, and walking on

( the ground.

I Suspended ; in hot sum-

-l mer nights all night

( long.

5 Sometimes from bush to

\ bush.

( Uses when singing on the

X wing odd jerks and ges-

( ticulations.

In soft sunny weather.
( Sometimes from bush to
1 bush.

102

WHITE

Birds that breed most early in the;

RAII NOMINA

Raven,

CorvKs.

Song-thrush,
Blackbird,

Turdus.

Merula.

Rook,

Comix friigilega.

Woodlark,

Alaitda arbor ea.

Ring-dove,

Pahimbits torquatus

( Hatches in February and
\ March.

In March.

In March.
< Builds the beginning of
\ March.

Hatches in April.
^ Lays the beginning of
\ April.

All birds that continue in full song till after midsummer
appear to me to breed more than once.

Most kinds of birds seem to me to be wild and shy some-
what in proportion to their bulk ; I mean in this island, where
they are much pursued and annoyed ; but in Ascension Island,
and many other desolate places, mariners have found fowls so
unacquainted with a human figure, that they would stand still
to be taken ; as is the case with boobies, etc. As an example
of what is advanced, I remark that the golden-crested wren
(the smallest British bird) will stand unconcerned till you
come within three or four yards of it, while the bustard {Otis\
the largest British land fowl, does not care to admit a person
within so many furlongs.^

I am, etc.
Note

^ The bustard, once common in several parts of the country, is now almost
extinct. Its last abiding place was the fenny part of Norfolk, but the gun
and snare, indiscriminately used, have banished it. One way of destroying
it was by baiting a spot within range of a battery of shotguns, so laid that
a person at a distance could, by means of a long string, discharge them when
the bustards came sufficiently near. Two or three years ago a male bustard
was seen on the fens, and every effort was made by the landowners to keep
it safe. They even turned out two female birds in the hope that it would
pair with one and breed ; but after staying about for a few days it flew away,
and was not again seen. — G. C. D.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE IO3

LETTER III

SELB0RNE,y<2«. I5M, I770.

Dear Sir, — It was no small matter of satisfaction to me
to find that you were not displeased with my little viethodus
of birds. If there was any merit in the sketch, it must be
owing to its punctuality. For many months I carried a list
in my pocket of the birds that were to be remarked, and, as I
rode or walked about my business, I noted each day the con-
tinuance or omission of each bird's song ; so that I am as sure
of the certainty of my facts as a man can be of any transac-
tion whatsoever.

I shall now proceed to answer the several queries which
you put in your two obliging letters, in the best manner that
I am able. Perhaps Eastwick, and its environs, where you
heard so very few birds, is not a woodland country, and there-
fore not stocked with such songsters. If you will cast your
eye on my last letter, you will find that many species continued
to warble after the beginning of July.

The titlark and yellow-hammer breed late, the latter very
late ; and therefore it is no wonder that they protract their
song : for I lay it down as a maxim in ornithology, that as
long as there is any incubation going on there is music. As
to the redbreast and wren, it is well known to the most incuri-
ous observer that they whistle the year round, hard frost
excepted ; especially the latter.

It was not in my power to procure you a blackcap, or a less
reed-sparrow, or sedge-bird, alive. As the first is undoubtedly,
and the last, as far as I can yet see, a summer bird of pas-
sage, they would require more nice and curious management
in a cage than I should be able to give them : they are both
distinguished songsters. The note of the former has such a
wild sweetness that it always brings to my mind those lines
in a song in " As You Like It : " —

"And tune his merry note
Unto the wild bird's throat." — Shakespeare.

The latter has a surprising variety of notes resembling the
song of several other birds ; but then it has also a hurrying

104 WHITE

manner, not at all to its advantage : it is notwithstanding a
delicate polyglot.

It is new to me that titlarks in cages sing in the night ; per-
haps only caged birds do so. I once knew a tame redbreast
in a cage that always sang as long as candles were in the
room ; but in their wild state no one supposes they sing in the
night.

I should be almost ready to doubt the fact, that there are to
be seen much fewer birds in July than in any former month,
notwithstanding so many young are hatched daily. Sure I
am that it is far otherwise with respect to the swallow tribe,
which increases prodigiously as the summer advances : and I
saw at the time mentioned, many hundreds of young wagtails
on the banks of the Cherwell, which almost covered the
meadows. If the matter appears as you say in the other
species, may it not be owing to the dams being engaged in
incubation, while the young are concealed by the leaves ?

Many times have I had the curiosity to open the stomachs

of woodcocks and snipes ; but nothing ever occurred that

helped to explain to me what their subsistence might be : all

that I could ever find was a soft mucus, among which lay

many pellucid small gravels.^

I am, etc.
Note

1 Upon examining patches of mud on which I have flushed woodcocks
and snipes, I have found them riddled with small perforations, clearly made
by the bills of the birds, which must have been seeking some insects or
worms therein. — G. CD.

LETTER IV

Selborne, Fed. igi/i, 1770.
Dear Sir, — Your observation that " the cuckoo does not
deposit its egg indiscriminately in the nest of the first bird
that comes in its way, but probably looks out a nurse in some
degree congenerous, with whom to entrust its young," is per-
fectly new to me ; and struck me so forcibly, that I naturally
fell into a train of thought that led me to consider whether
the fact was so, and what reason there was for it. When I

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 105

came to recollect and inquire, I could not find that any cuckoo
had ever been seen in these parts, except in the nest of the
wagtail, the hedge-sparrow, the titlark, the whitethroat, and
the redbreast, all soft-billed insectivorous birds. The excel-
lent Mr. Willughby mentions the nest of the Pahimbus (ring-
dove), and of the fringilla (chaffinch), birds that subsist on
acorns and grains, and such hard food : but then he does not
mention them as of his own knowledge ; but says afterwards
that he saw himself a wagtail feeding a cuckoo. It appears
hardly possible that a soft-billed bird should subsist on the
same food with the hard-billed : for the former have thin
membranaceous stomachs suited to their soft food ; while the
latter, the granivorous tribe, have strong muscular gizzards,
which, like mills, grind, by the help of small gravels and peb-
bles, what is swallowed. This proceeding of the cuckoo, of
dropping its eggs as it were by chance, is such a monstrous
outrage on maternal affection, one of the first great dictates
of nature ; and such a violence on instinct ; that, had it only
been related of a bird in the Brazils, or Peru, it would never
have merited our belief. But yet, should it farther appear
that this simple bird, when divested of that natural arop^ri
that seems to raise the kind in general above themselves, and
inspire them with extraordinary degrees of cunning and ad-
dress, may be still endued with a more enlarged faculty of
discerning what species are suitable and congenerous nursing-
mothers for its disregarded eggs and young, and may deposit
them only under their care, this would be adding wonder to
wonder, and instancing, in a fresh manner, that the methods
of Providence are not subjected to any mode or rule, but
astonish us in new lights, and in various and changeable
appearances.

What was said by a very ancient and sublime writer concern-
ing the defect of natural affection in the ostrich, may be well
applied to the bird we are talking of : —

" She is hardened against her young ones, as though they
were not hers :

" Because God hath deprived her of wisdom, neither hath
He imparted to her understanding." ^

Query. — Does each female cuckoo lay but one Qgg in a

I06 WHITE

season, or does she drop several in different nests according

as opportunity offers ? ^

I am, etc.
Notes '

1 Job xxxix. i6, 17. — G. W.

- I have found so many cuckoos' eggs in a district where there were but
a limited number of cuckoos, that I am satisfied it lays several eggs. The
egg of the cuckoo is small for the size of the bird, yet it often looks a monster
in some of the nests in which it is deposited, such as sedge-warblers and
reed- wrens. Three times at least it has been found in a grasshopper- war-
bler's, where the foot or the beak must have been the agent in transferring
the egg after being laid into the nest. One July at Wroxham Broad in
Norfolk, there were thirty or forty cuckoos flying restlessly about from tree
to tree, and uttering frequently a treble cry ; thus : cuck-cuckoo — cuck-
cuckoo. A week later they were all gone. — G. C. D.

LETTER V

Selborne, April 12th, 1770.

Dear Sir, — I heard many birds of several species sing
last year after midsummer; enough to prove that the summer
solstice is not the period that puts a stop to the music of the
woods. The yellow-hammer no doubt persists with more
steadiness than any other ; but the woodlark, the wren, the
redbreast, the swallow, the whitethroat, the goldfinch, the
common linnet, are all undoubted instances of the truth of
what I advanced.

If this severe season does not interrupt the regularity of the
summer migrations, the blackcap will be here in two or three
days. I wish it was in my power to procure you one of those
songsters ; but I am no birdcatcher; and so little used to birds
in a cage, that I fear if I had one it would soon die for want
of skill in feeding.

Was your reed-sparrow, which you kept in a cage, the thick-
billed reed-sparrow of the " Zoology," p. 320 ; or was it the
less reed-sparrow of Ray, the sedge-bird of Mr. Pennant's last
publication, p. 16 ?

As to the matter of long-billed birds growing fatter in mod-
erate frosts, I have no doubt within myself what should be the

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 107

reason. The thriving at those times appears to me to arise
altogether from the gentle check which the cold throws upon
insensible perspiration. The case is just the same with black-
birds, etc. ; and farmers and warreners observe, the first,
that their hogs fat more kindly at such times, and the latter
that their rabbits are never in such good case as in a gentle
frost. But when frosts are severe, and of long continuance,
the case is soon altered ; for then a want of food soon over-
balances the repletion occasioned by a checked perspiration.
I have observed, moreover, that some human constitutions are
more inclined to plumpness in winter than in summer.

When birds come to suffer by severe frost, I find that the
first that fail and die are the redwing-fieldfares, and then the
song-thrushes.

You wonder, with good reason, that the hedge-sparrows, etc.,
can be induced at all to sit on the egg of the cuckoo without
being scandalized at the vast disproportionate size of the sup-
posititious egg ; but the brute creation, I suppose, have very
little idea of size, color, or number. For the common hen, I
know, when the fury of incubation is on her, will sit on a single
shapeless stone instead of a nest full of eggs that have been
withdrawn : and, moreover, a hen turkey, in the same circum-
stances, would sit on in the empty nest till she perished with
hunger.

I think the matter might easily be determined whether a
cuckoo lays one or two eggs, or more, in a season, by opening
a female during the laying time. If more than one was come
down out of the ovary and advanced to a good size, doubtless
then she would that spring lay more than one.

I will endeavor to get a hen, and to examine.

Your supposition that there may be some natural obstruc-
tion in singing birds while they are mute, and that when this
is removed the song recommences, is new and bold : I wish
you could discover some good grounds for this suspicion.

I was glad you were pleased with my specimen of the capri-
mulgus, or fern-owl ; you were, I find, acquainted with the bird
before.

When we meet I shall be glad to have some conversation
with you concerning the proposal you make of my drawing

I08 WHITE

up an account of the animals in this neighborhood. Your
partiahty towards my small abilities persuades you, I fear, that
I am able to do more than is in my power : for it is no small
undertaking for a man unsupported and alone to begin a natu-
ral history from his own autopsia ! Though there is endless
room for observation in the field of nature, which is bound-
less, yet investigation (where a man endeavors to be sure of
his facts) can make but slow progress; and all that one
could collect in many years would go into a very narrow
compass.

Some extracts from your ingenious " Investigations of the
Difference between the Present Temperature of the Air in
Italy," etc., have fallen in my way, and gave me great satis-
faction : they have removed the objections that always arose
in my mind whenever I came to the passages which you quote.
Surely the judicious Virgil, when writing a didactic poem for
the region of Italy, could never think of describing freezing
rivers, unless such severity of weather pretty frequently oc-
curred !

P.S. — Swallows appear amidst snows and frost.

LETTER VI

Selborne, May 21st, 1770.

Dear Sir, — The severity and turbulence of last month so
interrupted the regular process of summer migration, that some
of the birds do but just begin to show themselves, and others
are apparently thinner than usual ; as the whitethroat, the
blackcap, the redstart, the fly-catcher. I well remember that
after the very severe spring in the year 1739-40, summer birds
of passage were very scarce. They come probably hither with
a south-east wind, or when it blows between those points;
but in that unfavorable year the winds blew the whole spring
and summer through from the opposite quarters. And yet
amidst all these disadvantages two swallows, as I mentioned
in my last, appeared this year as early as the i ith April amidst
frost and snow ; but they withdrew again for a time.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE IO9

I am not pleased to find that some people seem so little satis-
fied with Scopoli's new publication ; there is room to expect
great things from the hands of that man, who is a good natu-
ralist : and one would think that a history of the birds of so
distant and southern a region as Carniola would be new and
interesting. I could wish to see that work, and hope to get
it sent down. Dr. Scopoli is physician to the wretches that
work in the quicksilver mines of that district.

When you talked of keeping a reed-sparrow, and giving it
seeds, I could not help wondering ; because the reed-sparrow
which I mentioned to you {Passer arnndinace7is minor Rail)
is a soft-billed bird; and most probably migrates hence before
winter ; whereas the bird you kept {Passer torquatus Raii)
abides all the year, and is a thick-billed bird. I question
whether the latter be much of a songster ; but in this matter
I want to be better informed. The former has a variety of
hurrying notes, and sings all night. Some part of the song
of the former, I suspect, is attributed to the latter. We have
plenty of the soft-billed sort; which Mr. Pennant had entirely
left out of his " British Zoology," till I reminded him of his
omission. See " British Zoology" last published, p. 16.

I have somewhat to advance on the different manners in
which different birds fly and walk; but as this is a subject that
I have not enough considered, and is of such a nature as not
to be contained in a small space, I shall say nothing further
about it at present.

No doubt the reason why the sex of birds in their first plu-
mage is so difficult to be distinguished is, as you say, " because
they are not to pair and discharge their parental functions till
the ensuing spring." As colors seem to be the chief external
sexual distinction in many birds, these colors do not take place
till sexual attachments begin to obtain. And the case is the
same in quadrupeds ; among whom, in their younger days, the
sexes differ but little : but, as they advance to maturity, horns
and shaggy manes, beards and brawny necks, etc., etc., strongly
discriminate the male from the female. We may instance still
farther in our own species, where a beard and stronger features
are usually characteristic of the male sex: but this sexual diver-
sity does not take place in earlier life ; for a beautiful youth

no WHITE

shall be so like a beautiful girl that the difference shall not be

discernible : —

" Quern si puellarum insereres choro,
Mire sagaces falleret hospites
Discrinien obscurum, solutis
Crinibus, ambiguoque vultu."

— HoR. Odes, II. od. 5-21, p. 131, orig. edit.

LETTER VII

RiNGMER, near Lewes, Oct. Zth, 1770.

Dear Sir, — I am glad to hear that Kuckalm is to furnish
you with the birds of Jamaica ; a sight of the Jiirimdmes of that
hot and distant island would be a great entertainment to me.

The "Anni" of Scopoli are now in my possession; and I
have read the "Annus Primus" with satisfaction; for though
some parts of this work are exceptionable, and he may advance
some mistaken observations, yet the ornithology of so distant
a country as Carniola is very curious. Men that undertake
only one district are much more likely to advance natural
knowledge than those that grasp at more than they can
possibly be acquainted with : every kingdom, every province,
should have its own monographer.

The reason perhaps why he mentions nothing of Ray's " Or-
nithology " may be the extreme poverty and distance of his
country, into which the works of our great naturalist may have
never yet found their way. You have doubts, I know, whether
this "Ornithology" is genuine, and really the work of Scopoli;
as to myself, I think I discover strong tokens of authenticity ;
the style corresponds with that of his "Entomology" ; and his
characters of his Ordines and Genera are many of them new,
expressive, and masterly. He has ventured to alter some of
the Linnaean genera with sufficient show of reason.

It might perhaps be mere accident that you saw so many
swifts and no swallows at Staines ; because, in my long obser-
vation of those birds, I never could discover the least degree
of rivalry or hostility between the species.

Ray remarks that birds of the gallince order, as cocks and

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE III

hens, partridges and pheasants, etc., zxe pulveratrices, such as
dust themselves, using that method of cleansing their feathers,
and ridding themselves of their vermin. As far as I can ob-
serve, many birds that dust themselves never wash; and I once
thought that those birds that wash themselves would never
dust ; but here I find myself mistaken ; for common house-
sparrows are great pulveratrices, being frequently seen grovel-
ling and wallowing in dusty roads ; and yet they are great
washers. Does not the skylark dust }

Query. — Might not Mahomet and his followers take one
method of purification from these pulveratrices.-' because I find
from travellers of credit, that if a strict Mussulman is journey-
ing in a sandy desert where no water is to be found, at stated
hours he strips off his clothes, and most scrupulously rubs his
body over with sand or dust.

A countryman told me he had found a young fern-owl in the
nest of a small bird on the ground ; and that it was fed by the
little bird. I went to see this extraordinary phenomenon, and
found that it was a young cuckoo hatched in the nest of a tit-
lark ; it was become vastly too big for its nest, appearing

" in tenui re

Majores pennas nido extendisse " . .

and was very fierce and pugnacious, pursuing my finger, as I
teased it, for many feet from the nest, and sparring and buffet-
ing with its wings like a game-cock. The dupe of a dam ap-
peared at a distance, hovering about with meat in its mouth,
and expressing the greatest solicitude.

In July I saw several cuckoos skimming over a large pond ;
and found, after some observation, that they were feeding on
\.\i& Libelltilce, or dragon-flies; some of which they caught as
they settled on the weeds, and some as they were on the wing.
Notwithstanding what Linnaeus says, I cannot be induced to
believe that they are birds of prey.

This district affords some birds that are hardly ever heard
of at Selborne. In the first place considerable flocks of cross-
beaks (yLoxicz airvirostrcB) have appeared this summer in the
pine-groves belonging to this house ; the water-ousel is said to
haunt the mouth of the Lewes River, near Newhaven ; and the

112 WHITE

Cornish chough builds, I know, all along the chalky cliffs of
the Sussex shore.

I was greatly pleased to see little parties of ring-ousels (my
newly discovered migrators) scattered, at intervals, all along
the Sussex Downs, from Chichester to Lewes. Let them come
from whence they will, it looks very suspicious that they are
cantoned along the coast in order to pass the Channel when
severe weather advances. They visit us again in April, as it
should seem, in their return ; and are not to be found in the
dead of winter. It is remarkable that they are very tame, and
seem to have no manner of apprehensions of danger from a
person with a gun. There are bustards on the wide downs
near Brighthelmstone. No doubt you are acquainted with the
Sussex Downs ; the prospects and rides round Lewes are most
lovely !

As I rode along near the coast I kept a very sharp look-
out in the lanes and woods, hoping I might, at this time of
the year, have discovered some of the summer short-winged
birds of passage crowding towards the coast in order for their
departure : but it was very extraordinary that I never saw a red-
start, whitethroat, blackcap, uncrested wren, fly-catcher, etc.
And I remember to have made the same remark in former
years, as I usually come to this place annually about this time.
The birds most common along the coast, at present, are the
stone-chatters, whin-chats, buntings, linnets, some few wheat-
ears, titlarks, etc. Swallows and house-martins abound yet, in-
duced to prolong their stay by this soft, still, dry season.

A land tortoise, which has been kept for thirty years in a
little walled court belonging to the house where I now am
visiting, retires under ground about the middle of November,
and comes forth again about the middle of April. When it
first appears in the spring it discovers very little inclination
towards food ; but in the height of summer grows voracious ;
and then as the summer declines its appetite declines; so
that for the last six weeks in autumn it hardly eats at all.
Milky plants, such as lettuces, dandelions, sowthistles, are its
favorite dish. In a neighboring village one was kept till
by tradition it was supposed to be a hundred years old. An
instance of vast longevity in such a poor reptile !

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I13

LETTER VIII

Selborne, Dec. 20th, 1770.

Dear Sir, — The birds that I took for aberdavines were
reed-sparrows {Passeres torqiiati).

There are doubtless many home internal migrations within
this kingdom that want to be better understood : witness those
vast flocks of hen chaffinches that appear with us in the
winter with hardly any cocks among them. Now was there
a due proportion of each sex, it should seem very improbable
that any one district should produce such numbers of these
little birds ; and much more when only one-half of the spe-
cies appears ; therefore we may conclude that the FringillcB
ccelebes, for some good purposes, have a peculiar migration of
their own in which the sexes part. Nor should it seem so
wonderful that the intercourse of sexes in this species of bird
should be interrupted in winter ; since in many animals, and
particularly in bucks and does, the sexes herd separately, ex-
cept at the season when commerce is necessary for the con-
tinuance of the breed. For this matter of the chaffinches see
" Fauna Suecica," p. 58, and " Systema Naturae," p. 3 18. I see
every winter vast flights of hen chaffinches, but none of cocks.

Your method of accounting for the periodical motions of
the British singing birds, or birds of flight, is a very probable
one ; since the matter of food is a great regulator of the
actions and proceedings of the brute creation ; there is but
one that can be set in competition with it, and that is love.
But I cannot quite acquiesce with you in one circumstance,
when you advance that, " when they have thus feasted, they
again separate into small parties of five or six, and get the
best fare they can within a certain district, having no induce-
ment to go in quest of fresh-turned earth." Now if you
mean that the business of congregating is quite at an end
from the conclusion of wheat sowing to the season of barley
and oats, it is not the case with us ; for larks and chaffinches,
and particularly linnets, flock and congregate as much in the
very dead of winter as when the husbandman is busy with
his ploughs and harrows.
9

114 WHITE

Sure there can be no doubt but that woodcocks and field-
fares leave us in the spring, in order to cross the seas, and to
retire to some districts more suitable to the purpose of breed-
ing. That the former pair before they retire, and that the
hens are forward with egg, I myself, when I was a sports-
man, have often experienced. It cannot indeed be denied
but that now and then we hear of a woodcock's nest, or young
birds, discovered in some part or other of this island ; but
then they are all always mentioned as rarities, and somewhat
out of the common course of things : but as to redwings and
fieldfares, no sportsman or naturalist has ever yet, that I
could hear, pretended to have found the nest or young of
those species in any part of these kingdoms. And I the
more admire at this instance as extraordinary, since, to all
appearance, the same food in summer as well as in winter
might support them here which maintains their congeners,
the blackbirds and thrushes, did they choose to stay the
summer through. From hence it appears that it is not food
alone which determines some species of birds with regard to
their stay or departure. Fieldfares or redwings disappear
sooner or later according as the warm weather comes on
earlier or later. For I well remember, after that dreadful
winter 1739-40, that cold north-east winds continued to blow
on through April and May, and that these kind of birds
(what few remained of them) did not depart as usual, but
were seen lingering about till the beginning of June.

The best authority that we can have for the nidification of
the birds above-mentioned in any district, is the testimony
of faunists that have written professedly the natural history
of particular countries. Now as to the fieldfare, Linnaeus, in
his " Fauna Suecica," says of it, that " maximts in arboribiis
ntdi/i cat ;" and oi the redwing he says, in the same place,
thaX ^^ mdt/icat in mediis arbuscidis, sive sepibus : ova sex
coeriileo-viridia macidis nigris variis." Hence we may be
assured that fieldfares and redwings build in Sweden. Sco-
poli says, in his " Annus Primus," of the woodcock, that
" niipta ad nos venit circa cEqiiinoctium vernale ; " meaning in
the Tyrol, of which he is a native. And afterwards he adds
" nidificat in pahidibiis alpinis : ova ponit 3-5." It does not

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I15

appear from Kramer that woodcocks breed at all in Austria ;
but he says, "Avis Jia;c septentrionaliimi provmciarum cestivo
tempore incola est ; ubi plenimqtie nidificat. Appropinqtiante
hyeme aiistraliores provincias petit ; hinc circa pleniltmiutn
viensis Octobris plernmqiie Aiistriam transmigrat. Ttmc
rursiis ci7'cd pleniluniinn potissimuvi mensis Martii per Aus-
triam iiiatrimofiio juncta ad septentrionales provincias redit."
For the whole passage (which I have abridged) see " Elen-
chus," etc., p. 351. This seems to be a full proof of the
migration of woodcocks ; though little is proved concerning
the place of breeding.

P.S. — There fell in the county of Rutland, in three weeks
of this present very wet weather, seven inches and a half of
rain, which is more than has fallen in any three weeks for
these thirty years past in that part of the world. A mean
quantity in that county for one year is twenty inches and a
half.

LETTER IX

Fyfield, near Andover, Feb. 12th, 1772.

Dear Sir, — You are, I know, no great friend to migration;
and the well-attested accounts from various parts of the king-
dom seem to justify you in your suspicions, that at least many
of the swallow kind do not leave us in the winter, but lay
themselves up like insects and bats in a torpid state, and
slumber away the more uncomfortable months till the return
of the sun and fine weather awakens them.

But then we must not, I think, deny migration in general ;
because migration certainly does subsist in some places, as my
brother in Andalusia has fully informed me. Of the motions
of these birds he has ocular demonstration, for many weeks
together, both spring and fall ; during which periods myriads
of the swallow kind traverse the straits from north to south,
and from south to north, according to the season. And these
vast migrations consist not only of hirundines but of bee-birds,
hoopoes, Oro pendolos, or golden thrushes, etc., etc., and also
of many of our soft-billed summer birds of passage ; and more-

Il6 WHITE

over of birds which never leave us, such as all the various
sorts of hawks and kites. Old Belon, two hundred years ago,
gives a curious account of the incredible armies of hawks and
kites which he saw in the springtime traversing the Thracian
Bosphorus from Asia to Europe. Besides the above men-
tioned, he remarks that the procession is swelled by whole
troops of eagles and vultures.

Now it is no wonder that birds residing in Africa should re-
treat before the sun as it advances, and retire to milder regions,
and especially birds of prey, whose blood being heated with
hot animal food, are more impatient of a sultry climate ; but
then I cannot help wondering why kites and hawks, and such
hardy birds as are known to defy all the severity of England,
and even of Sweden and all north Europe, should want to mi-
grate from the south of Europe, and be dissatisfied with the
winters of Andalusia.

It does not appear to me that much stress may be laid on
the difficulty and hazard that birds must run in their migra-
tions, by reason of vast oceans, cross winds, etc. ; because, if
we reflect, a bird may travel from England to the equator
without launching out and exposing itself to boundless seas,
and that by crossing the water at Dover, and again at Gibral-
tar. And I with the more confidence advance this obvious re-
mark, because my brother has always found that some of his
birds, and particularly the swallow kind, are very sparing of
their pains in crossing the Mediterranean ; for when arrived
at Gibraltar they do not

. . . " Ranged in figure wedge their way,

And set forth

Their airy caravan high over seas

Flying, and over lands with mutual wing

Easing their flight :".... — MiLTON.

but scout and hurry along in little detached parties of six or
seven in a company; and sweeping low, just over the surface
of the land and water, direct their course to the opposite con-
tinent at the narrowest passage they can find. They usually
slope across the bay to the south-west, and so pass over
opposite to Tangier, which, it seems, is the narrowest space.
In former letters we have considered whether it was prob-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE II7

able that woodcocks in moonshiny nights cross the German
Ocean from Scandinavia. As a proof that birds of less speed
may pass that sea, considerable as it is, I shall relate the fol-
lowing incident, which, though mentioned to have happened
so many years ago, was strictly matter of fact : — As some
people were shooting in the parish of Trotton, in the county
of Sussex, they killed a duck in that dreadful winter, 1708-9,
with a silver collar about its neck,^ on which were engraven
the arms of the king of Denmark. This anecdote the rector
of Trotton at that time has often told to a near relation of
mine ; and, to the best of my remembrance, the collar was in
the possession of the rector.

At present I do not know anybody near the seaside that
will take the trouble to remark at what time of the moon
woodcocks first come; if I lived near the sea myself I would
soon tell you more of the matter. One thing I used to
observe when I was a sportsman, that there were times in
which woodcocks were so sluggish and sleepy that they
would drop again when flushed just before the spaniels, nay,
just at the muzzle of a gun that had been fired at them ;
whether this strange laziness was the effect of a recent
fatiguing journey I shall not presume to say.^

Nightingales not only never reach Northumberland and
Scotland, but also, as I have been always told, Devonshire
and Cornwall. In those two last counties we cannot attrib-
ute the failure of them to the want of warmth ; the defect
in the west is rather a presumptive argument that these
birds come over to us from the continent at the narrowest
passage, and do not stroll so far westward.

Let me hear from your own observation whether sky-
larks do not dust. I think they do ; and if they do, whether
they wash also.

The Alanda pratensis of Ray was the poor dupe that was
educating the booby of a cuckoo mentioned in my letter of
October last.

Your letter came too late for me to procure a ring-ousel for
Mr. Tunstal during their autumnal visit ; but I will endeavor
to get him one when they call on us again in April. I am
glad that you and that gentleman saw my Andalusian birds ;

Il8 WHITE

I hope they answered your expectation. Royston, or gray
crows, are winter birds that come much about the same time
with the woodcock; they, like the fieldfare and redwing,
have no apparent reason for migration; for as they fare in
the winter like their congeners, so might they in all appear-
ance in the summer. Was not Tenant, when a boy, mis-
taken } did he not find a missel-thrush's nest, and take it for
the nest of a fieldfare.-'

The stock-dove, or wood-pigeon, (Ettas Ran, is the last
winter bird of passage which appears with us ; it is not seen
till towards the end of November : about twenty years ago
they abounded in the district of Selborne ; and strings of
them were seen morning and evening that reached a mile or
more ; but since the beechen woods have been greatly thinned
they are much decreased in number. The ring-dove, Palum-
btis Rail, stays with us the whole year, and breeds several
times through the summer.

Before I received your letter of October last I had just
remarked in my journal that the trees were unusually green.
This uncommon verdure lasted on late into November; and
may be accounted for from a late spring, a cool and moist
summer ; but more particularly from vast armies of chafers,
or tree-beetles, which, in many places, reduced whole woods
to a leafless naked state. These trees shot again at midsum-
mer, and then retained their foliage till very late in the year.^

My musical friend, at whose house I am now visiting, has
tried all the owls that are his near neighbors with a pitch-pipe
set at concert pitch, and finds they all hoot in B flat. He
will examine the nightingales next spring.

I am, etc., etc.

Notes

1 I have read a like anecdote of a swan. — G. W.

2 I have observed woodcocks sluggish and owl-like in their movements
during a continuance of bright cool weather in the autumn, and have attrib-
uted it to fatigue after a long flight. — G. C. D.

3 The leaves of a number of currant bushes in my garden were destroyed
this spring by a vast number of the caterpillars of the magpie moth, so that
the trees were black and apparently lifeless ; yet after midsummer, when the
caterpillars had turned into moths, the bushes budded again and were soon
in full leaf, but bore no fruit.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE II9

LETTER X

Selborne, Aug. 1st, 1 77 1.

Dear Sir, — From what follows, it will appear that neither
owls nor cuckoos keep to one note. A friend remarks that
many (most) of his owls hoot in B flat ; but that one went
almost half a note below A. The pipe he tried their notes
by was a common half-crown pitch-pipe, such as masters
use for tuning of harpsichords ; it was the common London
pitch.

A neighbor of mine, who is said to have a nice ear, remarks
that the owls about this village hoot in three different keys, in
G flat or F sharp, in B flat, and A flat. He heard two hoot-
ing to each other, the one in A flat, and the other in B flat.
Query. — Do these different notes proceed from different spe-
cies, or only from various individuals .'' The same person finds
upon trial that the note of the cuckoo (of which we have but
one species) varies indifferent individuals ; for, about Selborne
wood, he found they were mostly in D : he heard two sing
together, the one in D, the other in D sharp, who made a dis-
agreeable concert : he afterwards heard one in D sharp, and
about Wolmer Forest some in C. As to nightingales, he says
that their notes are so short, and their transitions so rapid, that
he cannot well ascertain their key. Perhaps in a cage, and
in a room, their notes may be more distinguishable. This
person has tried to settle the notes of a swift, and of several
other small birds, but cannot bring them to any criterion.

As I have often remarked that redwings are some of the
first birds that suffer with us in severe weather, it is no wonder
at all that they retreat from Scandinavian winters : and much
more the ordo of grallce, who, all to a bird, forsake the north-
ern parts of Europe at the approach of winter. " GrallcB tan-
quam conjtiratcB, unanimiter infngam se coitjiciiint ; ne eanint
tinicam quidein inter nos habitantem invenire possinius ; iit enim
cestate in aiistralibus degere nequeunt ob defectum liimbricoriim,
terramque siccam ; ita nee infrigidis ob eandcm causam," says
Ekmarck the Swede, in his ingenious little treatise called
" Migrationes Avium," which by all means you ought to read

120 WHITE

while your thoughts run on the subject of migration. See
" Amoenitates Academicae," Vol. IV., p. 565.

Birds may be so circumstanced as to be obliged to migrate
in one country, and not in another : but the grallce (which
procure their food from marshes and boggy grounds) must in
winter forsake the more northerly parts of Europe, or perish
for want of food.

I am glad you are making inquiries from Linnaeus concern-
ing the woodcock : it is expected of him that he should be
able to account for the motions and manner of life of the
animals of his own " Fauna."

Faunists, as you observe, are too apt to acquiesce in bare
descriptions, and a few synonyms : the reason is plain ; be-
cause all that may be done at home in a man's study, but the
investigation of the life and conversation of animals is a con-
cern of much more trouble and difficulty, and is not to be at-
tained but by the active and inquisitive, and by those that
reside much in the country.

Foreign systematics are, I observe, much too vague in their
specific differences ; which are almost universally constituted
by one or two particular marks, the rest of the description
running in general terms. But our countryman, the excellent
Mr. Ray, is the only describer that conveys some precise idea
in every term or word, maintaining his superiority over his
followers and imitators in spite of the advantage of fresh dis-
coveries and modern information.

At this distance of years it is not in my power to recollect
at what periods woodcocks used to be sluggish or alert when
I was a sportsman : but, upon my mentioning this circum-
stance to a friend, he thinks he has observed them to be
remarkably listless against snowy foul weather ; if this should
be the case, then the inaptitude for flying arises only from an
eagerness for food ; as sheep are observed to be very intent
on grazing against stormy wet evenings.

I am, etc., etc.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 121

LETTER XI

Selborne, Feb. Zth, I'j'jz.

Dear Sir, — When I ride about in the winter, and see
such prodigious flocks of various kinds of birds, I cannot help
admiring at these congregations, and wishing that it was in
my power to account for those appearances almost peculiar to
the season. The two great motives which regulate the pro-
ceedings of the brute creation are love and hunger ; the former
incites animals to perpetuate their kind; the latter induces
them to preserve individuals : whether either of these should
seem to be the ruling passion in the matter of congregating
is to be considered. As to love, that is out of the question at
a time of the year when that soft passion is not indulged :
besides, during the amorous season, such a jealousy prevails
between the male birds that they can hardly bear to be to-
gether in the same hedge or field. Most of the singing and
elation of spirits of that time seem to me to be the effect of
rivalry and emulation : and it is to this spirit of jealousy that
I chiefly attribute the equal dispersion of birds in the spring
over the face of the country.

Now as to the business of food : as these animals are actu-
ated by instinct to hunt for necessary food, they should not,
one would suppose, crowd together in pursuit of sustenance
at a time when it is most likely to fail ; yet such associations
do take place in hard weather chiefly, and thicken as the
severity increases. As some kind of self-interest and self-
defence is no doubt the motive for the proceeding, may it not
arise from the helplessness of their state in such rigorous
seasons ; as men crowd together, when under great calamities,
though they know not why } Perhaps approximation may
dispel some degree of cold ; and a crowd may make each
individual appear safer from the ravages of birds of prey
and other dangers.

If I admire when I see how much congenerous birds love
to congregate, I am the more struck when I see incongruous
ones in such strict amity. If we do not much wonder to see
a flock of rooks usually attended by a train of daws, yet it is

122 WHITE

Strange that the former should so frequently have a flight of
starlings for their satellites. Is it because rooks have a more
discerning scent than their attendants, and can lead them to
spots more productive of food ? Anatomists say that rooks,
by reason of two large nerves which run down between the
eyes into the upper mandible, have a more delicate feeling in
their beaks than other round-billed birds, and can grope for
their meat when out of sight. Perhaps, then, their associates
attend them on the motive of interest, as greyhounds wait on
the motions of their finders ; and as lions are said to do on
the yelpings of jackals. Lapwings and starlings sometimes

associate.

♦

LETTER XII

March gtk, 1772.

Dear Sir, — As a gentleman and myself were walking on
the 4th of last November round the sea-banks at Newhaven,
near the mouth of the Lewes River, in pursuit of natural
knowledge, we were surprised to see three house-swallows
gliding very swiftly by us. That morning was rather chilly,
with the wind at north-west ; but the tenor of the weather for
some time before had been delicate, and the noons remark-
ably warm. From this incident, and from repeated accounts
which I meet with, I am more and more induced to believe
that many of the swallow kind do not depart from this island,
but lay themselves up in holes and caverns ; and do, insect-
like and bat-like, come forth at mild times, and then retire
again to their latcbrce. Nor make I the least doubt but that,
if I lived at Newhaven, Seaford, Brighthelmstone, or any of
those towns near the chalk-cliffs of the Sussex coast, by proper
observations I should see swallows stirring at periods of the
winter when the noons were soft and inviting and the sun
warm and invigorating. And I am the more of this opinion
from what I have remarked during some of our late springs,
that though some swallows did make their appearance about
the usual time, viz., the 13th or 14th April, yet meeting with
a harsh reception, and blustering cold north-east winds, they
immediately withdrew, absconding for several days, till the
weather gave them better encouragement.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I 23

LETTER XIII

April i2th, 1772.

Dear Sir, — While I was in Sussex last autumn my resi-
dence was at the village near Lewes, from whence I had for-
merly the pleasure of writing to you. On the ist November
I remarked that the old tortoise, formerly mentioned, began
first to dig the ground in order to the forming its hybernacu-
lum, which it had fixed on just beside a great tuft of hepaticas.
It scrapes out the ground with its fore-feet, and throws it up
over its back with its hind ; but the motion of its legs is ridicu-
lously slow, little exceeding the hour-hand of a clock ; and
suitable to the composure of an animal said to be a whole month
in performing one feat of copulation. Nothing can be more
assiduous than this creature night and day in scooping the
earth, and forcing its great body into the cavity ; but, as the
noons of that season proved unusually warm and sunny, it
was continually interrupted, and called forth by the heat in
the middle of the day ; and though I continued there till the
13th November, yet the work remained unfinished. Harsher
weather, and frosty mornings, would have quickened its oper-
ations. No part of its behavior ever struck me more than the
extreme timidity it always expresses with regard to rain ; for
though it has a shell that would secure it against the wheel of
a loaded cart, yet does it discover as much solicitude about
rain as a lady dressed in all her best attire, shuffling away on
the first sprinklings, and running its head up in a corner. If
attended to, it becomes an excellent weather-glass ; for as sure
as it walks elate, and as it were on tiptoe, feeding with great
earnestness in a morning, so sure will it rain before night. It
is totally a diurnal animal, and never pretends to stir after it
becomes dark. The tortoise, like other reptiles, has an arbi-
trary stomach as well as lungs ; and can refrain from eating
as well as breathing for a great part of the year. When first
awakened it eats nothing; nor again in the autumn before it
retires: through the height of the summer it feeds voraciously,
devouring all the food that comes in its way. I was much
taken with its sagacity in discerning those that do it kind
offices ; for, as soon as the good old lady comes in sight who

t24 WHITE

has waited on it for more than thirty years, it hobbles towards
its benefactress with awkward alacrity ; but remains inatten-
tive to strangers. Thus not only "the ox knoweth his owner,
and the ass his master's crib,"^ but the most abject reptile and
torpid of beings distinguishes the hand that feeds it, and is
touched with the feelings of gratitude !

I am, etc., etc.

P.S. — In about three days after I left Sussex the tortoise
retired into the ground under the hepatica.

Note
Msa. i. 3. — G. W.

LETTER XIV

Selborne, March 26th, 1773.

Dear Sir, — The more I reflect on the a-Topyij of animals, the
more I am astonished at its effects. Nor is the violence of this
affection more wonderful than the shortness of its duration.
Thus every hen is in her turn the virago of the yard, in pro-
portion to the helplessness of her brood ; and will fly in the face
of a dog or a sow in defence of those chickens which in a few
weeks she will drive before her with relentless cruelty.

This affection sublimes the passions, quickens the invention,
and sharpens the sagacity of the brute creation. Thus a hen,
just become a mother, is no longer that placid bird she used
to be, but with feathers standing on end, wings hovering, and
clocking note, she runs about like one possessed. Dams will
throw themselves in the way of the greatest danger in order
to avert it from their progeny. Thus a partridge will tumble
along before a sportsman in order to draw away the dogs from
her helpless covey. In the time of nidification the most feeble
birds will assault the most rapacious. All the hirundines of a
village are up in arms at the sight of a hawk, whom they will
persecute till he leaves that district. A very exact observer
has often remarked that a pair of ravens nesting in the rock
of Gibraltar would suffer no vulture or eagle to rest near their

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 25

station, but would drive them from the hill with an amazing
fury ; even the blue thrush at the season of breeding would
dart out from the clefts of the rocks to chase away the kestril,
or the sparrow-hawk. If you stand near the nest of a bird
that has young, she will not be induced to betray them by an
inadvertent fondness, but will wait about at a distance with
meat in her mouth for an hour together.

Should I farther corroborate what I have advanced above
by some anecdotes which I probably may have mentioned
before in conversation, yet you will, I trust, pardon the repeti-
tion for the sake of the illustration.

The fly-catcher of the " Zoology " (the Stoparola of Ray)
builds every year in the vines that grow on the walls of my
house. A pair of these little birds had one year inadvertently
placed their nest on a naked bough, perhaps in a shady time,
not being aware of the inconvenience that followed. But a
hot sunny season coming on before the brood was half fledged,
the reflection of the wall became insupportable, and must in-
evitably have destroyed the tender young, had not affection
suggested an expedient, and prompted the parent birds to
hover over the nest all the hotter hours, while with wings ex-
panded, and mouths gaping for breath, they screened off the
heat from their suffering offspring.

A farther instance I once saw of notable sagacity in a
willow-wren, which had built in a bank in my fields. This bird
a friend and myself had observed as she sat in her nest ; but
were particularly careful not to disturb her, though we saw
she eyed us with some degree of jealousy. Some days after
as we passed that way we were desirous of remarking how this
brood went on ; but no nest could be found, till I happened to
take a large bundle of long green moss, as it were carelessly
thrown over the nest in order to dodge the eye of any im-
pertinent intruder.

A still more remarkable mixture of sagacity and instinct
occurred to me one day as my people were pulling off the
lining of a hotbed, in order to add some fresh dung. From
out of the side of this bed leaped an animal, with great agility,
that made a most grotesque figure ; nor was it without great
difficulty that it could be taken ; when it proved to be a large

126 WHITE

white-bellied field-mouse with three or four young clinging to
her teats by their mouths and feet. It was amazing that the
desultory and rapid motions of this dam should not oblige her
litter to quit their hold, especially when it appeared that they
were so young as to be both naked and blind !

To these instances of tender attachment, many more of
which might be daily discovered by those that are studious of
nature, may be opposed that rage of affection, that monstrous
perversion of the <TTop<yr), which induces some females of the
brute creation to devour their young because their owners have
handled them too freely, or removed them from place to place!
Swine, and sometimes the more gentle race of dogs and cats,
are guilty of this horrid and preposterous murder. When I
hear now and then of an abandoned mother that destroys her
offspring, I am not so much amazed ; since reason perverted,
and the bad passions let loose, are capable of any enormity ;
but why the parental feelings of brutes, that usually flow in
one most uniform tenor, should sometimes be so extravagantly
diverted, I leave to abler philosophers than myself to deter-
mine.

» I am, etc.

LETTER XV

Selborne, July Zth, 1773.

Dear Sir, — Some young men went down lately to a pond
on the verge of Wolmer Forest to hunt flappers, or young
wild-ducks, many of which they caught, and, among the rest,
some very minute yet well-fledged wild-fowls alive, which upon
examination I found to be teals. I did not know till then that
teals ever bred in the south of England, and was much pleased
with the discovery : this I look upon as a great stroke in natu-
ral history.

We have had, ever since I can remember, a pair of white
owls that constantly breed under the eaves of this church. As
I have paid good attention to the manner of life of these birds
during their season of breeding, which lasts the summer
through, the following remarks may not perhaps be unaccept-
able : — About an hour before sunset (for then the mice begin

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 12/

to run) they sally forth in quest of prey, and hunt all round
the hedges of meadows and small enclosures for them, which
seem to be their only food. In this irregular country we can
stand on an eminence and see them beat the fields over like a
setting dog, and often drop down in the grass or corn. I have
minuted these birds with my watch for an hour together, and
have found that they return to their nest, the one or the other
of them, about once in five minutes ; reflecting at the same
time on the adroitness that every animal is possessed of as far
as regards the well-being of itself and offspring. But a piece
of address, which they show when they return loaded, should
not, I think, be passed over in silence. — As they take their
prey with their claws, so they carry it in their claws to their
nest ; but, as the feet are necessary in their ascent under the
tiles, they constantly perch first on the roof of the chancel,
and shift the mouse from their claws to their bill, that their
feet may be at liberty to take hold of the plate on the wall as
they are rising under the eaves.

White owls seem not (but in this I am not positive) to hoot
at all ; ^ all that clamorous hooting appears to me to come
from the wood kinds. The white owl does indeed snore and
hiss in a tremendous manner ; and these menaces well answer
the intention of intimidating ; for I have known a whole vil-
lage up in arms on such an occasion, imagining the church-
yard to be full of goblins and spectres. White owls also often
scream horribly as they fly along ; from this screaming proba-
bly arose the common people's imaginary species of screech-
owl, which they superstitiously think attends the windows of
dying persons. The plumage of the remiges of the wings of
every species of owl that I have yet examined is remarkably
soft and pliant. Perhaps it may be necessary that the wings
of these birds should not make much resistance or rushing,
that they may be enabled to steal through the air unheard
upon a nimble and watchful quarry.

While I am talking of owls, it may not be improper to
mention what I was told by a gentleman of the county of Wilts.
As they were grubbing a vast hollow pollard-ash that had been
the mansion of owls for centuries, he discovered at the bottom
a mass of matter that at first he could not account for. After

128 WHITE

some examination he found that it was a congeries of the bones
of mice (and perhaps of birds and bats) that had been heaping
together for ages, being cast up in pellets out of the crops of
many generations of inhabitants. For owls cast up the bones,
fur, and feathers of what they devour, after the manner of
hawks. He believes, he told me, that there were bushels of
this kind of substance.

When brown owls hoot, their throats swell as big as a hen's
egg. I have known an owl of this species live a full year
without any water. Perhaps the case may be the same with
all birds of prey. When owls fly they stretch out their legs
behind them as a balance to their large heavy heads, for as
most nocturnal birds have large eyes and ears they must have
large heads to contain them. Large eyes I presume are neces-
sary to collect every ray of light, and large concave ears to com-
mand the smallest degree of sound or noise. I am, etc.

[It will be proper to premise here that the sixteenth, eigh-
teenth, twentieth, and twenty-first letters have been published
already in the " Philosophical Transactions ; " but as nicer
observation has furnished several corrections and additions, it
is hoped that the republication of them will not give offence ;
especially as these sheets would be very imperfect without
them, and as they will be new to many readers who had
no opportunity of seeing them when they made their first
appearance.]

" The hirundines are a most inoffensive, harmless, entertain-
ing, social, and useful tribe of birds ; they touch no fruit in our
gardens ; delight, all except one species, in attaching them-
selves to our houses ; amuse us with their migrations, songs,
and marvellous agility ; and clear our outlets from the annoy-
ances of gnats and other troublesome insects. Some districts
in the south seas, near Guayaquil, are desolated, it seems, by
the infinite swarms of venomous mosquitoes which fill the
air and render those coasts insupportable. It would be worth
inquiring whether any species of hirundines is found in those
regions. Whoever contemplates the myriads of insects that
sport in the sunbeams of a summer evening in this country,

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 29

will soon be convinced to what a degree our atmosphere would
be choked with them was it not for the friendly interposition
of the swallow tribe.

" Many species of birds have their peculiar lice ; but the
hirundines alone seem to be annoyed with dipterous insects,
which infest every species, and are so large, in proportion to
themselves, that they must be extremely irksome and injurious
to them. These are the Jiippobosccs hinuidinis, with narrow
subulated wings, abounding in every nest ; and are hatched by
the warmth of the bird's own body during incubation, and crawl
about under its feathers.

"A species of them is familiar to horsemen in the south of
England under the name of forest-fly ; and to some of side-fly,
from its running sideways like a crab. It creeps under the
tails, and about the groins, of horses, which, at their first com-
ing out of the north, are rendered half frantic by the tickling
sensation ; while our own breed little regards them,

" The curious Reaumur discovered the large eggs, or rather
pupcE, of these flies as big as the flies themselves, which he
hatched in his own bosom. Any person that will take the
trouble to examine the old nests of either species of swallows
may find in them the black, shining cases or skins of the/;//c^
of these insects ; but for other particulars, too long for this
place, we refer the reader to 'L'Histoire d'lnsectes' of that
admirable entomologist. Tom. iv., pi, ii."

Notes

^ The white owl does hoot, although it is not its most frequent cry. —
G. C. D.

2 See Ulloa's "Travels." — G. W.

LETTER XVI

Selborne, Nov. 20th, 1773.

Dear Sir, — In obedience to your injunctions I sit down to

give you some account of the house-martin, or martlet ; and if

my monography of this little domestic and familiar bird should

happen to meet with your approbation, I may probably soon

10

I30 WHITE

extend my inquiries to the rest of the British hirundines — the
sv/allow, the swift, and the bank-martin.

A few house-martins begin to appear about the i6th April;
usually some few days later than the swallow. For some time
after they appear the hirundines in general pay no attention
to the business of nidification, but play and sport about, either
to recruit from the fatigue of their journey, if they do migrate
at all, or else that their blood may recover its true tone and
texture after it has been so long benumbed by the severities of
winter. About the middle of May, if the weather be fine, the
martin begins to think in earnest of providing a mansion for
its family. The crust or shell of this nest seems to be formed
of such dirt or loam as comes most readily to hand, and is tem-
pered and wrought together with little bits of broken straws
to render it tough and tenacious. As this bird often builds
against a perpendicular wall without any projecting ledge
under, it requires its utmost efforts to get the first foundation
firmly fixed, so that it may safely carry the superstructure. On
this occasion the bird not only clings with its claws, but partly
supports itself by strongly inclining its tail against the wall,
making that a fulcrum ; and thus steadied, it works and plas-
ters the materials into the face of the brick or stone. But then,
that this work may not, while it is soft and green, pull itself
down by its own weight, the provident architect has prudence
and forbearance enough not to advance her work too fast ; but
by building only in the morning, and by dedicating the rest of
the day to food and amusement, gives it sufficient time to dry
and harden. About half an inch seems to be a sufficient layer
for a day. Thus careful workmen, when they build mud-walls
(informed at first perhaps by this little bird), raise but a mod-
erate layer at a time, and then desist, lest the work should be-
come top-heavy, and so be ruined by its own weight. By this
method in about ten or twelve days is formed a hemispheric
nest with a small aperture towards the top, strong, compact,
and warm ; and perfectly fitted for all the purposes for which
it was intended. But then nothing is more common than for
the house-sparrow, as soon as the shell is finished, to seize on
it as its own, to eject the owner, and to line it after its own
manner.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I3I

After so much labor is bestowed in erecting a mansion, as
nature seldom works in vain, martins will breed on for several
years together in the same nest, where it happens to be well
sheltered and secure from the injuries of weather. The shell
or crust of the nest is a sort of rustic work, full of knobs and
protuberances on the outside ; nor is the inside of those that
I have examined smoothed with any exactness at all ; but is
rendered soft and warm, and fit for incubation, by a lining of
small straws, grasses, and feathers, and sometimes by a bed
of moss interwoven with wool. In this nest they tread, or
engender, frequently during the time of building ; and the hen
lays from three to five white eggs.

At first, when the young are hatched and are in a naked
and helpless condition, the parent birds, with tender assiduity,
carry out what comes away from their young. Was it not for
this affectionate cleanliness the nestlings would soon be burnt
up and destroyed, in so deep and hollow a nest, by their own
caustic excrement. In the quadruped creation the same neat
precaution is made use of ; particularly among dogs and cats,
where the dams lick away what proceeds from their young.
But in birds there seems to be a particular provision, that the
dung of nestlings is enveloped in a tough kind of jelly, and
therefore is the easier conveyed off without soiling or daubing.
Yet, as nature is cleanly in all her ways, the young perform
this office for themselves in a little time by thrusting their
tails out at the aperture of their nest. As the young of small
birds presently arrive at their rjXiKLa, or full growth, they soon
become impatient of confinement, and sit all day with their
heads out at the orifice, where the dams, by clinging to the
nest, supply them with food from morning to night. For a
time the young are fed on the wing by their parents ; but the
feat is done by so quick and almost imperceptible a flight that
a person must have attended very exactly to their motions
before he would be able to perceive it. As soon as the young
are able to shift for themselves, the dams immediately turn
their thoughts to the business of a second brood ; while the
first flight, shaken off and rejected by their nurses, congregate
in great flocks, and are the birds that are seen clustering and
hovering on sunny mornings and evenings round towers and

132 WHITE

Steeples, and on the roofs of churches and houses. These
congregatings usually begin to take place about the first week
in August ; and therefore we may conclude that by that time
the first flight is pretty well over. The young of this species
do not quit their abodes altogether ; but the more forward birds
get abroad some days before the rest. These approaching
the eaves of buildings, and playing about before them, make
people think that several old ones attend one nest. They are
often capricious in fixing on a nesting-place, beginning many
edifices, and leaving them unfinished ; but when once a nest
is completed in a sheltered place, it serves for several seasons.
Those which breed in a ready finished house get the start in
hatching of those that build new by ten days or a fortnight.
These industrious artificers are at their labors in the long days
before four in the morning. When they fix their materials
they plaster them on with their chins, moving their heads with
a quick vibratory motion. They dip and wash as they fly
sometimes in very hot weather ; but not so frequently as swal-
lows. It has been observed that martins usually build to a
north-east or north-west aspect, that the heat of the sun may
not crack and destroy their nests ; but instances are also remem-
bered where they bred for many years in vast abundance in a
hot stifled inn-yard against a wall facing to the south.

Birds in general are wise in their choice of situation ; but in
this neighborhood every summer is seen a strong proof to the
contrary at a house without eaves in an exposed district, where
some martins build year by year in the corners of the windows.
But, as the corners of these windows (which face to the south-
east and south-west) are too shallow, the nests are washed down
every hard rain ; and yet these birds drudge on to no purpose
from summer to summer, without changing their aspect or
house. It is a piteous sight to see them laboring when half
their nest is washed away and bringing dirt . . . ^^ generis lapsi
sarcire ruiiias.'" Thus is instinct a most wonderful unequal
faculty ; in some instances so much above reason, in other
respects so far below it ! Martins love to frequent towns,
especially if there are great lakes and rivers at hand ; nay,
they even affect the close air of London. And I have not
only seen them nesting in the Borough, but even in the Strand

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 33

and Fleet Street ; but then it was obvious from the dinginess
of their aspect that their feathers partook of the filth of that
sooty atmosphere. Martins are by far the least agile of the
four species ; their wings and tails are short, and therefore
they are not capable of such surprising turns and quick and
glancing evolutions as the swallow. Accordingly they make
use of a placid easy motion in a middle region of the air, sel-
dom mounting to any great height, and never sweeping long
together over the surface of the ground or water. They do
not wander far for food, but affect sheltered districts, over
some lake, or under some hanging wood, or in some hollow
vale, especially in windy weather. They breed the latest of
all the swallow kind : in 1772 they had nestlings on to Octo-
ber 2 1 St, and are never without unfledged young as late as
Michaelmas.

As the summer declines the congregating flocks increase in
numbers daily by the constant accession of the second broods ;
till at last they swarm in myriads upon myriads round the vil-
lages on the Thames, darkening the face of the sky as they
frequent the aits of that river, where they roost. They retire,
the bulk of them I mean, in vast flocks together about the begin-
ning of October ; but have appeared of late years in a consid-
erable flight in this neighborhood, for one day or two, as late
as November 3rd and 6th, after they were supposed to have
been gone for more than a fortnight. They therefore with-
draw with us the latest of any species. Unless these birds
are very short-lived indeed, or unless they do not return to
the districts where they are bred, they must undergo vast
devastations somehow, and somewhere ; for the birds that
return yearly bear no manner of proportion to the birds that
retire.

House-martins are distinguished from their congeners by
having their legs covered with soft downy feathers down to
their toes. They are no songsters ; but twitter in a pretty
inward soft manner in their nests. During the time of breed-
ing they are often greatly molested with fleas.

I am, etc.

134 WHITE

LETTER XVII

RiNGMER, near Lewes, Dec. gth, 1773.

Dear Sir, — I received your last favor just as I was setting
out for this place ; and am pleased to find that my monog-
raphy met with your approbation. My remarks are the re-
sult of many years' observation ; and are I trust true in the
whole, though I do not pretend to say that they are perfectly
void of mistake, or that a more nice observer might not make
many additions, since subjects of this kind are inexhaustible.

If you think my letter worthy the notice of your respectable
society, you are at liberty to lay it before them ; and they will
consider it, I hope, as it was intended, as a humble attempt to
promote a more minute inquiry into natural history ; into the
life and conversation of animals. Perhaps, hereafter, I may
be induced to take the house-swallow under consideration; and
from that proceed to the rest of the British hirundines.

Though I have now travelled the Sussex Downs upwards
of thirty years, yet I still investigate that chain of majestic
mountains with fresh admiration year by year ; and I think I
see new beauties every time I traverse it. This range, which
runs from Chichester eastward as far as East Bourn, is about
sixty miles in length, and is called the South Downs, properly
speaking, only round Lewes. As you pass along you command
a noble view of the wild, or weald, on one hand, and the broad
downs and sea on the other. Mr. Ray used to visit a family
just at the foot of these hills, and was so ravished with the
prospect from Plumpton Plain, near Lewes, that he mentions
those scapes in his " Wisdom of God in the Works of the Crea-
tion " with the utmost satisfaction, and thinks them equal to
anything he has seen in the finest parts of Europe.

For my own part, I think there is somewhat peculiarly sweet
and amusing in the shapely-figured aspect of chalk-hills in
preference to those of stone, which are rugged, broken, abrupt,
and shapeless.

Perhaps I may be singular in my opinion, and not so happy
as to convey to you the same idea ; but I never contemplate
these mountains without thinking I perceive somewhat analo-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 35

gous to growth in their gentle swellings and smooth fungus-
like protuberances, their fluted sides, and regular hollows and
slopes, that carry at once the air of vegetative dilation and
expansion. . . .

... Or was there ever a time when these immense masses
of calcareous matter were thrown into fermentation by some
adventitious moisture ; were raised and leavened into such
shapes by some plastic power ; and so made to swell and
heave their broad backs into the sky so much above the less
animated clay of the wild below .-*

By what I can guess from the admeasurements of the hills
that have been taken round my house, I should suppose that
these hills surmount the wild at an average at about the rate
of five hundred feet.

One thing is very remarkable as to the sheep : from the
westward till you get to the river Adur all the flocks have
horns, and smooth white faces, and white legs, and a hornless
sheep is rarely to be seen ; but as soon as you pass that river
eastward, and mount Beeding Hill, all the flocks at once be-
come hornless, or as they call them, poll-sheep ; and have,
moreover, black faces with a white tuft of wool on their fore-
heads, and speckled and spotted legs, so that you would think
that the flocks of Laban were pasturing on one side of the
stream, and the variegated breed of his son-in-law Jacob were
cantoned along on the other. And this diversity holds good re-
spectively on each side from the valley of Bramber and Beed-
ing to the eastward, and westward all the whole length of the
downs. If you talk with the shepherds on this subject, they
tell you that the case has been so from time immemorial; and
smile at your simplicity if you ask them whether the situation
of these two different breeds might not be reversed. How-
ever, an intelligent friend of mine near Chichester is deter-
mined to try the experiment ; and has this autumn, at the
hazard of being laughed at, introduced a parcel of black-faced
hornless rams among his horned western ewes. The black-
faced poll-sheep have the shortest legs and the finest wool.

As I had hardly ever before travelled these downs at so late
a season of the year, I was determined to keep as sharp a look-
out as possible so near the southern coast, with respect to the

136 WHITE

summer short-winged birds of passage. We make great in-
quiries concerning the withdrawing of the swallow kind, with-
out examining enough into the causes why this tribe is never
to be seen in winter ; for, entre nous, the disappearing of the
latter is more marvellous than that of the former, and much
more unaccountable. The hirundines, if they please, are cer-
tainly capable of migration, and yet no doubt are often found
in a torpid state ; but redstarts, nightingales, whitethroats,
blackcaps, etc., etc., are very ill provided for long flights ;
have never been once found, as I ever heard of, in a torpid
state, and yet can never be supposed, in such troops, from
year to year to dodge and elude the eyes of the curious and
inquisitive, which from day to day discern the other small
birds that are known to abide our winters. But, notwithstand-
ing all my care, I saw nothing like a summer bird of passage ;
and what is more strange not one wheat-ear, though they abound
so in the autumn as to be a considerable perquisite to the shep-
herds that take them ; and though many are to be seen to my
knowledge all the winter through in many parts of the south
of England. The most intelligent shepherds tell me that som^e
few of these birds appear on the downs in March, and then
withdraw to breed probably in warrens and stone-quarries :
now and then a nest is ploughed up in a fallow on the downs
under a furrow, but it is thought a rarity. At the time of
wheat-harvest they begin to be taken in great numbers ; are
sent for sale in vast quantities to Brighthelmstone and Tun-
bridge ; and appear at the tables of all the gentry that enter-
tain with any degree of elegance. About Michaelmas they
retire and are seen no more till March. Though these birds
are, when in season, in great plenty on the South Downs round
Lewes, yet at East Bourn, which is the eastern extremity of
those downs, they abound much more. One thing is very
remarkable, that though in the height of the season so many
hundreds of dozens are taken, yet they never are seen to
flock ; and it is a rare thing to see more than three or four at
a time ; so that there must be a perpetual flitting and constant
progressive succession. It does not appear that any wheat-
ears are taken to the westward of Houghton Bridge, which
stands on the river Arun.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 137

I did not fail to look particularly after my new migration of
ring-ousels ; and to take notice whether they continued on the
downs to this season of the year ; as I had formerly remarked
them in the month of October all the way from Chichester to
Lewes wherever there were any shrubs and covert : but not
one bird of this sort came within my observation. 1 only saw
a few larks and whin-chats, some rooks, and several kites and
buzzards.

About midsummer a flight of crossbills comes to the pine
groves about this house, but never makes any long stay.

The old tortoise, that I have mentioned in a former letter,
still continues in this garden ; and retired under ground about
the 20th November, and came out again for one day on the
30th : it lies now buried in a wet swampy border under a wall
facing to the south, and is enveloped at present in mud and
mire !

Here is a large rookery round this house, the inhabitants of
which seem to get their livelihood very easily ; for they spend
the greatest part of the day on their nest-trees when the weather
is mild. These rooks retire every evening all the winter from
this rookery, where they only call by the way, as they are
going to roost in deep woods : at the dawn of day they always
revisit their nest-trees, and are preceded a few minutes by a
flight of daws, that act, as it were, as their harbingers.

I am, etc.

LETTER XVIII

Selborne, /<««. 29M, 1774.

Dear Sir, — The house-swallow, or chimney-swallow, is un-
doubtedly the first comer of all the British hirundines ; and
appears in general on or about 13th April, as I have remarked
from many years' observation. Not but now and then a strag-
gler is seen much earlier ; and, in particular, when I was a
boy I observed a swallow for a whole day together on a sunny
warm Shrove Tuesday ; which day could not fall out later than
the middle of March, and often happened early in February.

It is worth remarking that these birds are seen first about

138 WHITE

lakes and mill-ponds ; and it is also very particular, that if
these early visitors happen to find frost and snow, as was the
case of the two dreadful springs of 1770 and 1771, they im-
mediately withdraw for a time. A circumstance this much
more in favor of hiding than migration ; since it is much more
probable that a bird should retire to its hybernaculum just at
hand, than return for a week or two to warmer latitudes.

The swallow, though called the chimney-swallow, by no
means builds altogether in chimneys, but often within barns
and out-houses against the rafters; and so she did in Virgil's
time : —

.... "Ante

Garrula quam tignis nidum suspendit hirundo."

In Sweden she builds in barns, and is called ladit swala, the
barn-swallow. Besides, in the warmer parts of Europe there
are no chimneys to houses, except they are English-built : in
these countries she constructs her nest in porches, and gate-
ways, and galleries, and open halls.

Here and there a bird may affect some odd, peculiar place ;
as we have known a swallow build down the shaft of an old
well, through which chalk had been formerly drawn up for
the purpose of manure : but in general with us this hiriutdo
breeds in chimneys ; and loves to haunt those stacks where
there is a constant fire, no doubt for the sake of warmth. Not
that it can subsist in the immediate shaft where there is a fire ;
but prefers one adjoining to that of the kitchen, and disregards
the perpetual smoke of that funnel, as I have often observed
with some degree of wonder.

Five or six or more feet down the chimney does this little bird
begin to form her nest about the middle of May, which consists,
like that of the house-martin, of a crust or shell composed of
dirt or mud, mixed with short pieces of straw to render it tough
and permanent ; with this difference, that whereas the shell of
the martin is nearly hemispheric, that of the swallow is open at
the top, and like half a deep dish : this nest is lined with fine
grasses and feathers, which are often collected as they float
in the air.

Wonderful is the address which this adroit bird shows all

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 39

day long in ascending and descending with security through
so narrow a pass. When hovering over the mouth of the
funnel, the vibrations of her wings acting on the confined air
occasion a rumbling like thunder. It is not improbable that
the dam submits to this inconvenient situation so low in the
shaft, in order to secure her broods from rapacious birds, and
particularly from owls, which frequently fall down chimneys,
perhaps in attempting to get at these nestlings.

The swallow lays from four to six white eggs, dotted with
red specks ; and brings out her first brood about the last week
in June, or the first week in July. The progressive method
by which the young are introduced into life is very amusing :
first, they emerge from the shaft with difficulty enough, and
often fall down into the rooms below : for a day or so they are
fed on the chimney-top, and then are conducted to the dead
leafless bough of some tree, where, sitting in a row, they are
attended with great assiduity, and may then be called perchers.
In a day or two more they become yTjvrj, but are still unable
to take their own food ; therefore they play about near the
place where the dams are hawking for flies ; and, when a
mouthful is collected, at a certain signal given, the dam and
the nestling advance, rising towards each other, and meeting
at an angle ; the young one all the while uttering suoh a little
quick note of gratitude and complacency, that a person must
have paid very little regard to the wonders of nature that has
not often remarked this feat.

The dam betakes herself immediately to the business of a
second brood as soon as she is disengaged from her first; which
at once associates with the first broods of house-martins ; and
with them congregates, clustering on sunny roofs, towers, and
trees. This hirundo brings out her second brood towards the
middle and end of August.

All the summer long is the swallow a most instructive pattern
of unwearied industry and affection ; for, from morning to
night, while there is a family to be supported, she spends the
whole day in skimming close to the ground, and executing the
most sudden turns and quick evolutions. Avenues, and long
walks under hedges, and pasture-fields, and mown meadows
where cattle graze, are her delight, especially if there are trees

140 WHITE

interspersed; because in such spots insects most abound.
When a fly is taken a smart snap from her bill is heard,
resembling the noise at the shutting of a watch-case; but
the motion of the mandibles is too quick for the eye.

The swallow, probably the male bird, is the exaibitorXo house-
martins, and other little birds, announcing the approach of
birds of prey. For as soon as a hawk appears, with a shrill
alarming note he calls all the swallows and martins about him ;
who pursue in a body, and buffet and strike their enemy till
they have driven him from the village, darting down from above
on his back, and rising in a perpendicular line in perfect secur-
ity. This bird also will sound the alarm, and strike at cats
when they climb on the roofs of houses, or otherwise approach
the nests. Each species of hirundo drinks as it flies along,
sipping the surface of the water; but the swallow alone in
general washes on the wing, by dropping into a pool for many
times together: in very hot weather house-martins and bank-
martins dip and wash a little.

The swallow is a delicate songster, and in soft sunny weather
sings both perching and flying; on trees in a kind of concert,
and on chimney-tops : is also a bold flyer, ranging to distant
downs and commons even in windy weather, which the other
species seem much to dislike ; nay, even frequenting exposed
seaport towns, and making little excursions over the salt
water. Horsemen on wide downs are often closely attended
by a little party of swallows for miles together, which plays
before and behind them, sweeping around them, and collect-
ing all the skulking insects that are roused by the trampling
of the horses' feet : when the wind blows hard, without this
expedient, they are often forced to settle to pick up their lurk-
ing prey.

This species feeds much on little Coleoptera, as well as on
gnats and flies ; and often settles on dug ground, or paths, for
gravels to grind and digest its food. Before they depart, for
some weeks, to a bird they forsake houses and chimneys and
roost in trees ; and usually withdraw about the beginning of
October ; though some few stragglers may appear on at times
till the first week in November.

Some few pairs haunt the new and open streets of London

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 141

next the fields, but do not enter, like the house-martin, the
close and crowded parts of the city.

Both male and female are distinguished from their conge-
ners by the length and forkedness of their tails. They are
undoubtedly the most nimble of all the species : and when
the male pursues the female in amorous chase, they then go
beyond their usual speed, and exert a rapidity almost too
quick for the eye to follow.

After this circumstantial detail of the life and discerning
(xrop'yr} of the swallow, I shall add, for your farther amuse-
ment, an anecdote or two not much in favor of her sagacity : —

A certain swallow built for two years together on the
handles of a pair of garden-shears that were stuck up against
the boards in an out-house, and therefore must have her nest
spoiled whenever that implement was wanted : and, what is
stranger still, another bird of the same species built its nest
on the wings and body of an owl that happened by accident
to hang dead and dry from the rafter of a barn. This owl,
with the nest on its wings, and the eggs in the nest, was brought
as a curiosity worthy the most elegant private museum in Great
Britain. The owner, struck with the oddity of the sight, fur-
nished the bringer with a large shell, or conch, desiring him
to fix it just where the owl hung : the person did as he was
ordered, and the following year a pair, probably the same pair,
built their nests in the conch, and laid their eggs.

The owl and the conch make a strange, grotesque appear-
ance, and not the least curious specimens in that wonderful
collection of art and nature.

Thus is instinct in animals, taken the least out of its way,
an undistinguishing, limited faculty ; and blind to every cir-
cumstance that does not immediately respect self-preservation,
or lead at once to the propagation or support of their species.

I am, with all respect, etc., etc.

142 WHITE

LETTER XIX

Selborne, />^. 14///, 1774.

Dear Sir, — I received your favor of the 8th, and am pleased
to find that you read my little history of the swallow with your
usual candor : nor was I the less pleased to find that you made
objections where you saw reason.

As to the quotations, it is difficult to say precisely what
species of hirundo Virgil might intend in the lines in question,
since the ancients did not attend to specific differences like
modern naturalists : yet somewhat may be gathered, enough
to incline me to suppose that in the two passages quoted the
poet had his eye on the swallow.

In the first place the epithet ^rtrr;//« suits the swallow well,
who is a great songster, and not the martin, which is rather a
mute bird ; and when it sings is so inward as scarce to be heard.
Besides, if tigmim in that place signifies a rafter rather than
a beam, as it seems to me to do, then I think it must be the
swallow that is alluded to, and not the martin, since the former
does frequently build within the roof against the rafters ; while
the latter always, as far as I have been able to observe, builds
without the roof against eaves and cornices.

As to the simile, too much stress must not be laid on it ;
yet the epithet nig7-a speaks plainly in favor of the swallow,
whose back and wings are very black ; while the rump of the
martin is milk-white, its back and wings blue, and all its under
part white as snow. Nor can the clumsy motions (compara-
tively clumsy) of the martin well represent the sudden and
artful evolutions and quick turns which Juturna gave to her
brother's chariot, so as to elude the eager pursuit of the en-
raged ^neas. The verb sojiat also seems to imply a bird
that is somewhat loquacious.^

We have had a very wet autumn and winter, so as to raise
the springs to a pitch beyond anything since 1764 ; which was
a remarkable year for floods and high waters. The land-springs
which we call lavants, break out much on the downs of Sus-
sex, Hampshire, and Wiltshire. The country-people say when
the lavants rise corn will always be dear ; meaning that when

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I43

the earth is so glutted with water as to send forth springs on the
downs and uplands, that the corn-vales must be drowned ; and
so it has proved for these ten or eleven years past. For land-
springs have never obtained more since the memory of man
than during that period ; nor has there been known a greater
scarcity of all sorts of grain, considering the great improve-
ments of modern husbandry. Such a run of wet seasons a
century or two ago would, I am persuaded, have occasioned
a famine. Therefore pamphlets and newspaper letters, that
talk of combinations, tend to inflame and mislead ; since we
must not expect plenty till Providence sends us more favor-
able seasons.

The wheat of last year, all round this district, and in the
county of Rutland, and elsewhere, yields remarkably bad ; and
our wheat on the ground, by the continual late sudden vicissi-
tudes from fierce frost to pouring rains, looks poorly ; and the
turnips rot very fast.

Note ^ ^^ ^^^•

^ " Nigra velut magnas domini cum divitis aedes
Pervolat, et pennis alta atria lustrat hirundo,
Pabula parva legens, nidisque loquacibus escas :
Et nunc porticibus vacuis, nunc humida circum

Stagna sonat.^''

'' As the black swallow near the palace plies :
O'er empty courts, and under arches flies ;
Now hawks aloft, now skims along the flood,
To furnish her loquacious nests with food."

Dryd. Virg. ^n. xii. 1. 691. — G. W.

LETTER XX

Selborne, Fed. 26///, 1774.

Dear Sir, — The sand-martin, or bank-martin, is by much
the least of any of the British hirundines ; and as far as we have
ever seen, the smallest known hirundo ; though Brisson asserts
that there is one much smaller, and that is the hirundo esadcnta.

But it is much to be regretted that it is scarce possible for any
observer to be so full and exact as he could wish in reciting the

144 WHITE

circumstances attending the life and conversation of this little
bird, since it isfera itaturd, at least in this part of the kingdom,
disclaiming all domestic attachments, and haunting wild heaths
and commons where there are large lakes ; while the other spe-
cies, especially the swallow and house-martin, are remarkably
gentle and domesticated, and never seem to think themselves
safe but under the protection of man.

Here are in this parish, in the sand-pits and banks of the
lakes of Wolmer Forest, several colonies of these birds ; and
yet they are never seen in the village ; nor do they at all fre-
quent the cottages that are scattered about in that wild district.
The only instance I ever remember where this species haunts
any building is at the town of Bishop's Waltham, in this county,
where many sand-martins nestle and breed in the scaffold holes
of the back-wall of William of Wykeham's stables ; but then
this wall stands in a very sequestered and retired enclosure,
and faces upon a large and beautiful lake. And indeed this
species seems so to delight in large waters, that no instance
occurs of their abounding, but near vast pools or rivers ; and
in particular it has been remarked that they swarm in the
banks of the Thames in some places below London bridge.

It is curious to observe with what different degrees of archi-
tectonic skill Providence has endowed birds of the same genus,
and so nearly correspondent in their general mode of life ! For
while the swallow and the house-martin discover the greatest
address in raising and securely fixing crusts or shells of loam as
cunabula for their young, the bank-martin terebrates a round
and regular hole in the sand or earth, which is serpentine,
horizontal, and about two feet deep. At the inner end of this
burrow does this bird deposit, in a good degree of safety, her
rude nest, consisting of fine grasses and feathers, usually goose-
feathers, very inartificially laid together.

Perseverance will accomplish anything; though at first one
would be disinclined to believe that this weak bird, with her
soft and tender bill and claws, should ever be able to bore the
stubborn sand-bank without entirely disabling herself ; yet with
these feeble instruments have I seen a pair of them make great
despatch, and could remark how much they had scooped that
day by the fresh sand which ran down the bank, and was of

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 145

a different color from that which lay loose and bleached in
the sun.

In what space of time these little artists are able to mine and
finish these cavities I have not been able to discover, for rea-
sons given above ; but it would be a matter worthy of obser-
vation, where it falls in the way of any naturalist to make his
remarks. This I have often taken notice of, that several holes
of different depths are left unfinished at the end of summer.
To imagine that these beginnings were intentionally made in
order to be in the greater forwardness for next spring is allow-
ing perhaps too much foresight and rermn prudentia to a
simple bird. May not the cause of these latebrce being left
unfinished arise from their meeting in those places with strata
too harsh, hard, and solid for their purpose, which they re-
linquish, and go to a fresh spot that works more freely .-' Or
may they not in other places fall in with a soil as much too
loose and mouldering, liable to flounder, and threatening to
overwhelm them and their labors }

One thing is remarkable — that, after some years, the old
holes are forsaken and new ones bored ; perhaps because the
old habitations grow foul and fetid from long use, or because
they may so abound with fleas as to become untenantable.
This species of swallow moreover is strangely annoyed with
fleas ; and we have seen fleas, bed-fleas {pidex irritans), swarm-
ing at the mouths of these holes, like bees on the stools of their
hives. ^

The following circumstance should by no means be omitted
— that these birds do not make use of their caverns by way of
hybernacula, as might be expected ; since banks so perforated
have been dug out with care in the winter, when nothing was
found but empty nests.

The sand-martin arrives much about the same time with the
swallow, and lays, as she does, from four to six white eggs.
But as this species is cryptogame, carrying on the business of
nidification, incubation, and the support of its young in the
dark, it would not be so easy to ascertain the time of breeding,
were it not for the coming forth of the broods, which appear
much about the time, or rather somewhat earlier than those of
the swallow. The nestlings are supported in common like
II

146 WHITE

those of their congeners, with gnats and other small insects ;
and sometimes they are fed with libelhdcE (dragon-flies) almost
as long as themselves. In the last week in June we have seen
a row of these sitting on a rail near a great pool as perchers,
and so young and helpless, as easily to be taken by hand ; but
whether the dams ever feed them on the wing, as swallows and
house-martins do, we have never yet been able to determine ;
nor do we know whether they pursue and attack birds of prey.

When they happen to breed near hedges and enclosures, they
are dispossessed of their breeding holes by the house-sparrow,
which is on the same account a fell adversary to house-martins.

These hirundines are no songsters, but rather mute, making
only a little harsh noise when a person approaches their nests.
They seem not to be of a sociable turn, never with us con-
gregating with their congeners in the autumn. Undoubtedly
they breed a second time, like the house-martin and swallow ;
and withdraw about Michaelmas.

Though in some particular districts they may happen to
abound, yet in the whole, in the south of England at least, is
this much the rarest species. For there are few towns or large
villages but what abound with house-martins ; few churches,
towers, or steeples, but what are haunted by some swifts ;
scarce a hamlet or single cottage-chimney that has not its
swallow; while the bank-martins, scattered here and there,
live a sequestered life among some abrupt sand-hills, and in
the banks of some few rivers.

These birds have a peculiar manner of flying ; flitting about
with odd jerks and vacillations, not unlike the motions of a
butterfly. Doubtless the flight of all hirundines is influenced
by, and adapted to, the peculiar sort of insects which furnish
their food. Hence it would be worth inquiry to examine what
particular genus of insects affords the principal food of each
respective species of swallow.

Notwithstanding what has been advanced above, some few
sand-martins, I see, haunt the skirts of London, frequenting
the dirty pools in Saint George's Fields, and about White-
chapel. The question is where these build, since there are
no banks or bold shores in that neighborhood : perhaps they
nestle in the scaffold holes of some old or new deserted build-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 147

ing. They dip and wash as they fly sometimes, like the house-
martin and swallow.

Sand-martins differ from their congeners in the diminutive-
ness of their size, and in their color, which is what is usually
called a mouse-color. Near Valencia, in Spain, they are taken,
says Willughby, and sold in the markets for the table ; and
are called by the country-people, probably from their desul-
tory jerking manner of flight, Papilion de Montagna.

Note

1 This insect is not the bed-flea, but another, distinct also from those
which trouble the swallow and the swift. — G. C. D.

LETTER XXI

Selborne, Sept. 2?>th, 1774.

Dear Sir, — As the swift or black-martin is the largest of
the British hirimdines, so it is undoubtedly the latest comer.
For I remember but one instance of its appearing before the
last week in April ; and in some of our late frosty, harsh
springs, it has not been seen till the beginning of May. This
species usually arrives in pairs.

The swift, like the sand-martin, is very defective in archi-
tecture, making no crust, or shell, for its nest ; but forming it
of dry grasses and feathers, very rudely and inartificially put
together. With all my attention to these birds, I have never
been able once to discover one in the act of collecting or carry-
ing in materials ; so that I have suspected (since their nests
are exactly the same) that they sometimes usurp upon the
house-sparrows, and expel them, as sparrows do the house and
sand martin ; well remembering that I have seen them squab-
bling together at the entrance of their holes, and the sparrows
up in arms, and much disconcerted at these intruders. And
yet I am assured, by a nice observer in such matters, that
they do collect feathers for their nests in Andalusia, and that
he has shot them with such materials in their mouths.

Swifts, like sand-martins, carry on the business of nidifica-

148 WHITE

tion quite in the dark, in crannies of castles, and towers, and
steeples, and upon the tops of the walls of churches under the
roof ; and therefore cannot be so narrowly watched as those
species that build more openly ; but, from what I could ever
observe, they begin nesting about the middle of May ; and I
have remarked, from eggs taken, that they have sat hard by
the 9th June. In general they haunt tall buildings, churches,
and steeples, and breed only in such ; yet in this village some
pairs frequent the lowest and meanest cottages, and educate
their young under those thatched roofs. We remember but
one instance where they breed out of buildings, and that is in
the sides of a deep chalk-pit near the town of Odiham, in this
county, where we have seen many pairs entering the crevices,
and skimming and squeaking round the precipices.

As I have regarded these amusive birds with no small atten-
tion, if I should advance something new and peculiar with
respect to them, and different from all other birds, I might
perhaps be credited ; especially as my assertion is the result
of many years' exact observation. The fact that I would ad-
vance is, that swifts tread, or copulate, on the wing ; and I
would wish any nice observer, that is startled at this supposi-
tion, to use his own eyes, and I think he will soon be con-
vinced. In another class of animals, viz., the insect, nothing
is so common as to see the different species of many genera
in conjunction as they fly. The swift is almost continually on
the wing ; and as it never settles on the ground, on trees, or
roofs, would seldom find opportunity for amorous rites, was it
not enabled to indulge them in the air. If any person would
watch these birds of a fine morning in May, as they are sailing
round at a great height from the ground, he would see, every
now and then, one drop on the back of another, and both of
them sink down together for many fathoms with a loud pierc-
ing shriek. This I take to be the juncture when the business
of generation is carrying on.

As the swift eats, drinks, collects materials for its nest, and,
as it seems, propagates on the wing, it appears to live more
in the air than any other bird, and to perform all functions
there save those of sleeping and incubation.

This hirundo differs widely from its congeners in laying in-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 149

variably but two eggs at a time, which are milk-white, long, and
peaked at the small end ; whereas the other species lay at each
brood from four to six. It is a most alert bird, rising very early,
and retiring to roost very late ; and is on the wing in the height
of summer at least sixteen hours. In the longest days it does
not withdraw to rest till a quarter before nine in the evening,
being the latest of all day birds. Just before they retire whole
groups of them assemble high in the air, and squeak, and shoot
about with wonderful rapidity. But this bird is never so much
alive as in sultry thundery weather, when it expresses great
alacrity, and calls forth all its powers. In hot mornings sev-
eral, getting together in little parties, dash round the steeples
and churches, squeaking as they go in a very clamorous man-
ner ; these, by nice observers, are supposed to be males sere-
nading their sitting hens ; and not without reason, since they
seldom squeak till they come close to the walls or eaves, and
since those within utter at the same time a little inward note
of complacency.

When the hen has sat hard all day, she rushes forth just as
it is almost dark, and stretches and relieves her weary limbs,
and snatches a scanty meal for a few minutes, and then re-
turns to her duty of incubation. Swifts, when wantonly and
cruelly shot while they have young, discover a little lump of
insects in their mouths, which they pouch and hold under
their tongue. In general they feed in a much higher district
than the other species ; a proof that gnats and other insects
do also abound to a considerable height in the air ; they also
range to vast distances, since locomotion is no labor to them
who are endowed with such wonderful powers of wing. Their
powers seem to be in proportion to their levers ; and their
wings are longer in proportion than those of almost any other
bird. When they mute, or ease themselves in flight, they
raise their wings and make them meet over their backs.

At some certain times in the summer I had remarked that
swifts were hawking very low for hours together over pools
and streams; and could not help inquiring into the object
of their pursuit that induced them to descend so much below
their usual range. After some trouble, I found that they were
taking phryganecs, ephemercs, and libcllidce (cadew-flies, may-

I50 WHITE

flies, and dragon-flies), that were just emerged out of their
aurelia state. I then no longer wondered that they should be
so willing to stoop for a prey that afforded them such plentiful
and succulent nourishment.

They bring out their young about the middle or latter end of
July ; but as these never become perchers, nor, that ever I could
discern, are fed on the wing by their dams, the coming forth
of the young is not so notorious as in the other species.

On the 30th of last June, I untiled the eaves of a house
where many pairs build, and found in each nest only two
squab, naked piUli ; on the 8th July I repeated the same
inquiry, and found that they had made very little progress
towards a fledged state, but were still naked and helpless.
From whence we may conclude that birds whose way of life
keeps them perpetually on the wing would not be able to quit
their nest till the end of the month. Swallows and martins,
that have numerous families, are continually feeding them
every two or three minutes ; while swifts, that have but two
young to maintain, are much at their leisure and do not attend
on their nest for hours together.

Sometimes they pursue and strike at hawks that come in
their way; but not with that vehemence and fury that swal-
lows express on the same occasion. They are out all day long
in wet days, feeding about, and disregarding still rain : from
whence two things may be gathered : first, that many insects
abide high in the air, even in rain ; and next, that the feath-
ers of these birds must be well preened to resist so much wet.
Windy weather, and particularly windy weather with heavy
showers, they dislike ; and on such days withdraw, and are
scarce ever seen.

There is a circumstance respecting the color of swifts, which
seems not to be unworthy of our attention. When they arrive
in the spring, they are all over of a glossy, dark soot-color,
except their chins, which are white ; but, by being all day long
in the sun and air, they become quite weather-beaten and
bleached before they depart, and yet they return glossy again
in the spring. Now, if they pursue the sun into lower lati-
tudes, as some suppose, in order to enjoy a perpetual summer,
why do they not return bleached .'' Do they not rather per-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 151

haps retire to rest for a season, and at that juncture moult
and change their feathers, since all other birds are known to
moult soon after the season of breeding ?

Swifts are very anomalous in many particulars, dissenting
from all their congeners not only in the number of their young,
but in breeding but once in a summer ; whereas all the other
British hirundines breed invariably twice. It is past all doubt
that swifts can breed but once, since they withdraw in a short
time after the flight of their young, and some time before their
congeners bring out their second broods. We may here re-
mark, that, as swifts breed but once in a summer, and only
two at a time, and the other hirundines twice, the latter, who
lay from four to six eggs, increase at an average five times as
fast as the former.

But in nothing are swifts more singular than in their early
retreat. They retire, as to the main body of them, by the loth
August, and sometimes a few days sooner ; and every strag-
gler invariably withdraws by the 20th, while their congeners,
all of them, stay till the beginning of October ; many of them
all through that month, and some occasionally to the begin-
ning of November. This early retreat is mysterious and won-
derful, since that time is often the sweetest season in the year.
But what is more extraordinary, they begin to retire still earlier
in the most southerly parts of Andalusia, where they can be
in no ways influenced by any defect of heat ; or, as one might
suppose, failure of food. Are they regulated in their motions
with us by a defect of food, or by a propensity to moulting, or
by a disposition to rest after so rapid a life, or by what ? This
is one of those incidents in natural history that not only baffles
our searches, but almost eludes our guesses !

These hirundines never perch on trees or roofs, and so never
congregate with their congeners. They are fearless while
haunting their nesting-places, and are not to be scared with
a gun ; and are often beaten down with poles and cudgels as
they stoop to go under the eaves. Swifts are much infested
with those pests to the genus called hippobosccB himndinis ;
and often wriggle and scratch themselves in their flight to get
rid of that clinging annoyance.

Swifts are no songsters, and have only one harsh screaming

152 WHITE

note ; yet there are ears to which it is not displeasing, from
an agreeable association of ideas, since that note never occurs
but in the most lovely summer weather.

They never can settle on the ground but through accident ;
and when down, can hardly rise, on account of the shortness
of their legs and the length of their wings ; neither can they
walk, but only crawl ; but they have a strong grasp with their
feet, by which they cling to walls. Their bodies being flat
they can enter a very narrow crevice ; and where they cannot
pass on their bellies they will turn up edgewise.

The particular formation of the foot discriminates the swift
from all the British hirundines ; and indeed from all other
known birds, the hirimdo melba, or great white-bellied swift
of Gibraltar, excepted; for it is so disposed as to carry ''omnes
quatuor digitos anticos " — all its four toes forward ; besides, the
least toe, which should be the back toe, consists of one bone
alone, and the other three only of two apiece, — a construction
most rare and peculiar, but nicely adapted to the purposes in
which their feet are employed. This and some peculiarities
attending the nostrils and under mandible have induced a dis-
cerning ^ naturalist to suppose that this species might constitute
a genus per se.

In London a party of swifts frequents the Tower, playing
and feeding over the river just below the bridge ; others haunt
some of the churches of the Borough, next the fields, but do
not venture, like the house-martin, into the close-crowded part
of the town.

The Swedes have bestowed a very pertinent name on this
swallow, calling it "ring swala," from the perpetual rings or
circles that it takes round the scene of its nidification.

Swifts feed on coleoptera, or small beetles with hard cases
over their wings, as well as on the softer insects ; but it does
not appear how they can procure gravel to grind their food,
as swallows do, since they never settle on the ground. Young
ones, overrun with hippobosc(B, are sometimes found, under
their nests, fallen to the ground ; the number of vermin ren-
dering their abode insupportable any longer. They frequent
in this village several abject cottages ; yet a succession still
haunts the same unlikely roofs, — a good proof this that the

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I 53

same birds return to the same spots. As they must stoop
very low to get up under these humble eaves, cats lie in wait,
and sometimes catch them on the wing.

On July 5th, 1775, I again untiled part of a roof over the
nest of a swift. The dam sat in the nest ; but so strongly was
she affected by natural a-Topyrj for her brood, which she sup-
posed to be in danger, that, regardless of her own safety, she
would not stir, but lay sullenly by them, permitting herself to
be taken in hand. The squab young we brought down and
placed on the grass-plot, where they tumbled about, and were
as helpless as a new-born child. While we contemplated their
naked bodies, their unwieldy disproportioned abdomina, and
their heads, too heavy for their necks to support, we could not
but wonder when we reflected that these shiftless beings in a
little more than a fortnight would be able to dash through the
air almost with the inconceivable swiftness of a meteor ; and
perhaps in their emigration must traverse vast continents and
oceans as distant as the equator. So soon does nature advance
small birds to their rfkLKia, or state of perfection; while the
progressive growth of men and large quadrupeds is slow and

tedious ! I am, etc.

Note

* John Antony Scopoli, M.D., of Carniola. — G. W.

LETTER XXII

Selborne, Sept. 13//^, 1774.

Dear Sir, — By means of a straight cottage chimney I had
an opportunity this summer of remarking, at my leisure, how
swallows ascend and descend through the shaft ; but my
pleasure in contemplating the address with which this feat
was performed to a considerable depth in the chimney was
somewhat interrupted by apprehensions lest my eyes might
undergo the same fate with those of Tobit.^

Perhaps it may be some amusement to you to hear at what
times the different species of hirundines arrived this spring
in three very distant counties of this kingdom. With us the

154 WHITE

swallow was seen first on April 4th, the swift on April 24th,
the bank-martin on April 12th, and the house-martin not till
April 30th. At South Zele, Devonshire, swallows did not
arrive till April 25th, swifts in plenty on May ist, and house-
martins not till the middle of May. At Blackburn, in Lanca-
shire, swifts were seen April 28th, swallows April 29th, house-
martins May I St. Do these different dates, in such distant
districts, prove anything for or against migration .'*

A farmer, near Weyhill, fallows his land with two teams of
asses ; one of which works till noon, and the other in the after-
noon. When these animals have done their work, they are
penned all night, like sheep, on the fallow. In the winter they
are confined and foddered in a yard, and make plenty of dung.

Linnaeus says that hawks ^^ paciscuntiir inducias acm avibiis,
quamdiii ciicidns ciiculat ; " but it appears to me, that during
that period, many little birds are taken and destroyed by birds
of prey, as may be seen by their feathers left in lanes and
under hedges.

The missel-thrush is, while breeding, fierce and pugnacious,
driving such birds as approach its nest with great fury to a
distance. The Welsh call it "pen y llwyn," the head or mas-
ter of the coppice. He suffers no magpie, jay, or blackbird
to enter the garden where he haunts ; and is, for the time, a
good guard to the new-sown legumens. In general, he is very
successful in the defence of his family ; but once I observed
in my garden, that several magpies came determined to storm
the nest of a missel-thrush : the dams defended their mansion
with great vigor, and fought resolutely pro aris et focis ; but
numbers at last prevailed," they tore the nest to pieces, and
swallowed the young alive.

In the season of nidification the wildest birds are compara-
tively tame. Thus the ring-dove breeds in my fields, though
they are continually frequented ; and the missel-thrush, though
most shy and wild in the autumn and winter, builds in my
garden close to a walk where people are passing all day long.

Wall-fruit abounds with me this year ; but my grapes, that
used to be forward and good, are at present backward beyond
all precedent : and this is not the worst of the story ; for the
same ungenial weather, the same black cold solstice, has in-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 155

jured the more necessary fruits of the earth, and discolored
and blighted our wheat. The crop of hops promises to be
very large.

Frequent returns of deafness incommode me sadly, and half
disqualify me for a naturalist ; for, when those fits are upon me,
I lose all the pleasing notices and little intimations arising from
rural sounds ; and May is to me as silent and mute with respect
to the notes of birds, etc., as August. My eyesight is, thank
God, quick and good ; but with respect to the other sense, I am,
at times, disabled: —

" And Wisdom at one entrance quite shut out."

Note

1 " The same night also I returned from the burial and slept by the wall
of my court-yard, being polluted, and my face was uncovered.

" And I knew not that there were sparrows (swallows ?) in the wall, and
mine eyes being open, the sparrows muted warm dung into mine eyes, and a
whiteness came in mine eyes ; and I went to the physicians, but they helped
me not." Tobit ii. 10. — G. W.

LETTER XXIII

Selborne, /««^ 8///, 1775.

Dear Sir, — On September 21st, 1741, being then on a visit,
and intent on field-diversions, I rose before daybreak : when I
came into the enclosures, I found the stubbles and clover-
grounds matted all over with a thick coat of cobweb, in the
meshes of which a copious and heavy dew hung so plentifully
that the whole face of the country seemed, as it were, covered
with two or three setting-nets drawn one over another. When
the dogs attempted to hunt, their eyes were so blinded and hood-
winked that they could not proceed, but were obliged to lie
down and scrape the encumbrances from their faces with their
fore-feet, so that, finding my sport interrupted, I returned home
musing in my mind on the oddness of the occurrence.

As the morning advanced the sun became bright and warm,
and the day turned out one of those most lovely ones which no
season but the autumn produces, — cloudless, calm, serene,
and worthy of the south of France itself.

156 WHITE

About nine an appearance very unusual began to demand
our attention, a shower of cobwebs falling from very elevated
regions, and continuing, without any interruption, till the close
of the day. These webs were not single filmy threads, floating
in the air in all directions, but perfect flakes or rags ; some
near an inch broad, and five or six long, which fell with a degree
of velocity that showed they were considerably heavier than the
atmosphere.

On every side as the observer turned his eyes might he
behold a continual succession of fresh flakes falling into his
sight, and twinkling like stars as they turned their sides tow-
ards the sun.

How far this wonderful shower extended would be difficult
to say ; but we know that it reached Bradley, Selborne, and
Alresford, three places which lie in a sort of a triangle, the
shortest of whose sides is about eight miles in extent.

At the second of those places there was a gentleman (for
whose veracity and intelligent turn we have the greatest venera-
tion) who observed it the moment he got abroad ; but concluded
that, as soon as he came upon the hill above his house, where
he took his morning rides, he should be higher than this meteor,
which he imagined might have been blown, like thistle-down,
from the common above ; but, to his great astonishment, when
he rode to the most elevated part of the down, three hundred
feet above his fields, he found the webs in appearance still as
much above him as before; still descending into sight in a con-
stant succession, and twinkling in the sun, so as to draw the
attention of the most incurious.

Neither before nor after was any such fall observed ; but on
this day the flakes hung in the trees and hedges so thick that
a diligent person sent out might have gathered baskets full.

The remark that I shall make on these cobweb-like appear-
ances, called gossamer, is, that, strange and superstitious as
the notions about them were formerly, nobody in these days
doubts but that they are the real production of small spiders,
which swarm in the fields in fine weather in autumn, and have
a power of shooting out webs from their tails, so as to render
themselves buoyant, and lighter than air. But why these apte-
rous insects should that day take such a wonderful aerial excur-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 57

sion, and why their webs should at once become so gross and
material as to be considerably more weighty than air, and to
descend with precipitation, is a matter beyond my skill. If I
might be allowed to hazard a supposition, I should imagine
that those filmy threads, when first shot, might be entangled
in the rising dew, and so drawn up, spiders and all, by a brisk
evaporation, into the regions where clouds are formed : and if
the spiders have a power of coiling and thickening their webs
in the air, as Dr. Lister says they have [see his Letters to Mr.
Ray], then, when they were become heavier than the air, they
must fall.

Every day in fine weather, in autumn chiefly, do I see those
spiders shooting out their webs and mounting aloft : they will
go off from your finger if you will take them into your hand.
Last summer one alighted on my book as I was reading in the
parlor; and, running to the top of the page, and shooting out
a web, took its departure from thence. But what I most won-
dered at was, that it went off with considerable velocity in a
place where no air was stirring ; and I am sure that I did not
assist it with my breath. So that these little crawlers seem to
have, while mounting, some locomotive power without the use
of wings, and to move in the air faster than the air itself.^

Note

^ The appearance of the gossamer-covered fields will be familiar to all
who live in the country. It seems clear that the "locomotive power" of
the tiny spiders is due solely to the movement of the atmosphere. On the
quietest days, if you will wet your finger and hold it up, you will find it grow
sensibly cooler on one side than the other, and on that side is there a faint
wind blowing. If you will then watch the spiders, you will see them shoot
out long silvery threads, which will incline to leeward, and presently the
spiders will let go their hold of the grass, and launch themselves into the
air, floating av/ay on the slightest movement of it.

158 WHITE

LETTER XXIV

Selborne, Aug. i^th, 177$.

Dear Sir, — There is a wonderful spirit of sociality in the
brute creation, independent of sexual attachment : the con-
gregating of gregarious birds in the winter is a remarkable
instance.

Many horses, though quiet with company, will not stay one
minute in a field by themselves : the strongest fences cannot
restrain them. My neighbor's horse will not only not stay by
himself abroad, but he will not bear to be left alone in a strange
stable without discovering the utmost impatience, and endeav-
oring to break the rack and manger with his fore-feet. He
has been known to leap out at a stable-window, through which
dung was thrown, after company ; and yet in other respects
is remarkably quiet. Oxen and cows will not fatten by them-
selves ; but will neglect the finest pasture that is not recom-
mended by society. It would be needless to instance in sheep,
which constantly flock together.

But this propensity seems not to be confined to animals of
the same species ; for we know a doe, still alive, that was
brought up from a little fawn with a dairy of cows ; with them
it goes afield, and with them it returns to the yard. The dogs
of the house take no notice of this deer, being used to her ; but,
if strange dogs come by, a chase ensues ; while the master
smiles to see his favorite securely leading her pursuers over
hedge, or gate, or stile, till she returns to the cows, who, with
fierce lowings and menacing horns, drive the assailants quite
out of the pasture.

Even great disparity of kind and size does not always prevent
social advances and mutual fellowship. For a very intelligent
and observant person has assured me that, in the former part
of his life, keeping but one horse, he happened also on a time
to have but one solitary hen. These two incongruous animals
spent much of their time together in a lonely orchard, where
they saw no creature but each other. By degrees an apparent
regard began to take place between these two sequestered indi-
viduals. The fowl would approach the quadruped with notes

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 59

of complacency, rubbing herself gently against his legs : while
the horse would look down with satisfaction, and move with the
greatest caution and circumspection, lest he should trample on
his diminutive companion. Thus, by mutual good offices, each
seemed to console the vacant hours of the other : so that Mil-
ton, when he puts the following sentiment in the mouth of
Adam, seems to be somewhat mistaken : —

" Much less can bird with beast, or fish with fowl,
So well converse, nor with the ox the ape."

I am, etc.

LETTER XXV

Selborne, Oct. 2nd, 1775.

Dear Sir, — We have two gangs or hordes of gypsies which
infest the south and west of England, and come round in their
circuit two or three times in the year. One of these tribes
calls itself by the noble name of Stanley, of which I have
nothing particular to say ; but the other is distinguished by an
appellative somewhat remarkable. As far as their harsh gib-
berish can be understood, they seem to say that the name of
their clan is Curleople ; now the termination of this word is
apparently Grecian, and as Mezeray and the gravest histori-
ans all agree that these vagrants did certainly migrate from
Egypt and the East, two or three centuries ago, and so spread
by degrees over Europe, may not this family name, a little
corrupted, be the very name they brought with them from
the Levant .-^ It would be matter of some curiosity, could
one meet with an intelligent person among them, to inquire
whether, in their jargon, they still retain any Greek words;
the Greek radicals will appear in hand, foot, head, water, earth,
etc. It is possible that amidst their cant and corrupted dialect
many mutilated remains of their native language might still
be discovered.

With regard to those peculiar people, the gypsies, one thing
is very remarkable, and especially as they came from warmer
climates ; and that is, that while other beggars lodge in barns,
stables, and cow-houses, these sturdy savages seem to pride

l60 WHITE

themselves in braving the severities of winter, and in living
sub dio the whole year round. Last September was as wet a
month as ever was known ; and yet during those deluges did
a young gypsy girl lie in the midst of one of our hop-gardens,
on the cold ground, with nothing over her but a piece of a
blanket extended on a few hazel-rods bent hoop-fashion, and
stuck into the earth at each end, in circumstances too trying
for a cow in the same condition ; yet within this garden there
was a large hop-kiln, into the chambers of which she might
have retired, had she thought shelter an object worthy her
attention.

Europe itself, it seems, cannot set bounds to the rovings of
these vagabonds ; for Mr. Bell, in his return from Peking, met
a gang of those people on the confines of Tartary, who were
endeavoring to penetrate those deserts, and try their fortune
in China.

Gypsies are called in French, Bohemians; in Italian and

modern Greek, Zingari.

* I am, etc.

LETTER XXVI

Selborne, Nov. \st, 1775.

" Hie .... taedas pingues, hie plurimus ignis
Semper, et assidua postes fuligine nigri."

Dear Sir, — I shall make no apology for troubling you with
the detail of a very simple piece of domestic economy, being
satisfied that you think nothing beneath your attention that
tends to utility ; the matter alluded to is the use of rushes
instead of candles, which I am well aware prevails in many dis-
tricts besides this ; but as I know there are countries also where
it does not obtain, and as I have considered the subject with
some degree of exactness, I shall proceed in my humble story,
and leave you to judge of the expediency.

The proper species of rush for this purpose seems to be the

juncus effiisiis, or common soft rush, which is to be found in

most moist pastures, by the sides of streams, and under hedges.

These rushes are in best condition in the height of summer ;

but may be gathered, so as to serve the purpose well, quite on

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE l6l

to autumn. It would be needless to add that the largest and
longest are best. Decayed laborers, women, and children make
it their business to procure and prepare them. As soon as
they are cut, they must be flung into water, and kept there,
for otherwise they will dry and shrink, and the peel will not
run. At first a person would find it no easy matter to divest
a rush of its peel or rind, so as to leave one regular, narrow,
even rib from top to bottom that may support the pith ; but
this, like other feats, soon becomes familiar even to children ;
and we have seen an old woman, stone blind, performing this
business with great despatch, and seldom failing to strip them
with the nicest regularity. When these jiinci are thus far
prepared, they must lie out on the grass to be bleached, and
take the dew for some nights, and afterwards be dried in the
sun.

Some address is required in dipping these rushes in the
scalding fat or grease ; but this knack also is to be attained
by practice. The careful wife of an industrious Hampshire
laborer obtains all her fat for nothing ; for she saves the scum-
mings of her bacon-pot for this use ; and, if the grease abounds
with salt, she causes the salt to precipitate to the bottom, by
setting the scummings in a warm oven. Where hogs are not
much in use, and especially by the sea-side, the coarser animal-
oils will come very cheap. A pound of common grease may
be procured for fourpence, and about six pounds of grease will
dip a pound of rushes, and one pound of rushes may be bought
for one shilling ; so that a pound of rushes, medicated and
ready for use, will cost three shillings. If men that keep bees
will mix a little wax with the grease, it will give it a consist-
ency, and render it more cleanly, and make the rushes burn
longer ; mutton-suet would have the same effect.

A good rush, which measured in length two feet four inches
and a half, being minuted, burnt only three minutes short of
an hour ; and a rush of still greater length has been known to
burn one hour and a quarter.

These rushes give a good clear light. Watch lights (coated
with tallow), it is true, shed a dismal one, " darkness visible ; "
but then the wick of those have two ribs of the rind, or peel,
to support the pith, while the wick of the dipped rush has but

12

l62 WHITE

one. The two ribs are intended to impede the progress of the
flame and make the candle last.

In a pound of dry rushes, avoirdupois, which I caused to
be weighed and numbered, we found upwards of one thou-
sand six hundred individuals. Now suppose each of these
burns, one with another, only half an hour, then a poor man
will purchase eight hundred hours of light, a time exceeding
thirty-three entire days, for three shillings. According to
this account each rush, before dipping, costs 3^3 of a farthing,
and y^y afterwards. Thus a poor family will enjoy five and
a half hours of comfortable light for a farthing. An expe-
rienced old housekeeper assures me that one pound and a
half of rushes completely supplies his family the year round,
since working people burn no candles in the long days,
because they rise and go to bed by daylight.

Little farmers use rushes much in the short days both morn-
ing and evening, in the dairy and kitchen ; but the very poor,
who are always the worst economists, and therefore must con-
tinue very poor, buy a halfpenny candle every evening, which
in their blowing open rooms, does not burn much more than
two hours. Thus have they only two hours' light for their
money instead of eleven.

While on the subject of rural economy, it may not be im-
proper to mention a pretty implement of housewifery that we
have seen nowhere else ; that is, little neat besoms which our
foresters make from the stalks of \hQ polytricum comimme, or
great golden maidenhair, which they call silk-wood, and find
plenty in the bogs. When this moss is well combed and
dressed, and divested of its outer skin, it becomes of a beau-
tiful, bright chestnut color ; and, being soft and pliant, is very
proper for the dusting of beds, curtains, carpets, hangings,
etc. If these besoms were known to the brush-makers in town,
it is probable they might come much in use for the purpose
above-mentioned.

I am, etc.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 163

LETTER XXVII

Selborne, Dec. 12th, 1775.
Dear Sir, — We had in this village more than twenty years
ago an idiot boy, whom I well remember, who^ from a child,
showed a strong propensity to bees ; they were his food, his
amusement, his sole object. And as people of this caste have
seldom more than one point in view, so this lad exerted all his
few faculties on this one pursuit. In the winter he dozed
away his time, within his father's house, by the fireside, in a
kind of torpid state, seldom departing from the chimney-cor-
ner ; but in the summer he was all alert, and in quest of his
game in the fields, and on sunny banks. Honey-bees, bumble-
bees, and wasps were his prey wherever he found them ; he
had no apprehensions from their stings, but would seize them
7iHdts manibiis, and at once disarm them of their weapons,
and suck their bodies for the sake of their honey-bags. Some-
times he would fill his bosom between his shirt and his skin
with a number of these captives, and sometimes would confine
them in bottles. He was a very merops apiaster, or bee-bird,
and very injurious to men that kept bees ; for he would slide
into their bee-gardens, and, sitting down before the stools,
would rap with his finger on the hives, and so take the bees
as they came out. He has been known to overturn hives for
the sake of honey, of which he was passionately fond. Where
metheglin was making, he would linger round the tubs and
vessels, begging a draught of what he called bee-wine. As
he ran about he used to make a humming noise with his lips,
resembling the buzzing of bees. This lad was lean and sal-
low, and of a cadaverous complexion ; and, except in his fa-
vorite pursuit, in which he was wonderfully adroit, discovered
no manner of understanding. Had his capacity been better,
and directed to the same object, he had perhaps abated much
of our wonder at the feats of a more modern exhibitor of bees;
and we may justly say of him now : —

. . . "Thou,
Had thy presiding star propitious shone,
Shouldst Wildman 1 be." . . .

1 64 WHITE

When a tall youth he was removed from hence to a distant

village, where he died, as I understand, before he arrived at

manhood. t .

I am, etc.

Note
^ Wildman was a writer on bees and their management. — G. C. D.

LETTER XXVIII

Selborne, Jati. Zth, 1776.

Dear Sir, — It is the hardest thing in the world to shake
off superstitious prejudices : they are sucked in, as it were,
with our mother's milk ; and, growing up with us at a time
when they take the fastest hold and make the most lasting
impressions, become so interwoven into our very constitutions,
that the strongest good sense is required to disengage our-
selves from them. No wonder, therefore, that the lower people
retain them their whole lives through, since their minds are
not invigorated by a liberal education, and therefore not en-
abled to make any efforts adequate to the occasion.

Such a preamble seems to be necessary before we enter on
the superstitions of this district, lest we should be suspected
of exaggeration in a recital of practices too gross for this
enlightened age.

But the people of Tring, in Hertfordshire, would do well
to remember, that no longer ago than the year 175 1, and
within twenty miles of the capital, they seized on two super-
annuated wretches, crazed with age, and overwhelmed with
infirmities, on a suspicion of witchcraft ; and, by trying experi-
ments, drowned them in a horse-pond.

In a farm-yard near the middle of this village stands, at
this day, a row of pollard-ashes, which, by the seams and long
cicatrices down their sides, manifestly show that, in former
times, they have been cleft asunder. These trees, when young
and flexible, were severed and held open by wedges, while
ruptured children, stripped naked, were pushed through the
apertures, under a persuasion that, by such a process, the

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 165

poor babes would be cured of their infirmity. As soon as
the operation was over, the tree, in the suffering part, was
plastered with loam, and carefully swathed up. If the parts
coalesced and soldered together, as usually fell out, where the
feat was performed with any adroitness at all, the party was
cured ; but, where the cleft continued to gape, the operation,
it was supposed, would prove ineffectual. Having occasion
to enlarge my garden not long since, I cut down two or three
such trees, one of which did not grow together.

We have several persons now living in the village, who, in
their childhood, were supposed to be healed by this super-
stitious ceremony, derived down perhaps from our Saxon
ancestors, who practised it before their conversion to Chris-
tianity.

At the fourth corner of the Plestor, or area, near the church,
there stood, about twenty years ago, a very old grotesque
hollow pollard-ash, which for ages had been looked on with
no small veneration as a shrew-ash. Now a shrew-ash is an
ash whose twigs or branches, when gently applied to the
limbs of cattle, will immediately relieve the pains which a
beast suffers from the running of a shrew-mouse over the part
affected ; for it is supposed that a shrew-mouse is of so bane-
ful and deleterious a nature, that wherever it creeps over a
beast, be it horse, cow, or sheep, the suffering animal is afflicted
with cruel anguish, and threatened with the loss of the use of
the limb.^ Against this accident, to which they were continu-
ally liable, our provident forefathers always kept a shrew-ash
at hand, which, when once medicated, would maintain its
virtue forever. A shrew-ash was made thus : — Into the body
of the tree a deep hole was bored with an auger, and a poor
devoted shrew-mouse was thrust in alive, and plugged in, no
doubt, with several quaint incantations long since forgotten.
As the ceremonies necessary for such a consecration are no
longer understood, all succession is at an end, and no such tree
is known to subsist in the manor, or hundred.

As to that on the Plestor —

" The late Vicar stubbed and burnt it,"
when he was way-warden, regardless of the remonstrances of

l66 WHITE

the bystanders, who interceded in vain for its preservation,
urging its power and efficacy, and alleging that it had been —

"Religione patrum multos servata per annos."

I am, etc.
Note

1 " When a horse in the fields happened to be suddenly seized with any-
thing like a numbness in his legs, he was immediately judged by the old
persons to be either planet-struck, or shrew-struck. The mode of cure
which they prescribed, and which they considered in all cases infallible,
was to drag the animal through a piece of bramble that grew at both ends."

— BiNGLEY.

LETTER XXIX

Selborne, Feb. jth, 1776.

Dear Sir, — In heavy fogs, on elevated situations especially,
trees are perfect alembics; and no one that has not attended to
such matters can imagine how much water one tree will distil in
a night's time, by condensing the vapor, which trickles down
the twigs and boughs, so as to make the ground below quite in
a float. In Newton Lane, in October 1775, on a misty day, a
particular oak in leaf dropped so fast that the cart-way stood in
puddles and the ruts ran with water, though the ground in
general was dusty.

In some of our smaller islands in the West Indies, if I mis-
take not, there are no springs or rivers ; but the people are
supplied with that necessary element, water, merely by the
dripping of some large teak-trees, which, standing in the bosom
of a mountain, keep their heads constantly enveloped with fogs
and clouds, from which they dispense their kindly, never-ceas-
ing moisture ; and so render those districts habitable by con-
densation alone.

Trees in leaf have such a vast proportion more of surface
ithan those that are naked, that, in theory, their condensations
should greatly exceed those that are stripped of their leaves ;
but, as the former imbibe also a great quantity of moisture, it
is difficult to say which drip most ; but this I know, that decid-
'uous trees that are entwined with much ivy seem to distil the

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I67

greatest quantity. Ivy leaves are smooth, and thick, and cold,
and therefore condense very fast ; and besides, evergreens im-
bibe very little. These facts may furnish the intelligent with
hints concerning what sorts of trees they should plant round
small ponds that they would wish to be perennial ; and show
them how advantageous some trees are in preference to others.

Trees perspire profusely, condense largely, and check evap-
oration so much, that woods are always moist ; no wonder,
therefore, that they contribute much to pools and streams.

That trees are great promoters of lakes and rivers appears
from a well-known fact in North America ; for, since the woods
and forests have been grubbed and cleared, all bodies of water
are much diminished ; so that some streams, that were very
considerable a century ago, will not now drive a common mill.
Besides, most wood-lands, forests, and chases with us abound
with pools and morasses ; no doubt for the reason given above.

To a thinking mind few phenomena are more strange than
the state of little ponds on the summits of chalk-hills, many of
which are never dry in the most trying droughts of summer.
On chalk-hills I say, because in many rocky and gravelly soils
springs usually break out pretty high on the sides of elevated
grounds and mountains ; but no person acquainted with chalky
districts will allow that they ever saw springs in such a soil
but in valleys and bottoms, since the waters of so pervious a
stratum as chalk all lie on one dead level, as well-diggers have
assured me again and again.

Now we have many such little round ponds in this district ;
and one in particular on our sheep-down, three hundred feet
above my house ; which, though never above three feet deep
in the middle, and not more than thirty feet in diameter, and
containing perhaps not more than two or three hundred hogs-
heads of water, yet never is known to fail, though it affords
drink for three hundred or four hundred sheep, and for at least
twenty head of large cattle beside. This pond, it is true, is
overhung with two moderate beeches, that, doubtless, at times
afford it much supply : but then we have others as small, that,
without the aid of trees, and in spite of evaporation from sun
and wind, and perpetual consumption by cattle, yet constantly
maintain a moderate share of water, without overflowing in

l68 WHITE

the wettest seasons, as they would do if suppUed by springs.
By my journal of May 1775, it appears that "the small and
even considerable ponds in the vales are now dried up, while
the small ponds on the very tops of hills are but little affected."
Can this difference be accounted for from evaporation alone,
which certainly is more prevalent in bottoms .<* or rather have
not those elevated pools some unnoticed recruits, which in the
night-time counterbalance the waste of the day ; without which
the cattle alone must soon exhaust them } And here it will be
necessary to enter more minutely into the cause. Dr. Hales, in
his "Vegetable Statics," advances, from experiment, that "the
moister the earth is the more dew falls on it in a night ; and
more than a double quantity of dew falls on a surface of water
than there does on an equal surface of moist earth." Hence
we see that water, by its coolness, is enabled to assimilate to
itself a large quantity of moisture nightly by condensation ;
and that the air, when loaded with fogs and vapors, and even
with copious dews, can alone advance a considerable and never-
failing resource. Persons that are much abroad, and travel
early and late, such as shepherds, fishermen, etc., can tell what
prodigious fogs prevail in the night on elevated downs, even
in the hottest parts of summer ; and how much the surfaces of
things are drenched by those swimming vapors, though, to the
senses, all the while, little moisture seems to fall.

I am, etc.

LETTER XXX

Selborne, April -i^rd, 1776.

Dear Sir, — Monsieur Herissant, a French anatomist, seems
persuaded that he has discovered the reason why cuckoos do
not hatch their own eggs ; the impediment, he supposes, arises
from the internal structure of their parts, which incapacitates
them for incubation. According to this gentleman, the crop,
or craw, of a cuckoo does not lie before the sternum at the
bottom of the neck, as in the gallincs, colnmbcB, etc., but
immediately behind it, on and over the bowels, so as to make
a large protuberance in the belly.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 169

Induced by this assertion, we procured a cuckoo ; and, cut-
ting open the breastbone, and exposing the intestines to sight,
found the crop lying as mentioned above. This stomach was
large and round, and stuffed hard, like a pincushion, with food,
which, upon nice examination, we found to consist of various
insects ; such as small scarabs, spiders, and dragon-flies ; the
last of which we have seen cuckoos catching on the wing as
they were just emerging out of the aurelia state. Among this
farrago also were to be seen maggots, and many seeds, which
belonged either to gooseberries, currants, cranberries, or some
such fruit ; so that these birds apparently subsist on insects
and fruits ; nor was there the least appearance of bones,
feathers, or fur, to support the idle notion of their being birds
of prey.

The sternum in this bird seemed to us to be remarkably short,
between which and the anus lay the crop, or craw, and im-
mediately behind that the bowels against the backbone.

It must be allowed, as this anatomist observes, that the crop
placed just upon the bowels must, especially when full, be in
a very uneasy situation during the business of incubation ; yet
the test will be to examine whether birds that are actually
known to sit for certain are not formed in a similar manner.
This inquiry I proposed to myself to make with a fern-owl, or
goat-sucker, as soon as opportunity offered : because, if their
formation proves the same, the reason for incapacity in the
cuckoo will be allowed to have been taken up somewhat hastily.

Not long after a fern-owl was procured, which, from its habit
and shape, we suspected might resemble the cuckoo in its inter-
nal construction. Nor were our suspicions ill-grounded ; for,
upon the dissection, the crop, or craw, also lay behind the ster-
num, immediately on the viscera, between them and the skin of
the belly. It was bulky, and stuffed hard with \z.xgQ.phal<Z)i(£,
moths of several sorts, and their eggs, which no doubt had been
forced out of those insects by the action of swallowing.

Now as it appears that this bird, which is so well known to
practise incubation, is formed in a similar manner with cuckoos.
Monsieur Herissant's conjecture, that cuckoos arc incapable of
incubation from the disposition of their intestines, seems to fall
to the ground; and we are still at a loss for the cause of that

I/O WHITE

strange and singular peculiarity in the instance of the cuailus
canoriis.

We found the case to be the same with the ring-tail hawk, in
respect to formation ; and, as far as I can recollect, with the
swift ; and probably it is so with many more sorts of birds that
are not granivorous. I am, etc.

LETTER XXXI

Selborne, April 2<)th, 1776.

Dear Sir, — On August 4th, 1775, we surprised a large
viper, which seemed very heavy and bloated, as it lay in the
grass basking in the sun. When we came to cut it up, we
found that the abdomen was crowded with young, fifteen in
number ; the shortest of which measured full seven inches, and
were about the size of full-grown earthworms. This little fry
issued into the world with the true viper-spirit about them,
showing great alertness as soon as disengaged from the belly
or the dam : they twisted and wriggled about, and set them-
selves up, and gaped very wide when touched with a stick,
showing manifest tokens of menace and defiance, though as yet
they had no manner of fangs that we could find, even with the
help of our glasses.

To a thinking mind nothing is more wonderful than that early
instinct which impresses young animals with a notion of the
situation of their natural weapons, and of using them properly
in their own defence, even before those weapons subsist or are
formed. Thus a young cock will spar at his adversary before
his spurs are grown ; and a calf or a lamb will push with their
heads before their horns are sprouted. In the same manner
did these young adders attempt to bite before their fangs were
in being. The dam however was furnished with very formi-
dable ones, which we lifted up (for they fold down when not
used) and cut them off with the point of our scissors.

There was little room to suppose that this brood had ever
been in the open air before ; and that they were taken in for
refuge, at the mouth of the dam, when she perceived that dan-
ger was approaching ; because then probably we should have
found them somewhere in the neck, and not in the abdomen.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 17I

LETTER XXXII

Castration has a strange effect : it emasculates both man,
beast, and bird, and brings them to a near resemblance of the
other sex. Thus eunuchs have smooth, unmuscular arms,
thighs, and legs ; and broad hips, and beardless chins, and
squeaking voices. Gelt stags and bucks have hornless heads,
like hinds and does. Thus wethers have small horns, like ewes ;
and oxen large bent horns, and hoarse voices when they low,
like cows : for bulls have short straight horns ; and though they
mutter and grumble in a deep tremendous tone, yet they low
in a shrill high key. Capons have small combs and gills, and
look pallid about the head, like pullets ; they also walk with-
out any parade, and hover chickens like hens. Barrow-hogs
have also small tusks like sows.

Thus far it is plain that the deprivation of masculine vigor
puts a stop to the growth of those parts or appendages that
are looked upon as its insignia. But the ingenious Mr. Lisle,
in his book on husbandry, carries it much farther ; for he says
that the loss of those insignia alone has sometimes a strange
effect on the ability itself : he had a boar so fierce and venere-
ous, that, to prevent mischief, orders were given for his tusks
to be broken off. No sooner had the beast suffered this injury
than his powers forsook him, and he neglected those females
to whom before he was passionately attached, and from whom
no fences would restrain him.

LETTER XXXIII

The natural term of a hog's life is little known, and the
reason is plain — because it is neither profitable nor conven-
ient to keep that turbulent animal to the full extent of its
time : however, my neighbor, a man of substance, who had
no occasion to study every little advantage to a nicety, kept
a half-bred bantam -sow, who was as thick as she was long
and whose belly swept on the ground, till she was advanced

172 WHITE

to her seventeenth year, at which period she showed some
tokens of age by the decay of her teeth and the decline of
her f ertiUty.

For about ten years this prolific mother produced two litters
in the year of about ten at a time, and once above twenty at a
litter ; but, as there were near double the number of pigs to
that of teats, many died. From long experience in the world
this female was grown very sagacious and artful. When she
found occasion to converse with a boar she used to open all
the intervening gates, and march, by herself, up to a distant
farm where one was kept ; and when her purpose was served
would return by the same means. At the age of about fifteen
her litters began to be reduced to four or five ; and such a
litter she exhibited when in her f atting-pen. She proved, when
fat, good bacon, juicy and tender ; the rind, or sward, was re-
markably thin. At a moderate computation she was allowed
to have been the fruitful parent of three hundred pigs : a pro-
digious instance of fecundity in so large a quadruped ! She
was killed in spring 1775.

I am, etc.

LETTER XXXIV

Selborne, May ^th, 1776.
. . . "adm6runt ubera tigres."

Dear Sir, — We have remarked in a former letter ^ how
much incongruous animals, in a lonely state, may be attached
to each other from a spirit of sociality ; in this it may not be
amiss to recount a different motive which has been known to
create as strange a fondness.

My friend had a little helpless leveret brought to him, which
the servants fed with milk in a spoon, and about the same
time his cat kittened and the young were despatched and
buried. The hare was soon lost, and supposed to be gone the
way of most fondlings, to be killed by some dog or cat. How-
ever, in about a fortnight, as the master was sitting in his
garden in the dusk of the evening, he observed his cat, with
tail erect, trotting towards him, and calling with little short

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 173

inward notes of complacency, such as they use towards their
kittens, and something gambolling after, which proved to be the
leveret that the cat had supported with her milk, and con-
tinued to support with great affection.^

Thus was the graminivorous animal nurtured by a carnivo-
rous and predaceous one !

Why so cruel and sanguinary a beast as a cat, of the fero-
cious genus of Felis, the miD-iiim leo, as Linnaeus calls it,
should be affected with any tenderness towards an animal
which is its natural prey, is not so easy to determine.

This strange affection probably was occasioned by that desi-
derium, those tender, maternal feelings, which the loss of her
kittens had awakened in her breast ; and by the complacency
and ease she derived to herself from the procuring her teats
to be drawn, which were too much distended with milk, till,
from habit, she became as much delighted with this foundling
as if it had been her real offspring.

This incident is no bad solution of that strange circumstance
which grave historians as well as the poets assert of exposed
children being sometimes nurtured by female wild beasts that
probably had lost their young. For it is not one whit more
mar\^ellous that Romulus and Remus, in their infant state,
should be nursed by a she-wolf, than that a poor little suck-
ing leveret should be fostered and cherished by a bloody
grimalkin.

, . . " viridi foetam Mavortis in antro
Procubuisse lupam : geminos huic ubera circum
Ludere pendentes pueros, et lambere matrem
Impavidos : illam tereti cervice reflexam
Mulcere alternos, et corpora fingere lingua." ^

Notes
iLetter XXIV. — G. W.

■^ An incident told me by Mr. Harrett, of Kirkwhelpington, may well oe
told here. He has a fine collie bitch which had young ones. She was
annoyed by a cat prowling about them, and killed it. This cat had one
small kitten, which the maids tried to rear by hand in the kitchen. The
bitch hearing its cries fetched it away and laid it among her own pups, suck-
ling it until they were all weaned together, thus atoning as far as she could
for the murder of its mother.

3 '' The cave of Mars was dressed with mossy greens :
There by the wolf were laid the martial twins,

174 WHITE

Intrepid on her swelling dugs they hung;

The foster dam lolled out her fawning tongue :

They sucked secure, while bending back her head,

She licked their tender limbs ; and formed them as they fed."

Dryd. Virg. ^n. viii. 1. 840. — G. W.

LETTER XXXV

Selborne, May 10th, 1777.

Dear Sir, — Lands that are subject to frequent inunda-
tions are always poor ; and probably the reason may be be-
cause the worms are drowned. The most insignificant insects
and reptiles are of much more consequence, and have much
more influence in the economy of nature, than the incurious
are aware of ; and are mighty in their effect, from their mi-
nuteness, which renders them less an object of attention ; and
from their numbers and fecundity. Earthworms, though in
appearance a small and despicable link in the chain of nature,
yet, if lost, would make a lamentable chasm. For to say noth-
ing of half the birds, and some quadrupeds, which are almost
entirely supported by them, worms seem to be the great pro-
moters of vegetation, which would proceed but lamely with-
out them, by boring, perforating, and loosening the soil, and
rendering it pervious to rains and the fibres of plants, by draw-
ing straws and stalks of leaves and twigs into it ; and, most of
all, by throwing up such infinite numbers of lumps of earth
called worm-casts, which, being their excrement, is a fine ma-
nure for grain and grass. Worms probably provide new soil
for hills and slopes where the rain washes the earth away ;
and they affect slopes, probably to avoid being flooded. Gar-
deners and farmers express their detestation of worms ; the
former because they render their walks unsightly, and make
them much work ; and the latter because, as they think, worms
eat their green corn. But these men would find that the earth
without worms would soon become cold, hard-bound, and void
of fermentation, and consequently sterile; and besides, in
favor of worms, it should be hinted that green corn, plants,
and flowers are not so much injured by them as by many spe-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 175

cies of coleoptera (scarabs) and /z/J'w/i? (long-legs) in their larva,
or grub-state ; and by unnoticed myriads of small shell-less
snails, called slugs, which silently and imperceptibly make
amazing havoc in the field and garden.^

These hints we think proper to throw out in order to set the
inquisitive and discerning to work.

A good monography of worms would afford much entertain-
ment and information at the same time, and would open a large
and new field in natural history. Worms work most in the
spring ; but by no means lie torpid in the dead months : are
out every mild night in the winter, as any person may be con-
vinced that will take the pains to examine his grass-plots with
a candle ; are hermaphrodites, and much addicted to venery,
and consequently very prolific.

I am, etc.
Note

1 Farmer Young, of Norton Farm, says, that this spring (1777) about four
acres of his wheat in one field were entirely destroyed by slugs, which swarmed
on the blades of corn and devoured it as fast as it sprang. — G. W.

LETTER XXXVI

Selborne, Nov. 22nd, 1777.

Dear Sir, — You cannot but remember that the 26th and
27th of last March were very hot days, — so sultry that every-
body complained and were restless under those sensations to
which they had not become reconciled by gradual approaches.

This sudden summer-like heat was attended by many sum-
mer coincidences ; for on those two days the thermometer rose
to 66° in the shade ; many species of insects revived and came
forth ; some bees swarmed in this neighborhood ; the old tor-
toise, near Lewes, in Sussex, awakened and came forth out
of its dormitory ; and, what is most to my present purpose,
many house-swallows appeared and were very alert in many
places, and particularly at Cobham, in Surrey.

But as that short warm period was succeeded as well as pre-
ceded by harsh severe weather, with frequent frosts and ice,

176 WHITE

and cutting winds, the insects withdrew, the tortoise retired
again into the ground, and the swallows were seen no more
until the loth April, when, the rigor of the spring abating, a
softer season began to prevail.

Again ; it appears by my journals for many years past that
house-martins retire, to a bird, about the beginning of October;
so that a person not very observant of such matters would con-
clude that they had taken their last farewell ; but then it may
be seen in my diaries also that considerable flocks have dis-
covered themselves again in the first week of November, and
often on the fourth day of that month only for one day ; and
that not as if they were in actual migration, but playing about
at their leisure and feeding calmly, as if no enterprise of
moment at all agitated their spirits. And this was the case in
the beginning of this very month ; for on the 4th November,
more than twenty house-martins, which, in appearance, had
all departed about the 7th October, were seen again for that
one morning only sporting between my fields and the Hanger,
and feasting on insects which swarmed in that sheltered district.
The preceding day was wet and blustering, but the 4th was
dark, and mild, and soft, the wind at south-west, and the ther-
mometer at 58-^-° ; a pitch not common at that season of the
year. Moreover, it may not be amiss to add in this place that
whenever the thermometer is above 50°, the bat comes flitting
out in every autumnal and winter month.

From all these circumstances laid together, it is obvious that
torpid insects, reptiles, and quadrupeds are awakened from
their profoundest slumbers by a little untimely warmth ; and
therefore that nothing so much promotes its death-like stupor
as a defect of heat. And farther, it is reasonable to suppose
that two whole species, or at least many individuals of those
two species of British hirundines do never leave this island at
all, but partake of the same benumbed state ; for we cannot
suppose, that after a month's absence, house-martins can return
from southern regions to appear for one morning in Novem-
ber, or that house-swallows should leave the districts of Asia
to enjoy in March the transient summer of a couple of days.

I am, etc.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 177

LETTER XXXVII

SELBORNE,/d!«. 8M, 1778.

Dear Sir, — There was in this village several years ago a
miserable pauper, who from his birth was afflicted with a lep-
rosy, as far as we are aware of a singular kind, since it
affected only the palms of his hands and the soles of his feet.
This scaly eruption usually broke out twice in the year, at the
spring and fall ; and, by peeling away, left the skin so thin
and tender that neither his hands nor feet were able to per-
form their functions; so that the poor object was half his
time on crutches, incapable of employ, and languishing in a
tiresome state of indolence and inactivity. His habit was
lean, lank, and cadaverous. In this sad plight he dragged on
a miserable existence, a burden to himself and his parish,
which was obliged to support him till he was relieved by death
at more than thirty years of age.

The good women, who love to account for every defect in
children by the doctrine of longing, said that his mother felt
a violent propensity for oysters, which she was unable to
gratify ; and that the black rough scurf on his hands and
feet were the shells of that fish. We knew his parents, nei-
ther of which were lepers ; his father in particular lived to
be far advanced in years.

In all ages the leprosy has made dreadful havoc among
mankind. The Israelites seem to have been greatly afflicted
with it from the most remote times, as appears from the pecul-
iar and repeated injunctions given them in the Levitical law.^
Nor was the rancor of this foul disorder much abated in the
last period of their commonwealth, as may be seen in many
passages of the New Testament,

Some centuries ago this horrible distemper prevailed all
Europe over : and our forefathers were by no means exempt,
as appears by the large provision made for objects laboring
under this calamity. There was an hospital for female lepers
in the diocese of Lincoln ; a noble one near Durham ; three
in London and Southwark ; and perhaps many more in or near
our great towns and cities. Moreover, some crowned heads,
13

178 WHITE

and other wealthy and charitable personages, bequeathed
large legacies to such poor people as languished under this
hopeless infirmity.

It must, therefore, in these days be to a humane and think-
ing person a matter of equal wonder and satisfaction, when
he* contemplates how nearly this pest is eradicated, and ob-
serves that a leper now is a rare sight. He will, moreover,
when engaged in such a train of thought naturally inquire
for the reason. This happy change, perhaps, may have
originated and been continued from the much smaller quan-
tity of salted meat and fish now eaten in these kingdoms ;
from the use of linen next the skin ; from the plenty of better
bread ; and from the profusion of fruits, roots, legumes, and
greens, so common in every family. Three or four centuries
ago, before there were any enclosures, sown-grasses, field-
turnips, or field-carrots, or hay, all the cattle which had grown
fat in summer, and were not killed for winter use, were turned
out soon after Michaelmas to shift as they could through the
dead months ; so that no fresh meat could be had in winter
or spring. Hence the marv^ellous account of the vast stores
of salted flesh found in the larder of the eldest Spencer 2 in
the days of Edward H., even so late in the spring as the 3rd
May. It was from magazines like these that the turbulent
barons supported in idleness their riotous swarms of retainers
ready for any disorder or mischief. But agriculture is now
arrived at such a pitch of perfection that our best and fattest
meats are killed in the winter ; and no man need eat salted
flesh unless he prefers it, that has money to buy fresh.

One cause of this distemper might be, no doubt, the quan-
tity of wretched fresh and salt fish consumed by the common-
alty at all seasons as well as in Lent ; which our poor now
would hardly be persuaded to touch.

The use of Unen changes, shirts or shifts, in the room of
sordid and filthy woollen, long worn next the skin, is a matter
of neatness comparatively modern ; but must prove a great
means of preventing cutaneous ails. At this very time woollen,
instead of linen, prevails among the poorer Welsh, who are
subject to foul eruptions.

The plenty of good wheaten bread that now is found among

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 179

all ranks of people in the south, instead of that miserable sort
which used in old days to be made of barley or beans, may con-
tribute not a little to the sweetening their blood and correcting
their juices; for the inhabitants of mountainous districts to
this day are still Hable to the itch and other cutaneous dis-
orders, from a wretchedness and poverty of diet.

As to the produce of a garden, every middle-aged person
of observation may perceive, within his own memory, both in
town and country, how vastly the consumption of vegetables
IS increased. Green-stalls in cities now support multitudes in
a comfortable state, while gardeners get fortunes. Every
decent laborer also has his garden, which is half his support
as well as his delight; and common farmers provide plenty
of beans, peas, and greens for their hinds to eat with their
bacon ; and those few that do not are despised for their sor-
did parsimony, and looked upon as regaidless of the welfare
of their dependants. Potatoes have prevailed in this little dis-
trict by means of premiums within these twenty years only •
and are much esteemed here now by the poor, who would
scarce have ventured to taste them in the last reign.

Our Saxon ancestors certainly had some sort of cabbage
because they call the month of February " sprout-cale ; " but
long after their days the cultivation of gardens was little
attended to. The religious, being men of leisure, and keeping
up a constant correspondence with Italy, were the first people
among us that had gardens and fruit-trees in any perfection
withm the wall of their abbeys ^ and priories. The barons
neglected every pursuit that did not lead to war or tend to
the pleasure of the chase.

It was not till gentlemen took up the study of horticulture
themselves that the knowledge of gardening made such hasty
advances. Lord Cobham, Lord Ila, and Mr. Waller, of Bea-
consfield, were some of the first people of rank that promoted
the elegant science of ornamenting without despising the
superintendence of the kitchen quarters and fruit walls.

A remark made by the excellent Mr. Ray, in his " Tour of
Europe," at once surprises us, and corroborates what has been
advanced above ; for we find him observing so late as his days
that " the Italians use several herbs for sallets, which are not

l8o WHITE

yet, or have not been but lately, used in England, viz., selleri
(celery), which is nothing else but the sweet smallage ; the
young shoots whereof, with a little of the head of the root cut
off, they eat raw with oil and pepper ; " and further adds :
" curled endive blanched is much used beyond seas ; and for
a raw sallet, seemed to excell lettuce itself." Now this jour-
ney was undertaken no longer ago than in the year 1663.

I am, etc.
Notes

' See Lev. xiii., xiv. — G. W.

2 Viz., six hundred bacons, eighty carcasses of beef, and six hundred mut-
tons.—G. W.

8 " In monasteries the lamp of knowledge continued to burn, however
dimly. In them men of business were formed for the state : the art of
writing was cultivated by the monks ; they were the only proficients in
mechanics, gardening, and architecture." Dalrymple's Annals of Scot-
land.— G. W.

LETTER XXXVIII

Selborne, Feb. \2th, 1778.

" Yorih puer, comitum seductus ab agmine fido,
Dixerat, ecquis adest ? et, adest, responderat echo.
Hie stupet ; utque aciem partes divisit in omnes ;
Voce, veni, clamat magna. Vocat ilia vocantem." ^

Dear Sir, — In a district so diversified as this, so full of
hollow vales and hanging woods, it is no wonder that echoes
should abound. Many we have discovered that return the cry
of a pack of dogs, the notes of a hunting-horn, a tunable ring
of bells, or the melody of birds very agreeably; but we were
still at a loss for a polysyllabical articulate echo, till a young
gentleman, who had parted from his company in a summer
evening walk, and was calling after them, stumbled upon a
very curious one in a spot where it might least be expected.
At first he was much surprised, and could not be persuaded
but that he was mocked by some boy; but repeating his trials
in several languages, and finding his respondent to be a very
adroit polyglot, he then discerned the deception.

This echo in an evening, before rural noises cease, would

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE l8l

repeat ten syllables most articulately and distinctly, especially
if quick dactyls were chosen. The last syllables of

" Tityre, tu patulae recubans "...

were as audibly and intelligibly returned as the first; and there
is no doubt, could trial have been made, but that at midnight,
when the air is very elastic, and a dead stillness prevails, one
or two syllables more might have been obtained ; but the dis-
tance rendered so late an experiment very inconvenient.

Quick dactyls, we observed, succeeded best ; for when we
came to try its powers in slow, heavy, embarrassed spondees
of the same number of syllables,

" Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens," . . .

we could perceive a return but of four or five.

All echoes have some one place to which they are returned
stronger and more distinct than to any other; and that is always
the place that lies at right angles with the object of repercus-
sion, and is not too near, nor too far off. Buildings, or naked
rocks, re-echo much more articulately than hanging woods or
vales ; because in the latter the voice is as it were entangled
and embarrassed in the covert, and weakened in the rebound.

The true object of this echo, as we found by various experi-
ments, is the stone-built, tiled hop-kiln in Gaily Lane, which
measures in front forty feet, and from the ground to the eaves
twelve feet. The true centrum phoniciivt, or just distance, is
one particular spot in the King's Field, in the path to Nore Hill
on the very brink of the steep balk above the hollow cart-way.
In this case there is no choice of distance ; but the path, by
mere contingency, happens to be the lucky, the identical spot,
because the ground rises or falls so immediately, if the speaker
either retires or advances, that his mouth would at once be above
or below the object.

We measured this polysyllabical echo with great exactness,
and found the distance to fall very short of Dr. Plot's rule for
distinct articulation ; for the Doctor, in his history of Oxford-
shire, allows a hundred and twenty feet for the return of each
syllable distinctly ; hence this echo, which gives ten distinct
syllables, ought to measure four hundred yards, or one hun-

1 82 WHITE

dred and twenty feet to each syllable ; whereas our distance
is only two hundred and fifty-eight yards, or near seventy-five
feet, to each syllable. Thus our measure falls short of the
Doctor's, as five to eight ; but then it must be acknowledged
that this candid philosopher was convinced afterwards that
some latitude must be admitted of in the distance of echoes
according to time and place.

When experiments of this sort are making, it should always
be remembered that weather and the time of day have a vast
influence on an echo ; for a dull, heavy, moist air deadens and
clogs the sound ; and hot sunshine renders the air thin and
weak, and deprives it of all its springiness, and a ruffling wind
quite defeats the whole. In a still, clear, dewy evening the
air is most elastic ; and perhaps the later the hour the more so.

Echo has always been so amusing to the imagination, that
the poets have personified her; and in their hands she has
been the occasion of many a beautiful fiction. Nor need the
gravest man be ashamed to appear taken with such a phe-
nomenon, since it may become the subject of philosophical or
mathematical inquiries.

One should have imagined that echoes, if not entertaining,

must at least have been harmless and inoffensive; yet Virgil

advances a strange notion that they are injurious to bees.

After enumerating some probable and reasonable annoyances,

such as prudent owners would wish far removed from their

bee-gardens, he adds : —

. . . " aut ubi concava pulsu
Saxa sonant, vocisque offensa resultat imago."

This wild and fanciful assertion will hardly be admitted by
the philosophers of these days, especially as they all now seem
agreed that insects are not furnished with any organs of hear-
ing at all. But if it should be urged, that though they cannot
hear yet perhaps they may feel the repercussions of sounds,
I grant it is possible they may. Yet that these impressions
are distasteful or hurtful, I deny, because bees, in good sum-
mers, thrive well in my outlet, where the echoes are very strong;
for this village is another Anathoth, a place of responses and
echoes. Besides, it does not appear from experiment that bees

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I 83

are in any way capable of being affected by sounds ; for I have
often tried my own with a large speaking-trumpet held close
to their hives, and with such an exertion of voice as would
have hailed a ship at the distance of a mile, and still these
insects pursued their various employments undisturbed, and
without showing the least sensibility or resentment.

Sometime since its discovery this echo is become totally
silent, though the object, or hop-kiln, remains; nor is there any
mystery in this defect ; for the field between is planted as a
hop-garden, and the voice of the speaker is totally absorbed
and lost among the poles and entangled foliage of the hops.
And when the poles are removed in autumn the disappoint-
ment is the same ; because a tall quick-set hedge, nurtured up
for the purpose of shelter to the hop ground, entirely inter-
rupts the impulse and repercussion of the voice ; so that till
those obstructions are removed no more of its garrulity can be
expected.

Should any gentleman of fortune think an echo in his park
or outlet a pleasing incident, he might build one at little or no
expense. For whenever he had occasion for a new barn,
stable, dog-kennel, or the like structure, it would be only need-
ful to erect this building on the gentle declivity of a hill, with
a like rising opposite to it, at a few hundred yards' distance ;
and perhaps success might be the easier insured could some
canal, lake, or stream intervene. From a seat at the centrum
phojiicum he and his friends might amuse themselves some-
times of an evening with the prattle of this loquacious nymph ;
of whose complacency and decent reserve more may be said
than can with truth of every individual of her sex ; since she

is —

. . . "quae nee reticere loquenti.
Nee prior ipsa loqui didieit resonabilis echo."

I am, etc.

P.S. — The classic reader will, I trust, pardon the following
lovely quotation, so finely describing echoes, and so poetically
accounting for their causes from popular superstition : —

" QuEe bene quom videas, rationem reddere possis
Tute tibi atque aliis, quo pacto per loca sola

1 84 WHITE

Saxa paries formas verborum ex ordine reddant,
Palanteis comites quom monteis inter opacos
Quaerimus, et magna disperses voce ciemus.
Sex etiam, aut septem loca vidi reddere voces
Unam quom jaceres : ita colles collibus ipsis
Verba repulsantes iterabant dicta referre.
Hccc loca capripedes Satyros, Nymphasque tenere
Finitimi fingunt, et Faunos esse loquuntur ;
Quorum noctivago strepitu, ludoque jocanti
Adfirmant volgo taciturna silentia rumpi,
Chordarumque sonos fieri, dulceisque querelas,
Tibia quas fundit digitis pulsata canentum :
Et genus agricolum late sentiscere, quom Pan
Pinea semiferi capitis velamina quassans,
Unco ssepe labro calamos percurrit hianteis,
Fistula silvestrem ne cesset fundere musam."^

— Lucretius, Lib. iv. 1. 576.

Notes

1 " Chance parts the youth from his companions dear,

He cries ' Who's here ? ' and Echo answers ' Here ; '

He stares around, and for a while stands dumb,

Then shouts out 'Come,' and Echo answers 'Come.'" — G. W.

2 " Whence may'st thou solve, ingenuous ! to the world

The rise of echoes, formed in desert scenes.

Mid rocks, and mountains, mocking every sound,

When late we wander through their solemn glooms,

And, with loud voice, some lost companion call.

And oft re-echoes echo till the peal

Rings seven times round ; so rock to rock repels

The mimic shout, reiterated close.

" Here haunt the goat-foot satyrs, and the nymphs,
As rustics tell, and fauns whose frolic dance,
And midnight revels oft, they say, are heard
Breaking the noiseless silence ; while soft strains
Melodious issue, and the vocal band
Strike to their madrigals the plaintive lyre.
Such, feign they, sees the shepherd obvious oft.
Led on by Pan, with pine-leaved garland crowned
And seven-mouthed reed his laboring lip beneath,
Waking the woodland muse with ceaseless song."

— J. Mason Good.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 18$

LETTER XXXIX

Selborne, May i^th, 1778.

Dear Sir, — Among the many singularities attending those
amusing birds the swifts, I am now confirmed in the opinion
that we have every year the same number of pairs invariably ;
at least the result of my inquiry has been exactly the same for
a long time past. The swallows and martins are so numerous,
and so widely distributed over the village, that it is hardly pos-
sible to recount them ; while the swifts, though they do not
build in the church, yet so frequently haunt it, and play and
rendezvous round it, that they are easily enumerated. The
number that I constantly find are eight pairs ; about half of
which reside in the church, and the rest build in some of the
lowest and meanest thatched cottages. Now as these eight
pairs, allowance being made for accidents, breed yearly eight
pairs more, what becomes annually of this increase, and what
determines every spring which pairs shall visit us and reoc-
cupy their ancient haunts .-•

Ever since I have attended to the subject of ornithology, I
have always supposed that that sudden reverse of affection,
that strange avrLaTopy-q, which immediately succeeds in the
feathered kind to the most passionate fondness, is the occa-
sion of an equal dispersion of birds over the face of the earth.
Without this provision one favorite district would be crowded
with inhabitants, while others would be destitute and forsaken.
But the parent birds seem to maintain a jealous superiority, and
to oblige the young to seek for new abodes ; and the rivalry
of the males in many kinds prevents their crowding the one on
the other. Whether the swallows and house-martins return in
the same exact number annually is not easy to say, for reasons
given above ; but it is apparent, as I have remarked before in
my monographies, that the numbers returning bear no man-
ner of proportion to the numbers retiring.

1 86 WHITE

LETTER XL

Selborne, June 2nd, 1778.

Dear Sir, — The standing objection to botany has always
been that it is a pursuit that amuses the fancy and exercises
the memory, without improving the mind or advancing any
real knowledge ; and, where the science is carried no farther
than a mere systematic classification, the charge is but too true.
But the botanist that is desirous of wiping off this aspersion
should be by no means content with a list of names ; he should
study plants philosophically, should investigate the laws of
vegetation, should examine the powers and virtues of effica-
cious herbs, should promote their cultivation, and graft the
gardener, the planter, and the husbandman, on the phytolo-
gist. Not that system is by any means to be thrown aside ;
without system the field of nature would be a pathless wil-
derness ; but system should be subservient to, not the main
object of, pursuit.

Vegetation is highly worthy of our attention ; and in itself
is of the utmost consequence to mankind, and productive of
many of the greatest comforts and elegances of life. To
plants we owe timber, bread, beer, honey, wine, oil, linen,
cotton, etc., what not only strengthens our hearts, and exhila-
rates our spirits, but what secures us from inclemencies of
weather and adorns our persons. Man, in his true state of
nature, seems to be subsisted by spontaneous vegetation ; in
middle climes, where grasses prevail, he mixes some animal
food with the produce of the field and garden ; and it is tow-
ards the polar extremes only that, like his kindred bears and
wolves, he gorges himself with flesh alone, and is driven to
what hunger has never been known to compel the very beasts,
to prey on his own species.^

The productions of vegetation have had a vast influence on
the commerce of nations, and have been the great promoters
of navigation, as may be seen in the articles of sugar, tea,
tobacco, opium, ginseng, betel, paper, etc. As every climate
has its peculiar produce, our natural wants bring on a mutual
intercourse ; so that by means of trade each distinct part is

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 187

supplied with the growth of every latitude. But, without the
knowledge of plants and their culture, we must have been
content with our hips and haws, without enjoying the delicate
fruits of India and the salutiferous drugs of Peru.

Instead of examining the minute distinctions of every vari-
ous species of each obscure genus, the botanist should en-
deavor to make himself acquainted with those that are useful.
You shall see a man readily ascertain every herb of the field,
yet hardly know wheat from barley, or at least one sort of
wheat or barley from another.

But of all sorts of vegetation the grasses seem to be most neg-
lected ; neither the farmer nor the grazier seems to distinguish
the annual from the perennial, the hardy from the tender, nor
the succulent and nutritive from the dry and juiceless.

The study of grasses would be of great consequence to a
northerly and grazing kingdom. The botanist that could im-
prove the sward of the district where he lived would be a
useful member of society : to raise a thick turf on a naked soil
would be worth volumes of systematic knowledge ; and he
would be the best commonwealth's man that could occasion
the growth of " two blades of grass where one alone was seen

before." I am, etc.

Note

^ Man seems to have a natural craving for fresh meat, and in some parts
of Africa where vegetable food is in plenty and even luxuriance, but animal
food is not so easily obtained, the desire to eat flesh causes cannibalism.
It is not hunger, because hunger could be satisfied by vegetable food, but
an irresistible craving for meat. The same cause may first have given rise
to the odious custom in some of the South Sea Islands. — G. C. D.

LETTER XLI

Selborne,/«/k 3^<^, 177^-
Dear Sir, — In a district so diversified with such a variety
of hill and dale, aspects, and soils, it is no wonder that great
choice of plants should be found. Chalks, clays, sands, sheep-
walks and downs, bogs, heaths, wood-lands, and champaign
fields cannot but furnish an ample Flora. The deep rocky

l88 WHITE

lanes abound with filices^ and the pastures and moist woods
\i\\.)\ fungi. If in any branch of botany we may seem to be
wanting, it must be in the large aquatic plants, which are not
to be expected on a spot far removed from rivers, and lying
up amidst the hill country at the spring heads. To enumer-
ate all the plants that have been discovered within our limits
would be a needless work ; but a short list of the more rare,
and the spots where they are to be found, may be neither un-
acceptable nor unentertaining : —

Helleborus foetidiis, stinking hellebore, bear's foot, or setter-
worth, — all over the High Wood and Coneycroft Hanger : this
continues a great branching plant the winter through, blossom-
ing about January, and is very ornamental in shady walks and
shrubberies. The good women give the leaves powdered to
children troubled with worms ; but it is a violent remedy, and
ought to be administered with caution.

Helleborns viridis, green hellebore, — in the deep stony lane
on the left hand just before the turning to Norton Farm, and
at the top of Middle Dorton under the hedge : this plant dies
down to the ground early in autumn, and springs again about
February, flowering almost as soon as it appears above the
ground.

Vaccinium oxycoccos, creeping bilberries, or cranberries, — in
the bogs of Bin's Pond.

Vaccinhim niyrtilhis, whortle, or bleaberries, — on the dry
hillocks of Wolmer Forest.

Drosera rotundifolia, round-leaved sundew, — in the bogs of
Bin's Pond.

Drosera longifolia, long-leaved sundew, — in the bogs of Bin's
Pond.

Comartim pahistre, purple comarum, or marsh cinquefoil, —
in the bogs of Bin's Pond.

Hypericum androscsmum, Tutsan, St. John's-wort, — in the
stony, hollow lanes.

Vinca minor, less periwinkle, — in Selborne Hanger and
Shrub Wood.

Monotropa hypopithys, yellow monotropa, or bird's-nest, —
in Selborne Hanger under the shady beeches, to whose roots it
seems to be parasitical, at the north-west end of the Hanger.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 1 89

Chlora perfoliata, Blackstonia perfoliata, Hudsotii, perfoliated
yellowwort, — on the banks in the King's Field.

Paris quadrifolia, herb of Paris, true-love, or one-berry, —
in the Church-litten coppice.

Chrysosplcniiim oppositifolmm, opposite golden saxifrage, —
in the dark and rocky hollow lanes.

Gentiana aviarclla, autumnal gentian, or fellwort, — on the
Zigzag and Hanger.

LatJircea sqicaviaria, tooth-wort, — in the church litten
coppice under some hazels near the foot-bridge, in Trimming's
garden hedge, and on the dry wall opposite Grange-yard.

Dipsaciis pilos2is, small teasel, — in the Short and Long Lith.

LatJiyriis sylvestris, narrow-leaved, or wild lathyrus, — in the
bushes at the foot of the Short Lith, near the path.

Oplirys spiralis, ladies' traces, — in the Long Lith, and
towards the south corner of the common.

Ophrys nidus avis, bird's-nest ophrys, — in the Long Lith
under the shady beeches among the dead leaves ; in Great
Dorton among the bushes, and on the Hanger plentifully.

Serapias latifolia, helleborine, — in the High Wood under the
shady beeches.

Daphne laureola, spurge laurel, — in Selborne Hanger and
the High Wood.

Daphne niezerenm, the mezereon, — in Selborne Hanger
among the shrubs, at the south-east end above the cottages.

Lycoperdon Uiber, truffles, — in the Hanger and High Wood.

Sambiicus ebulns, dwarf elder, walwort, or danewort, —
among the rubbish and ruined foundations of the Priory.

Of all the propensities of plants, none seem more strange
than their different periods of blossoming. Some produce
their flowers in the winter, or very first dawnings of spring ;
many when the spring is established ; some at midsummer, and
some not till autumn. When we see the hellcborns fa;tidus and
helleborus niger blowing at Christmas, the helleborus hyeinalis
in January, and the helleborus viridis as soon as ever it emerges
out of the ground, we do not wonder, because they are kindred
plants that we expect should keep pace the one with the other ;
but other congenerous vegetables differ so widely in their time
of flowering, that we cannot but admire. I shall only instance

igo WHITE

at present in the crocus sativtis, the vernal and the autumnal
crocus, which have such an affinity, that the best botanists
only make them varieties of the same genus, of which there is
only one species, not being able to discern any difference in the
corolla, or in the internal structure. Yet the vernal crocus
expands its flowers by the beginning of March at farthest, and
often in very rigorous weather ; and cannot be retarded but by
some violence offered ; while the autumnal (the saffron) defies
the influence of the spring and summer, and will not blow till
most plants begin to fade and run to seed. This circumstance
is one of the wonders of the creation, little noticed because a
common occurrence ; yet ought not to be overlooked on account
of its being familiar, since it would be as difficult to be explained
as the most stupendous phenomenon in nature.

" Say, what impels, amidst surrounding snow
Congealed, the crocus, flamy bud to grow?
Say, what retards, amidst the summer's blaze,
Th' autumnal bulb, till pale, declining days ?
The God of Seasons, whose pervading power
Controls the sun, or sheds the fleecy shower :
He bids each flower His quickening word obey,
Or to each lingering bloom enjoins delay."

LETTER XLII

" Omnibus animalibus reliquis certus et uniusmodi, et in suo cuique genere
incessus est : aves sols vario meatu feruntur, et in terra, et in aere."

Selborne, Aug. jth, 1778.

Dear Sir, — A good ornithologist should be able to distin-
guish birds by their air as well as by their colors and shape ;
on the ground as well as on the wing : and in the bush as well
as in the hand. For, though it must not be said that every
species of birds has a manner peculiar to itself, yet there is
somewhat in most genera at least that at first sight discrimi-
nates them and enables a judicious observer to pronounce upon
them with some certainty. Put a bird in motion

. . . " Et vera incessu patuit." . . .

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 191

Thus kites and buzzards sail round in circles with wingfs
expanded and motionless ; and it is from their gliding manner
that the former are still called in the north of England gleads,
from the Saxon verb glidan, to glide. The kestrel, or wind-
hover, has a peculiar mode of hanging in the air in one place,
his wings all the while being briskly agitated. Hen harriers
fly low over heaths or fields of corn, and beat the ground regu-
larly like a pointer or setting-dog. Owls move in a buoyant
manner, as if lighter than the air ; they seem to want ballast.
There is a peculiarity belonging to ravens that must draw the
attention even of the most incurious — they spend all their
leisure time in striking and cuffing each other on the wing in
a kind of playful skirmish ; and, when they move from one
place to another, frequently turn on their backs with a loud
croak, and seem to be falling to the ground. When this odd
gesture betides them, they are scratching themselves with one
foot, and thus lose the centre of gravity. Rooks sometimes
dive and tumble in a frolicsome manner ; crows and daws
swagger in their walk ; woodpeckers fly volatii undoso, open-
ing and closing their wings at every stroke, and so are always
rising or falling in curves. All of this genus use their tails,
which incline downward, as a support while they run up trees.
Parrots, like all other hooked-clawed birds, walk awkwardly,
and make use of their bill as a third foot, climbing and de-
scending with ridiculous caution. All the gallincB parade and
walk gracefully, and run nimbly ; but fly with difficulty, with
an impetuous whirring, and in a straight line. Magpies and
jays flutter with powerless wings, and make no despatch ;
herons seem encumbered with too much sail for their light
bodies, but these vast hollov/ wings are necessary in carrying
burdens, such as large fishes and the like ; ^ pigeons, and par-
ticularly the sort called smiters, have a way of clashing their
wings the one against the other over their backs with a loud
snap ; another variety, called tumblers, turn themselves over
in the air. Some birds have movements peculiar to the season
of love : thus ring-doves, though strong and rapid at other
times, yet in the spring hang about on the wing in a toying
and playful manner ; thus the cock snipe while breeding, for-
getting his former flight, fans the air like the wind-hover;

192 WHITE

and the greenfinch, in particular, exhibits such languishing
and faltering gestures as to appear like a wounded and dying
bird ; the kingfisher darts along like an arrow ; fern-owls, or
goat-suckers, glance in the dusk over the tops of trees like a
meteor ; starlings as it were swim along, while missel-thrushes
use a wild and desultory flight ; swallows sweep over the surface
of the ground and water, and distinguish themselves by rapid
turns and quick evolutions ; swifts dash round in circles ; and
the bank-martin moves with frequent vacillations like a but-
terfly. Most of the small birds fly by jerks, rising and falling
as they advance. Most small birds hop ; but wagtails and
larks walk, moving their legs alternately. Skylarks rise and
fall perpendicularly as they sing ; woodlarks hang poised in
the air ; and titlarks rise and fall in large curves, singing in
their descent. The whitethroat uses odd jerks and gesticula-
tions over the tops of hedges and bushes. All the duck kind
waddle ; divers and auks walk as if fettered, and stand erect
on their tails ; these are the compedes of Linnaeus. Geese and
cranes, and most wild fowls, move in figured flights, often
changing their position. The secondary remiges of Tringae,
wild-ducks, and some others, are very long, and give their
wings, when in motion, a hooked appearance. Dabchicks,
moor-hens, and coots fly erect, with their legs hanging down,
and hardly make any despatch ; the reason is plain: their
wings are placed too forward out of the true centre of gravity,
as the legs of auks and divers are situated too backward.

Note

1 The flight of the heron seems particularly slow, yet the beats of its
wings average one hundred and twenty in a minute, and it makes very rapid
progress. — G. C. D.

LETTER XLIII

Selborne, Sept. gth, 1778.

Dear Sir, — From the motion of birds, the transition is
natural enough to their notes and language, of which I shall
say something. Not that I would pretend to understand
their language like the vizier who, by the recital of a conver-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 193

sation which passed between two owls, reclaimed a sultan,^
before delighting in conquest and devastation ; but I would
be thought only to mean that many of the winged tribes have
various sounds and voices adapted to express their various
passions, wants, and feelings ; such as anger, fear, love,
hatred, hunger, and the like. All species are not equally
eloquent ; some are copious and fluent as it were in their
utterance, while others are confined to a few important
sounds : no bird, like the fish kind, is quite mute, though
some are rather silent. The language of birds is very ancient,
and, like other ancient modes of speech, very elliptical ; little
is said, but much is meant and understood.

The notes of the eagle kind are shrill and piercing; and
about the season of nidification much diversified, as I have
been often assured by a curious observer of nature, who long
resided at Gibraltar, where eagles abound. The notes of our
hawks much resemble those of the king of birds. Owls have
very expressive notes ; they hoot in a fine vocal sound, much
resembling the vox Jmniana, and reducible by a pitch-pipe to
a musical key. This note seems to express complacency and
rivalry among the males ; they use also a quick call and a
horrible scream ; and can snore and hiss when they mean to
menace. Ravens, besides their loud croak, can exert a deep
and solemn note that makes the woods to echo ; the amorous
sound of a crow is strange and ridiculous ; rooks, in the breed-
ing season, attempt sometimes in the gaiety of their hearts to
sing, but with no great success ; the parrot kind have many
modulations of voice, as appears by their aptitude to learn
human sounds ; doves coo in an amorous and mournful man-
ner, and are emblems of despairing lovers ; the woodpecker
sets up a sort of loud and hearty laugh ; the fern-owl, or goat-
sucker, from the dusk till daybreak, serenades his mate with
the clattering of castanets. All the tuneful passeres express
their complacency by sweet modulations and a variety of
melody. The swallow, as has been observed in a former
letter, by a shrill alarm bespeaks the attention of the other
hirundines, and bids them be aware the hawk is at hand.
Aquatic and gregarious birds, especially the nocturnal, that
shift their quarters in the dark, are very noisy and loquacious ;
'4

194 WHITE

as cranes, wild-geese, wild-ducks, and the like ; their perpet-
ual clamor prevents them from dispersing and losing their
companions.

In so extensive a subject, sketches and outlines are as much
as can be expected ; for it would be endless to instance in all
the infinite variety of the feathered nation. We shall there-
fore confine the remainder of this letter to the few domestic
fowls of our yards, which are most known and therefore best
understood. And first the peacock, with his gorgeous train,
demands our attention ; but, like most of the gaudy birds, his
notes are grating and shocking to the ear : the yelling of cats,
and the braying of an ass, are not more disgustful. The voice
of the goose is trumpet-like and clanking, and once saved the
Capitol at Rome, as grave historians assert ; the hiss, also, of
the gander is formidable and full of menace, and " protective
of his young." Among ducks the sexual distinction of voice
is remarkable ; for, while the quack of the female is loud and
sonorous, the voice of the drake is inward and harsh, and
feeble, and scarce discernible. The cock turkey struts and gob-
bles to his mistress in a most uncouth manner ; he hath also
a pert and petulant note when he attacks his adversary.
When a hen turkey leads forth her young brood she keeps a
watchful eye ; and if a bird of prey appear, though ever so
high in the air, the careful mother announces the enemy with
a little inward moan, and watches him with a steady and
attentive look ; but, if he approach, her note becomes earnest
and alarming, and her outcries are redoubled.

No inhabitants of a yard seem possessed of such a variety
of expression and so copious a language as common poultry.
Take a chicken of four or five days old, and hold it up to a
window where there are flies, and it will immediately seize its
prey, with little twitterings of complacency ; but if you tender
it a wasp or a bee, at once its note becomes harsh, and expres-
sive of disapprobation and a sense of danger. When a pullet
is ready to lay she intimates the event by a joyous and easy
soft note. Of all the occurrences of their life that of laying
seems to be the most important ; for no sooner has a hen dis-
burdened herself, than she rushes forth with a clamorous kind
of joy, which the cock and the rest of his mistresses immedi-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 195

ately adopt. The tumult is not confined to the family con-
cerned, but catches from yard to yard, and spreads to every
homestead within hearing, till at last the whole village is in
an uproar. As soon as a hen becomes a mother her new
relation demands a new language ; she then runs clocking and
screaming about, and seems agitated as if possessed. The
father of the flock has also a considerable vocabulary ; if he
finds food, he calls a favorite concubine to partake ; and if
a bird of prey passes over, with a warning voice he bids his
family beware. The gallant chanticleer has, at command, his
amorous phrases and his terms of defiance. But the sound
by which he is best known is his crowing : by this he has
been distinguished in all ages as the countryman's clock or
larum, as the watchman that proclaims the divisions of the
night. Thus the poet elegantly styles him —

. . . " the crested cock, whose clarion sounds
The silent hours."

A neighboring gentleman one summer had lost most of his
chickens by a sparrow-hawk, that came gliding down between
a faggot pile and the end of his house to the place where the
coops stood. The owner, inwardly vexed to see his flock thus
diminished, hung a setting-net adroitly between the pile and
the house, into which the caitiff dashed and was entangled.
Resentment suggested the law of retaliation ; he therefore
clipped the hawk's wings, cut off his talons, and, fixing a cork
on his bill, threw him down among the brood hens. Imagina-
tion cannot paint the scene that ensued ; the expressions that
fear, rage, and revenge inspired were new, or at least such
as had been unnoticed before : the exasperated matrons up-
braided, they execrated, they insulted, they triumphed. In a
word, they never desisted from buffeting their adversary till
they had torn him in a hundred pieces.

Note
1 See Spectator, Vol. VII., No. 512. — G. W.

196 WHITE

LETTER XLIV

. . . "Monstrent
* * * * *

Quid tantum Oceano properent se tingere soles
Hyberni ; vel quae tardis mora noctibus obstet."

Selborne.

Gentlemen who have outlets might contrive to make orna-
ments subservient to utility : a pleasing eye-trap might also
contribute to promote science : an obelisk in a garden or park
might be both an embellishment and an heliotrope.

Any person that is curious, and enjoys the advantage of a
good horizon, might, with little trouble, make two heliotropes ;
the one for the winter, the other for the summer solstice : and
the two erections might be constructed with very little expense ;
for two pieces of timber frame-work, about ten or twelve feet
high, and four feet broad at the base, and close lined with
plank, would answer the purpose.

The erection for the former should, if possible, be placed
within sight of some window in the common sitting parlor ;
because men, at that dead season of the year, are usually within
doors at the close of the day ; while that for the latter might
be fixed for any given spot in the garden or outlet ; whence
the owner might contemplate, in a fine summer's evening, the
utmost extent that the sun makes to the northward at the sea-
son of the longest days. Now nothing would be necessary but
to place these two objects with so much exactness, that the
westerly limb of the sun, at setting, might but just clear the
winter heliotrope to the west of it on the shortest day ; and
that the whole disc of the sun, at the longest day, might
exactly at setting also clear the summer heliotrope to the
north of it.

By this simple expedient it would soon appear that there
is no such thing, strictly speaking, as a solstice ; for, from the
shortest day, the owner would, every clear evening, see the disc
advancing at its setting, to the westward of the object; and,
from the longest day, observe the sun retiring backwards every
evening at its setting, towards the object westward, till, in a
few nights, it would set quite behind it, and so by degrees, to

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE I97

the west of it : for when the sun comes near the summer sol-
stice, the whole disc of it would at first set behind the object ;
after a time the northern limb would first appear, and so every
night gradually more, till at length the whole diameter would
set northward of it for about three nights ; but on the middle
night of the three, sensibly more remote than the former or
following. When beginning its recess from the summer tropic,
it would continue more and more to be hidden every night, till
at length it would descend quite behind the object again ; and
so nightly more and more to the westward.

LETTER XLV

. . . " Mugire videbis
Sub pedibus terram, et descendere montibus ornos."

Selborne.

When I was a boy I used to read, with astonishment and
implicit assent, accounts in Baker's " Chronicle " of walking
hills and travelling mountains. John Philips, in his " Cyder,"
alludes to the credit that was given to such stories with a deli-
cate but quaint vein of humor peculiar to the author of the
"Splendid Shilling:" —

" I nor advise, nor reprehend the choice
Of Marcely Hill ; the apple nowhere finds
A kinder mould ; yet 'tis unsafe to trust
Deceitful ground ; who knows but that once more
This mount may journey, and his present site
Forsaken, to thy neighbor's bounds transfer
Thy goodly plants, affording matter strange
For law debates ? "

But, when I came to consider better, I began to suspect that
though our hills may never have journeyed far, yet that the
ends of many of them have slipped and fallen away at distant
periods, leaving the cliffs bare and abrupt. This seems to
have been the case with Nore and Whetham hills ; and
especially with the ridge between Harteley Park and Ward
le Ham, where the ground has slid into vast swellings and fur-

198 WHITE

rows ; and lies still in such romantic confusion as cannot be
accounted for from any other cause. A strange event, that
happened not long since, justifies our suspicions ; which,
though it befell not within the limits of this parish, yet as it
was within the hundred of Selborne, and as the circumstances
were singular, may fairly claim a place in a work of this nature.
The months of January and February, in the year 1774,
were remarkable for great melting snows and vast gluts of
rain ; so that by the end of the latter month the land-springs,
or lavants, began to prevail, and to be near as high as in the
memorable winter of 1764. The beginning of March also
went on in the same tenor ; when, in the night between the
8th and 9th of that month, a considerable part of the great
woody hanger at Hawkley was torn from its place, and fell
down, leaving a high freestone cliff naked and bare, and
resembling the steep side of a chalk-pit. It appears that this
huge fragment, being perhaps sapped and undermined by
waters, foundered, and was ingulfed, going down in a perpen-
dicular direction ; for a gate which stood in the field, on the
top of the hill, after sinking with its posts for thirty or forty
feet, remained in so true and upright a position as to open and
shut with great exactness, just as in its first situation. Several
oaks also are still standing, and in a state of vegetation, after
taking the same desperate leap. That great part of this pro-
digious mass was absorbed in some gulf below is plain also
from the inclining ground at the bottom of the hill, which is
free and unencumbered, but would have been buried in heaps
of rubbish had the fragment parted and fallen forward.
About a hundred yards from the foot of this hanging coppice
stood a cottage by the side of a lane ; and two hundred yards
lower, on the other side of the lane, was a farmhouse, in
which lived a laborer and his family; and, just by, a stout new
barn. The cottage was inhabited by an old woman and her
son and his wife. These people in the evening, which was
very dark and tempestuous, observed that the brick floors of
their kitchens began to heave and part; and that the walls
seemed to open, and the roofs to crack ; but they all agree
that no tremor of the ground, indicating an earthquake, was
ever felt ; only that the wind continued to make a most tre-

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 199

mendous roaring in the woods and hangers. The miserable
inhabitants, not daring to go to bed, remained in the utmost
solicitude and confusion, expecting every moment to be buried
under the ruins of their shattered edifices. When daylight
came they were at leisure to contemplate the devastations of
the night : they then found that a deep rift, or chasm, had
opened under their houses, and torn them, as it were, in two;
and that one end of the barn had suffered in a similar man-
ner : that a pond near the cottage had undergone a strange
reverse, becoming deep at the shallow end, and so vice versa;
that many large oaks were removed out of their perpendicu-
lar, some thrown down, and some fallen into the heads of
neighboring trees ; and that a gate was thrust forward, with
its hedge, full six feet, so as to require a new track to be made
to it. From the foot of the cliff the general course of the
ground, which is pasture, inclines in a moderate descent for
half a mile, and is interspersed with some hillocks, which were
rifted, in every direction, as well towards the great woody
hanger, as from it. In the first pasture the deep clefts began ;
and running across the lane, and under the buildings, made
such vast shelves that the road was impassable for some time ;
and so over to an arable field on the other side, which was
strangely torn and disordered. The second pasture field,
being more soft and springy, was protruded forward without
many fissures in the turf, which was raised in long ridges
resembling graves, lying at right angles to the motion. At the
bottom of this enclosure the soil and turf rose many feet
against the bodies of some oaks that obstructed their farther
course and terminated this awful commotion.

The perpendicular height of the precipice in general is
twenty-three yards ; the length of the lapse or slip as seen
from the fields below, one hundred and eighty-one ; and a
partial fall, concealed in the coppice, extends seventy yards
more ; so that the total length of this fragment that fell was
two hundred and fifty-one yards. About fifty acres of land
suffered from this violent convulsion ; two houses were en-
tirely destroyed ; one end of a new barn was left in ruins, the
walls being cracked through the very stones that composed
them ; a hanging coppice was changed to a naked rock ; and

200 WHITE

some grass grounds and an arable field so broken and rifted
by the chasms as to be rendered for a time neither fit for the
plough nor safe for pasturage, till considerable labor and ex-
pense had been bestowed in levelling the surface and filling in
the gaping fissures.

LETTER XLVI

" resonant arbusta."

Selborne.

There is a steep, abrupt pasture field and interspersed with
furze close to the back of this village, well known by the name
of Short Lith, consisting of a rocky dry soil, and inclining to
the afternoon sun. This spot abounds with the grylliis cam-
Pestris, or field-cricket ; which, though frequent in these parts,
is by no means a common insect in many other countries.

As their cheerful summer cry cannot but draw the attention
of a naturalist, I have often gone down to examine the economy
of these ^/j/Zz, and study their mode of life ; but they are so shy
and cautious that it is no easy matter to get a sight of them ; for
feeling a person's footsteps as he advances, they stop short in
the midst of their song, and retire backward nimbly into their
burrows, where they lurk till all suspicion of danger is over.

At first we attempted to dig them out with a spade, but with-
out any great success ; for either we could not get to the bottom
of the hole, which often terminated under a great stone ; or
else in breaking up the ground we inadvertently squeezed the
poor insect to death. Out of one so bruised we took a multi-
tude of eggs, which were long and narrow, of a yellow color,
and covered with a very tough skin. By this accident we
learned to distinguish the male from the female ; the former
of which is shining black, with a golden stripe across his shoul-
ders ; the latter is more dusky, more capacious about the ab-
domen, and carries a long, sword-shaped weapon at her tail,
which probably is the instrument with which she deposits her
eggs in crannies and safe receptacles.

Where violent methods will not avail, more gentle means
will often succeed, and so it proved in the present case ; for,

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 20I

though a spade be too boisterous and rough an implement, a
pliant stock of grass, gently insinuated into the caverns, will
probe their windings to the bottom, and quickly bring out the
inhabitant ; and thus the humane inquirer may gratify his
curiosity without injuring the object of it. It is remarkable,
that though these insects are furnished with long legs behind,
and brawny thighs for leaping, like grasshoppers ; yet when
driven from their holes they show no activity, but crawl along
in a shiftless manner, so as easily to be taken ; and again,
though provided with a curious apparatus of wings, yet they
never exert them when there seems to be the greatest occasion.
The males only make that shrilling noise, perhaps, out of
rivalry and emulation, as is the case with many animals which
exert some sprightly note during their breeding time. It is
raised by a brisk friction of one wing against the other. They
are solitary beings, living singly male and female, each as it
may happen ; but there must be a time when the sexes have
some intercourse, and then the wings may be useful perhaps
during the hours of night. When the males meet they will
fight fiercely, as I found by some which I put into the crevices
of a dry stone wall, where I should have been glad to have
made them settle. For though they seemed distressed by be-
ing taken out of their knowledge, yet the first that got posses-
sion of the chinks would seize on any others that were intruded
upon them with a vast row of s^i i ated fangs. With their strong
jaws, toothed like the shears of a lobster's claws, they perforate
and round their curious regular cells, having no fore-claws to
dig, like the mole-cricket. When taken in hand I could not
but wonder that they never offered to defend themselves,
though armed with such formidable weapons. Of such herbs
as grow before the mouths of their burrows they eat indis-
criminately, and on a little platform which they make just by
they drop their dung ; and never, in the day-time, seem to stir
more than two or three inches from home. Sitting in the en-
trance of their caverns they chirp all night as well as day from
the middle of the month of May to the middle of July ; and in
hot weather, when they are most vigorous, they make the hills
echo, and in the stiller hours of darkness may be heard to a con-
siderable distance. In the beginning of the season their notes

202 WHITE

are more faint and inward ; but become louder as the summer
advances, and so die away again by degrees.

Sounds do not always give us pleasure according to their
sweetness and melody ; nor do harsh sounds always displease.
We are more apt to be captivated or disgusted with the asso-
ciations which they promote than with the notes themselves.
Thus the shrilling of the field-cricket, though sharp and stridu-
lous, yet marvellously delights some hearers, filling their minds
with a train of summer ideas of everything that is rural, ver-
durous, and joyous.

About the loth March the crickets appear at the mouths of
their cells, which they then open and bore, and shape very ele-
gantly. All that ever I have seen at that season were in their
pupa state, and had only the rudiments of wings, lying under
a skin or coat, which must be cast before the insect can arrive
at its perfect state ; from whence I should suppose that the
old ones of last year do not always survive the winter. In
August their holes begin to be obliterated, and the insects are
seen no more till spring.

Not many summers ago I endeavored to transplant a colony
to the terrace in my garden, by boring deep holes in the slop-
ing turf. The new inhabitants stayed some time, and fed and
sung ; but wandered away by degrees, and were heard at a
farther distance every morning, so that it appears that on this
emergency they made use of their wings in attempting to
return to the spot from which they were taken.

One of these crickets when confined in a paper cage and set
in the sun, and supplied with plants moistened with water, will
feed and thrive, and become so merry and loud as to be irk-
some in the same room where a person is sitting ; if the plants
are not wet it will die.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 203

LETTER XLVII

" Far from all resort of mirth
Save the cricket on the hearth."

— Milton's // Penseroso.

Selborne.

Dear Sir, — While many other insects must be sought after
in fields, and woods, and waters, the gryllus doviesticus, or
house-cricket, resides altogether within our dwellings, intrud-
ing itself upon our notice whether we will or no. This species
delights in new-built houses, being, like the spider, pleased
with the moisture of the walls ; and besides, the softness of the
mortar enables them to burrow and mine between the joints of
the bricks or stones, and to open communications from one
room to another. They are particularly fond of kitchens and
bakers' ovens, on account of their perpetual warmth.

Tender insects that live abroad either enjoy only the short
period of one summer, or else doze away the cold, uncomfort-
able months in profound slumbers ; but these, residing as it
were in a torrid zone, are always alert and merry, — a good
Christmas fire is to them like the heats of the dog-days.
Though they are frequently heard by day, yet is their natural
time of motion only in the night. As soon as it grows dusk, the
chirping increases, and they come running forth, and are from
the size of a flea to that of their full stature. As one should
suppose, from the burning atmosphere which they inhabit,
they are a thirsty race, and show a great propensity for liquids,
being found frequently drowned in pans of water, milk, broth,
or the like. Whatever is moist they affect ; and therefore often
gnaw holes in wet woollen stockings and aprons that are hung
to the fire : they are the housewife's barometer, foretelling her
when it will rain, and are prognostic sometimes, she thinks, of
ill or good luck, of the death of a near relation, or the approach
of an absent lover. By being the constant companions of her
solitary hours they naturally become the objects of her super-
stition. These crickets are not only very thirsty, but very
voracious; for they will eat the scummings of pots, and yeast,
salt, and crumbs of bread, and any kitchen offal or sweepings.

204 WHITE

In the summer we have observed them to fly, when it became
dusk, out of the windows and over the neighboring roofs. This
feat of activity accounts for the sudden manner in which they
often leave their haunts, as it does for the method by which
they come to houses where they were not known before. It
is remarkable that many sorts of insects seem never to use
their wings but when they have a mind to shift their quarters
and settle new colonies. When in the air they move "volatti
nndoso," in waves or curves, like woodpeckers, opening and
shutting their wings at every stroke, and so are always rising
or sinking.

When they increase to a great degree, as they did once in
the house where I am now writing, they become noisome pests,
flying into the candles, and dashing into people's faces ; but
may be blasted and destroyed by gunpowder discharged into
their crevices and crannies. In families at such times they
are like Pharaoh's plague of frogs, — " in their bedchambers,
and upon their beds, and in their ovens, and in their kneading
troughs." 1 Their shrilling noise is occasioned by a brisk attri-
tion of their wings. Cats catch hearth-crickets, and, playing
with them as they do with mice, devour them. Crickets may
be destroyed, like wasps, by phials half filled with beer, or any
liquid, and set in their haunts ; for being always eager to drink,
they will crowd in till the bottles are full.

Note
1 Exod. viii. 3. — G. W.

LETTER XLVIII

Selborne.

How diversified are the modes of life not only of incongru-
ous but even of congenerous animals ; and yet their specific
distinctions are not more various than their propensities.
Thus, while the field-cricket delights in sunny, dry banks, and
the house-cricket rejoices amidst the glowing heat of the
kitchen hearth or oven, the Gryllns gryllo talpa (the mole-
cricket) haunts moist meadows and frequents the sides of

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 20$

ponds and banks of streams, performing all its functions in a
swampy, wet soil. With a pair of fore-feet, curiously adapted
to the purpose, it burrows and works under ground like the
mole, raising a ridge as it proceeds, but seldom throwing up
hillocks.

As mole-crickets often infest gardens by the sides of canals,
they are unwelcome guests to the gardener, raising up ridges
in their subterraneous progress, and rendering the walks
unsightly. If they take to the kitchen quarters they occasion
great damage among the plants and roots by destroying whole
beds of cabbages, young legumes, and flowers. When dug
out they seem very slow and helpless, and make no use of
their wings by day ; but at night they come abroad, and make
long excursions, as I have been convinced by finding stragglers,
in a morning, in improbable places. In fine weather, about
the middle of April, and just at the close of day, they begin
to solace themselves with a low, dull, jarring note, continued
for a long time without interruption, and not unlike the chat-
tering of the fern-owl, or goat-sucker, but more inward.

About the beginning of May they lay their eggs, as I was
once an eye-witness ; for a gardener at a house where I was on a
visit, happening to be mowing, on the 6th of that month, by the
side of a canal, his scythe struck too deep, pared off a large
piece of turf, and laid open to viev/ a curious scene of domestic
economy : —

. . . " Ingentem lato dedit ore fenestram :
Apparet domus intus, et atria longa patescunt :
Apparent . . . penetralia."

There were many caverns and winding passages leading to
a kind of chamber, neatly smoothed and rounded, and about
the size of a moderate snuff-box. Within this secret nursery
were deposited near a hundred eggs of a dirty yellow color,
and enveloped in a tough skin, but too lately excluded to con-
tain any rudiments of young, being full of a viscous substance.
The eggs lay but shallow, and within the influence of the sun,
just under a little heap of fresh-mowed mould, like that which
is raised by ants.

When mole-crickets fly they move ''ciirsu tindoso^' rising

206 WHITE

and falling in curves, like the other species mentioned before.

In different parts of this kingdom people call them fen-crickets,

churr-worms, and eve-churrs, all very apposite names.

Anatomists who have examined the intestines of these

insects astonish me with their accounts; for they say that,

from the structure, position, and number of their stomachs, or

maws there seems to be good reason to suppose that this and

the two former species ruminate or chew the cud like many

quadrupeds ! ^

Note

^ The use of this peculiar formation of the stomach of the cricket (and
the locust has the same peculiarity) is not yet clear to naturalists, but it
seems quite clear that it does not chew the cud, and that it would be impos-
sible for the food to be returned for that purpose. — G. C. D.

LETTER XLIX

Selborne, May yth, 1779.

It is now more than forty years that I have paid some atten-
tion to the ornithology of this district, without being able to
exhaust the subject : new occurrences still arise as long as any
inquiries are kept alive.

In the last week of last month five of those most rare birds,
too uncommon to have obtained an English name, but known
to naturalists by the terms of hiniantopiis, or loi'ipes, and chara-
drius Jiimantopiis} were shot upon the verge of Frinsham Pond,
a large lake belonging to the Bishop of Winchester, and lying
between Wolmer Forest and the town of Farnham, in the county
of Surrey. The pond-keeper says there were three brace in
the flock : but, that after he had satisfied his curiosity, he suf-
fered the sixth to remain unmolested. One of these specimens
I procured, and found the length of the legs to be so extraor-
dinary, that, at first sight, one might have supposed the shanks
had been fastened on to impose on the credulity of the beholder :
they were legs in caricatiira ; and had we seen such proportions
on a Chinese or Japan screen we should have made large allow-
ances for the fancy of the draughtsman. These birds are of
the plover family, and might with propriety be called the stilt

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 20/

plovers. Brisson, under that idea, gives them the apposite
name of I'echasse. My specimen, when drawn and stuffed with
pepper, weighed only four ounces and a quarter, though the
naked part of the thigh measured three inches and a half, and
the legs four inches and a half. Hence we may safely assert
that these birds exhibit, weight for inches, incomparably the
greatest length of legs of any known bird. The flamingo, for
instance, is one of the most long-legged birds, and yet it bears
no manner of proportion to the himantopus ; for a cock flamingo
weighs, at an average, about four pounds avoirdupois ; and his
legs and thighs measure usually about twenty inches. But four
pounds are fifteen times and a fraction more than four ounces
and one quarter ; and if four ounces and a quarter have eight
inches of legs, four pounds must have one hundred and twenty
inches and a fraction of legs, viz., somewhat more than ten
feet ; such a monstrous proportion as the world never saw !
If you should try the experiment in still larger birds the dis-
parity would still increase. It must be matter of great curi-
osity to see the stilt plover move ; to observe how it can wield
such a length of lever with such feeble muscles as the thighs
seem to be furnished with. At best one should expect it to be
but a bad walker : but what adds to the wonder is that it has
no back toe. Now without that steady prop to support its steps
it must be liable, in speculation, to perpetual vacillations, and
seldom able to preserve the true centre of gravity.

The old name of himantopus is taken from Pliny ; and, by
an awkward metaphor, implies that the legs are as slender and
pliant as if cut out of a thong of leather. Neither Willughby
nor Ray, in all their curious researches, either at home or
abroad, ever saw this bird. Mr. Pennant never met with it in
all Great Britain, but observed it often in the cabinets of the
curious at Paris. Hasselquist says that it migrates to Egypt
in the autumn : and a most accurate observer of nature has
assured me that he has found it on the banks of the streams
in Andalusia.

Our writers record it to have been found only twice in Great
Britain. From all these relations it plainly appears that these
long-legged plovers are birds of south Europe, and rarely visit
our island ; and when they do, are wanderers and stragglers,

208 WHITE

and impelled to make so distant and northern an excursion from
motives or accidents for which we are not able to account.
One thing may fairly be deduced, that these birds come over
to us from the continent, since nobody can suppose that a
species not noticed once in an age, and of such a remarkable
make, can constantly breed unobserved in this kingdom.

Note

1 The bird referred to is the black-winged stilt, which is only an occa-
sional visitant in England. — G. C. D.

LETTER L

Selborne, April 21st, 1780.

Dear Sir, — The old Sussex tortoise, that I have mentioned
to you so often, is become my property. I dug it out of its
winter dormitory in March last, when it was enough awakened
to express its resentments by hissing ; and, packing it in a box
with earth, carried it eighty miles in post-chaises. The rattle
and hurry of the journey so perfectly roused it that, when I
turned it out on a border, it walked twice down to the bottom
of my garden; however, in the evening, the weather being cold,
it buried itself in the loose mould, and continues still concealed.

As it will be under my eye, I shall now have an opportunity
of enlarging my observations on its mode of life and propen-
sities ; and perceive already that, towards the time of coming
forth, it opens a breathing place in the ground near its head,
requiring, I conclude, a freer respiration as it becomes more
alive. This creature not only goes under the earth from the
middle of November to the middle of April, but sleeps great
part of the summer : for it goes to bed in the longest days at
four in the afternoon, and often does not stir in the morning
till late. Besides, it retires to rest for every shower ; and does
not move at all in wet days.

When one reflects on the state of this strange being, it is a
matter of wonder to find that Providence should bestow such
a profusion of days, such a seeming waste of longevity, on a
reptile that appears to relish it so little as to squander more

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 209

than two-thirds of its existence in a joyless stupor, and be lost
to all sensation for months together in the profoundest of
slumbers.

While I was writing this letter, a moist and warm afternoon,
with the thermometer at 50°, brought forth troops of shell-
snails ; and, at the same juncture, the tortoise heaved up the
mould and put out its head; and the next morning came forth,
as it were, raised from the dead; and walked about till four in
the afternoon. This was a curious coincidence ! a very amusing
occurrence ! to see such a similarity of feelings between the
two (})ep€OLKoi ! for so the Greeks called both the shell-snail and
the tortoise.

Summer birds are, this cold and backward spring, un-
usually late : I have seen but one swallow yet. This con-
formity with the weather convinces me more and more that
they sleep in the winter.

LETTER LI

Selborne, Sept. yd, 1781.

I HAVE now read your miscellanies through with much care
and satisfaction ; and am to return you my best thanks for
the honorable mention made in them of me as a naturalist,
which I wish I may deserve.

In some former letters I expressed my suspicions that many
of the house-martins do not depart in the winter far from this
village. I therefore determined to make some search about
the south-east end of the hill, where I imagined they might
slumber out the uncomfortable months of winter. But sup-
posing that the examination would be made to the best
advantage in the spring, and observing that no martins had
appeared by the nth April last, on that day I employed
some men to explore the shrubs and cavities of the suspected
spot. The persons took pains, but without any success;
however, a remarkable incident occurred in the midst of our
pursuit : while the laborers were at work a house-martin, the
first that had been seen this year, came down the village in
the sight of several people, and went at once into a nest,
15

210 WHITE

where it stayed a short time, and then flew over the houses ;
for some days after no martins were observed, not till the
i6th April, and then only a pair. Martins in general were
remarkably late this year.

LETTER LII

Selborne, Sept. gth, 1781.

I HAVE just met with a circumstance respecting swifts,
which furnishes an exception to the whole tenor of my
observations ever since I have bestowed any attention on that
species of hirundines. Our swifts, in general, withdrew this
year about the first day of August, all save one pair, which
in two or three days was reduced to a single bird. The
perseverance of this individual made me suspect that the
strongest of motives, that of an attachment to her young, could
alone occasion so late a stay. I watched therefore till the
24th August, and then discovered that, under the eaves of
the church, she attended upon two young, which were fledged,
and now put out their white chins from a crevice. These
remained till the 27th, looking more alert every day, and
seeming to long to be on the wing. After this day they
were missing at once ; nor could I ever observe them with
their dam coursing round the church in the act of learning to
fly, as the first broods evidently do. On the 31st I caused
the eaves to be searched, but we found in the nest only two
callow, dead, stinking swifts, on which a second nest had been
formed. This double nest was full of the black shining cases
of the hippobosccB Jih'imdinis.

The following remarks on this unusual incident are obvious.
The first is, that though it may be disagreeable to swifts to
remain beyond the beginning of August, yet that they can
subsist longer is undeniable. The second is, that this un-
common event, as it was owing to the loss of the first brood,
so it corroborates my former remark, that swifts breed
regularly but once ; since, was the contrary the case, the
occurrence above could neither be new nor rare.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 211

P.S. — One swift was seen at Lyndon, in the county of
Rutland, in 1782, so late as the 3rd September.

LETTER LIII

As I have sometimes known you make inquiries about sev-
eral kinds of insects, I shall here send you an account of one
sort which I little expected to have found in this kingdom.
I had often observed that one particular part of a vine grow-
ing on the walls of my house was covered in the autumn with
a black, dust-like appearance, on which the flies fed eagerly ;
and that the shoots and leaves thus affected did not thrive ;
nor did the fruit ripen. To this substance I applied my glasses ;
but could not discover that it had anything to do with animal
life, as I at first expected : but, upon a closer examination
behind the larger boughs, we were surprised to find that they
were coated over with husky shells, from whose sides pro-
ceeded a cotton-like substance, surrounding a multitude of
eggs. This curious and uncommon production put me upon
recollecting what I have heard and read concerning the coccus
vitis vinifei'ce of Linnaeus, which, in the south of Europe,
infests many vines, and is a horrid and loathsome pest. As
soon as I had turned to the accounts given of this insect, I
saw at once that it swarmed on my vine ; and did not appear
to have been at all checked by the preceding winter, which
had been uncommonly severe.

Not being then at all aware that it had anything to do with
England, I was much inclined to think that it came from
Gibraltar among the many boxes and packages of plants and
birds which I had formerly received from thence ; and espe-
cially as the vine infested grew immediately under my study
window, where I usually kept my specimens. True it is that
I had received nothing from thence for some years : but as
insects, we know, are conveyed from one country to another
in a very unexpected manner, and have a wonderful power of
maintaining their existence till they fall into a nidus proper
for their support and increase, I cannot but suspect still that

212 WHITE

these cocci came to me originally from Andalusia. Yet, all
the while, candor obliges me to confess that Mr. Lightfoot
has written me word that he once, and but once, saw these
insects on a vine at Weymouth in Dorsetshire ; which, it is
here to be observed, is a seaport town to which the coccus
might be conveyed by shipping.

As many of my readers may possibly never have heard of
this strange and unusual insect, I shall here transcribe a pas-
sage from a natural history of Gibraltar, written by the Rev-
erend John White, late vicar of Blackburn in Lancashire, but
not yet published : —

" In the year 1770 a vine, which grew on the east side of
my house, and which had produced the finest crops of grapes
for years past, was suddenly overspread on all the woody
branches with large lumps of a white fibrous substance re-
sembling spiders' webs, or rather raw cotton. It was of a
very clammy quality, sticking fast to everything that touched
it, and capable of being spun into long threads. At first I
suspected it to be the product of spiders, but could find none.
Nothing was to be seen connected with it but many brown
oval husky shells, which by no means looked like insects, but
rather resembled bits of the dry bark of the vine. The tree
had a plentiful crop of grapes set, when this pest appeared
upon it; but the fruit was manifestly injured by this foul en-
cumbrance. It remained all the summer, still increasing, and
loaded the woody and bearing branches to a vast degree. I
often pulled off great quantities by handf uls ; but it was so
slimy and tenacious that it could by no means be cleared.
The grapes never filled to their natural perfection, but turned
watery and vapid. Upon perusing the works afterwards of
M. de Reaumur, I found this matter perfectly described and
accounted for. Those husky shells, which I had observed,
were no other than the female coccus, from whose side this
cotton-like substance exudes, and serves as a covering and
security for their eggs."

To this account I think proper to add that, though the
female cocci are stationary, and seldom remove from the place
to which they stick, yet the male is a winged insect ; and that
the black dust which I saw was undoubtedly the excrement

Hrom coll. Mr. F Kaempttfr.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 213

of the females, which is eaten by ants as well as flies. Though
the utmost severity of our winter did not destroy these insects,
yet the attention of the gardener in a summer or two has
entirely relieved my vine from this filthy annoyance.

As we have remarked above that insects are often conveyed
from one country to another in a very unaccountable manner,
I shall here mention an emigration of small aphides, which was
observed in the village of Selborne no longer ago than August
1st, 1785.

About three o'clock in the afternoon of that day, v*^hich was
very hot, the people of this village were surprised by a shower
of aphides, or smother-flies, which fell in these parts. Those
that were walking in the street at that juncture found them-
selves covered with these insects, which settled also on the
hedges and gardens, blackening all the vegetables where they
alighted. My annuals were discolored with them, and the
stalks of a bed of onions were quite coated over for six days
after. These armies were then, no doubt, in a state of emi-
gration, and shifting their quarters ; and might have come,
as far as we know, from the great hop plantations of Kent or
Sussex, the wind being all that day in the easterly quarter.
They were observed at the same time in great clouds about
Farnham, and all along the vale from Farnham to Alton.

LETTER LIV

Dear Sir, — When I happen to visit a family where gold
and silver fishes are kept in a glass bowl, I am always pleased
with the occurrence, because it offers me an opportunity of
observing the actions and propensities of those beings with
whom we can be little acquainted in their natural state. Not
long since I spent a fortnight at the house of a friend where
there was such a vivary, to which I paid no small attention,
taking every occasion to remark what passed within its narrow
limits. It was here that I first observed the manner in which
fishes die.^ As soon as the creature sickens, the head sinks
lower and lower, and it stands as it were on its head ; till, get-

214 WHITE

ting weaker, and losing all poise, the tail turns over, and at last
it floats on the surface of the water with its belly uppermost.
The reason why fishes, when dead, swim in that manner is very
obvious ; because, when the body is no longer balanced by the
fins of the belly, the broad muscular back preponderates by
its own gravity, and turns the belly uppermost, as lighter from
its being a cavity, and because it contains the swimming-
bladders, which contribute to render it buoyant. Some that
delight in gold and silver fishes have adopted a notion that they
need no aliment. True it is that they will subsist for a long
time without any apparent food but what they can collect from
pure water frequently changed ; yet they must draw some sup-
port from animalcula, and other nourishment supplied by the
water; because, though they seem to eat nothing, yet the con-
sequences of eating often drop from them. That they are best
pleased with suchj'ejune diet may easily be confuted, since if you
toss them crumbs they will seize them with great readiness, not
to say greediness ; however, bread should be given sparingly,
lest, turning sour, it corrupt the water. They will also feed on the
water-plant called Lemna (ducks' meat), and also on small fry.^

When they want to move a little, they gently protrude them-
selves with their Pinncs pectorales ; but it is with their strong
muscular tails only that they and all fishes shoot along with
such inconceivable rapidity. It has been said that the eyes
of fishes are immovable ; but these apparently turn them for-
ward or backward in their sockets as occasions require. They
take little notice of a lighted candle, though applied close to
their heads, but flounce and seem much frightened by a sudden
stroke of the hand against the support whereon the bowl is
hung; especially when they have been motionless, and are
perhaps asleep. As fishes have no eyelids, it is not easy to
discern when they are sleeping or not, because their eyes are
always open.

Nothing can be more amusing than a glass bowl containing
such fishes ; the double refractions of the glass and water rep-
resent them, when moving, in a shifting and changeable vari-
ety of dimensions, shades, and colors ; while the two mediums,
assisted by the concavo-convex shape of the vessel, magnify
and distort them vastly ; not to mention that the introduction

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 21 5

of another element and its inhabitants into our parlors engages
the fancy in a very agreeable manner.

Gold and silver fishes, though originally natives of China
and Japan, yet are become so well reconciled to our climate
as to thrive and multiply very fast in our ponds and stews.
Linnaeus ranks this species of fish under the genus of Cypri-
7ms, or carp, and calls it Cyprhuis auratiis.

Some people exhibit this sort of fish in a very fanciful
way ; for they cause a glass bowl to be blown with a large
hollow space within, that does not communicate with it. In
this cavity they put a bird occasionally ; so that you may see
a goldfinch or a linnet hopping as it were in the midst of the
water, and the fishes swimming in a circle round it. The
simple exhibition of the fishes is agreeable and pleasant ; but
in so complicated a way becomes whimsical and unnatural,
and liable to the objection due to him,

"Qui variare cupit rem prodigialit^r unam."

I am, etc.

Notes

1 Only fish which are very heavy in the head and shoulders die in the
way described by White. Other fish, such as trout, swim with their noses
at the surface of the water, standing on their tails, as it were, until they
turn, bellies up, and die. — G. C. D.

2 In favorable waters the goldfish breeds very fast, and grows to a large
size. I know a small pond which is kept warm by waste water from the
boilers of an adjoining paper-mill, where these fish are in incredible num-
bers for so small a space, and grow to four or five pounds in weight.

LETTER LV

October loth, 1781.

Dear Sir, — I think I have observed before that much of
the most considerable part of the house-martins withdraw
from hence about the first week in October ; but that some,
the latter broods I am now convinced, linger on till towards
the middle of that month ; and that at times, once perhaps
in two or three years, a flight, for one day only, has shown
itself in the first week in November.

Having taken notice, in October 1780, that the last flight

2l6 WHITE

was numerous, amounting perhaps to one hundred and fifty ;
and that the season was soft and still ; I was resolved to pay
uncommon attention to these late birds ; to find, if possible,
where they roosted, and to determine the precise time of
their retreat. The mode of life of these latter hirundines is
very favorable to such a design ; for they spend the whole
day in the sheltered district, between me and the Hanger,
sailing about in a placid, easy manner, and feasting on those
insects which love to haunt a spot so secure from ruflfling
winds. As my principal object was to discover the place of
their roosting, I took care to wait on them before they re-
tired to rest, and was much pleased to find that for several
evenings together, just at a quarter past five in the afternoon,
they all scudded away in great haste towards the south-east,
and darted down among the low shrubs above the cottages
at the end of the hill. This spot in many respects seemed
to be well calculated for their winter residence ; for in many
parts it is as steep as the roof of any house, and therefore
secure from the annoyances of water; and it is moreover
clothed with beechen shrubs, which, being stunted and bitten
by sheep, make the thickest covert imaginable ; and are so
entangled as to be impervious to the smallest spaniel ; be-
sides, it is the nature of underwood beech never to cast its
leaf all the winter ; so that, with the leaves on the ground and
those on the twigs, no shelter can be more complete. I watched
them on the 13th and 14th October, and found their evening
retreat was exact and uniform ; but after this they made no
regular appearance. Now and then a straggler was seen; and
on the 22nd October, I observed two in the morning over the
village, and with them my remarks for the season ended.

From all these circumstances put together, it is more than
probable that this lingering flight, at so late a season of the
year, never departed from the island. Had they indulged
me that autumn with a November visit, as I much desired, I
presume that, with proper assistants, I should have settled
the matter past all doubt ; but though the 3rd November was
a sweet day, and in appearance exactly suited to my wishes,
yet not a martin was to be seen ; and so I was forced, re-
luctantly, to give up the pursuit.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 217

I have only to add that were the bushes, which cover some
acres, and are not my own property, to be grubbed and care-
fully examined, probably those late broods, and perhaps the
whole aggregate body of the house-martins of this district,
might be found there, in different secret dormitories ; and that,
so far from withdrawing into warmer climes, it would appear
that they never depart three hundred yards from the village.

LETTER LVI

They who write on natural history cannot too frequently
advert to instinct, that wonderful limited faculty, which in
some instances raises the brute creation, as it were, above
reason, and in others leaves them so far below it. Philoso-
phers have defined instinct to be that secret influence by which
every species is compelled naturally to pursue, at all times, the
same way or track, without any teaching or example ; whereas
reason, without instruction, would often vary and do that by
many methods which instinct effects by one alone. Now this
maxim must be taken in a qualified sense ; for there are in-
stances in which instinct does vary and conform to the circum-
stances of place and convenience.

It has been remarked that every species of bird has a mode
of nidification peculiar to itself, so that a school-boy would at
once pronounce on the sort of nest before him. This is the
case among fields and woods and wilds ; but in the villages
round London, where mosses and gossamer, and cotton from
vegetables, are hardly to be found, the nest of the chaffinch
has not that elegant finished appearance, nor is it so beauti-
fully studded with lichens, as in a more rural district ; and the
wren is obliged to construct its house with straws and dry
grasses, which do not give it that rotundity and compactness
so remarkable in the edifices of that little architect. Again, the
regular nest of the house-martin is hemispheric ; but where a
rafter, or a joist, or a cornice, may happen to stand in the way,
the nest is so contrived as to conform to the obstruction, and
becomes fiat, or compressed.

2l8 WHITE

In the following instances instinct is perfectly uniform and
consistent. There are three creatures, the squirrel, the field-
mouse, and the bird called the nuthatch {sitta EuropcBci), which
live much on hazel-nuts ; and yet they open them each in a
different way. The first, after rasping off the small end, splits
the shell in two with his long fore-teeth, as a man does with
his knife ; the second nibbles a hole with his teeth, so regular
as if drilled with a wimble, and yet so small that one could
wonder how the kernel can be extracted through it ; while the
last picks an irregular ragged hole with its bill : but as this
artist has no paws to hold the nut firm while he pierces it, like
an adroit workman he fixes it, as it were, in a vice, in some
cleft of a tree, or in some crevice ; when standing over it, he
perforates the stubborn shell. We have often placed nuts in
the chink of a gate-post where nuthatches have been known
to haunt, and have always found that those birds have readily
penetrated them. While at work they make a rapping noise
that may be heard at a considerable distance.

You that understand both the theory and practical part of
music may best inform us why harmony or melody should so
strangely assist some men, as it were by recollection, for days
after the concert is over. What I mean the following passage
will most readily explain : —

" Praehabebat porro vocibus humanis, instrumentisque har-
monicis musicam illam avium : non quod alia quoque non
delectaretur : sed quod ex musica humana relinqueretur in
animo continens quaedam, attentionemque et somnum contur-
bans agitatio ; dum ascensus, exscensus, tenores, ac mutationes
illae sonorum, etconsonantiarum euntque, redeuntque per phan-
tasiam : — cum nihil tale relinqui possit ex modulationibus
avium, quae, quod non sunt perinde a nobis imitabiles, non
possunt perinde internam facultatem commovere." — Gassen-
dus in Vita Peireskii.

This curious quotation strikes me much by so well repre-
senting my own case, and by describing what I have so often
felt but never could so well express. When I hear fine music
I am haunted with passages therefrom night and day ; and
especially at first waking, which, by their importunity, give me
more uneasiness than pleasure ; elegant lessons still tease my

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 219

imagination, and recur irresistibly to my recollection at seasons,

and eve

matters.

and even when I am desirous of thinking of more serious

I am, etc.

LETTER LVII

A RARE, and I think a new, little bird frequents my gar-
den, which I have great reason to think is the pettichaps : it
is common in some parts of the kingdom ; and I have received
formerly several dead specimens from Gibraltar. This bird
much resembles the whitethroat, but has a more white, or rather
silvery breast and belly; is restless and active, like the willow-
wrens, and hops from bough to bough, examining every part
for food; it also runs up the stems of the crown-imperials, and,
putting its head into the bells of those flowers, sips the liquor
which stands in the nectarium of each petal. Sometimes it
feeds on the ground like the hedge-sparrow, by hopping about
on the grass-plots and mown walks.^

One of my neighbors, an intelligent and observing man,
informs me that, in the beginning of May and about ten min-
utes before eight o'clock in the evening, he discovered a great
cluster of house-swallows, thirty, at least, he supposes, perch-
ing on a willow that hung over the verge of James Knight's
upper pond. His attention was first drawn by the twittering
of these birds, which sat motionless in a row on the bough,
with their heads all one way, and, by their weight, pressing
down the twig so that it nearly touched the water. In this
situation he watched them till he could see no longer. Re-
peated accounts of this sort, spring and fall, induce us greatly
to suspect that house-swallows have some strong attachment
to water, independent of the matter of food ; and, though they
may not retire into that element, yet they may conceal them-
selves in the banks of pools and rivers during the uncomfort-
able months of winter.

One of the keepers of Wolmer Forest sent me a peregrine-
falcon, which he shot on the verge of that district as it was
devouring a wood-pigeon. The falco peregriniis, or haggard-
falcon, is a noble species of hawk seldom seen in the southern

220 WHITE

counties. In winter 1767, one was killed in the neighboring
parish of Farringdon, and sent by me to Mr. Pennant into
North Wales.2 Since that time I have met with none till now.
The specimen mentioned above was in fine preservation, and
not injured by the shot : it measured forty-two inches from
wing to wing, and twenty-one from beak to tail, and weighed
two pounds and a half standing weight. This species is very
robust, and wonderfully formed for rapine ; its breast was
plump and muscular ; its thighs long, thick, and brawny ; and
its legs remarkably short and well set : the feet were armed
with most formidable, sharp, long talons : the eyelids and cere
of the bill were yellow ; but the irides of the eyes dusky ; the
beak was thick and hooked, and of a dark color, and had a
jagged process near the end of the upper mandible on each
side : its tail, or train, was short in proportion to the bulk of
its body ; yet the wings, when closed, did not extend to the
end of the train. From its large and fair proportions it might
be supposed to have been a female ; but I was not permitted
to cut open the specimen.^ For one of the birds of prey, which
are usually lean, this was in high case : in its craw were many
barleycorns, which probably came from the crop of the wood-
pigeon on which it was feeding when shot; for voracious birds
do not eat grain, but, when devouring their quarry, with undis-
tinguishing vehemence swallow bones and feathers, and all
matters, indiscriminately. This falcon was probably driven
from the mountains of North Wales or Scotland, where they
are known to breed, by rigorous weather and deep snows that
had lately fallen.

I am, etc.

Notes

1 The pettichaps is more usually known by the name of the garden war-
bler, but White's description is more like the lesser whitethroat, which is
peculiarly restless and active, and has a very silvery breast and belly. —
G. C. D.

2 See my tenth and eleventh letter to that gentleman. — G. W.

' Of the hawk tribe, the female is always the larger, stronger, and hand-
somer bird ; the reverse being the rule among those birds which are not
birds of prey. — G. C. D.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 221

LETTER LVIII

My near neighbor, a young gentleman in the service of the
East India Company, has brought home a dog and a bitch of
the Chinese breed from Canton, such as are fattened in that
country for the purpose of being eaten : they are about the
size of a moderate spaniel ; of a pale yellow color, with coarse
bristling hairs on their backs ; sharp upright ears, and peaked
heads, which give them a very fox-like appearance. Their
hind-legs are unusually straight, without any bend at the hock
or ham, to such a degree as to give them an awkward gait
when they trot. When they are in motion their tails are
curved high over their backs like those of some hounds, and
have a bare place each on the outside from the tip midway,
that does not seem to be matter of accident, but somewhat
singular. Their eyes are jet-black, small, and piercing ; the
insides of their lips and mouths of the same color, and their
tongues blue. The bitch has a dew-claw on each hind leg ;
the dog has none. When taken out into a field the bitch
showed some disposition for hunting, and dwelt on the scent
of a covey of partridges till she sprung them, giving her
tongue all the time. The dogs in South America are dumb;
but these bark much in a short thick manner like foxes, and
have a surly, savage demeanor like their ancestors, which are
not domesticated, but bred up in sties, where they are fed for
the table with rice-meal and other farinaceous food. These
dogs, having been taken on board as soon as weaned, could
not learn much from their dam ; yet they did not relish flesh
when they came to England. In the islands of the Pacific
Ocean the dogs are bred upon vegetables, and would not eat
flesh when offered them by our circumnavigators.

We believe that all dogs, in a state of nature, have sharp, up-
right, fox-like ears ; and that hanging ears, which are esteemed
so graceful, are the effect of choice breeding and cultivation.
Thus, in the " Travels of Ysbrandt Ides from Muscovy to
China," the dogs which draw the Tartars on snow-sledges,
near the river Oby, are engraved with prick ears, like those
from Canton. The Kamschatdales also train the same sort

222 WHITE

of sharp-eared, peak-nosed dogs to draw their sledges ; as
may be seen in an elegant print engraved for Captain Cook's
last voyage round the world.

Now we are upon the subject of dogs, it may not be imper-
tinent to add that spaniels, as all sportsmen know, though they
hunt partridges and pheasants as it were by instinct, and with
much delight and alacrity, yet will hardly touch their bones
when offered as food ; nor will a mongrel dog of my own,
though he is remarkable for finding that sort of game. But,
when we came to offer the bones of partridges to the two
Chinese dogs, they devoured them with much greediness, and
licked the platter clean.

No sporting dogs will flush woodcocks till inured to the scent
and trained to the sport, which they then pursue with vehe-
mence and transport ; but then they will not touch their bones,
but turn from them with abhorrence, even when they are
hungry.

Now, that dogs should not be fond of the bones of such
birds as they are not disposed to hunt is no wonder ; but why
they reject and do not care to eat their natural game is not
so easily accounted for, since the end of hunting seems to be,
that the chase pursued should be eaten. Dogs again will not
devour the more rancid water-fowls, nor indeed the bones of
any wild fowls ; nor will they touch the fetid bodies of birds
that feed on offal and garbage ; and indeed there may be
somewhat of providential instinct in this circumstance of dis-
like ; for vultures,^ and kites, and ravens, and crows, etc., were
intended to be messmates with dogs ^ over their carrion ; and
seem to be appointed by nature as fellow-scavengers to re-
move all cadaverous nuisances from the face of the earth.

I am, etc.
Notes

^ Hasselquist, in his travels to the Levant, observes that the dogs and
vultures at Grand Cairo maintain such a friendly intercourse as to bring up
their young together in the same place. — G. W.

2 The Chinese word for a dog to a European ear sounds like qiiihloh. —
G. W.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 223

LETTER LIX

The fossil wood buried in the bogs of Wolmer Forest is not
yet all exhausted ; for the peat-cutters now and then stumble
upon a log. I have just seen a piece which was sent by a
laborer of Oakhanger to a carpenter of this village ; this was
the butt end of a small oak, about five feet long, and about
five inches in diameter. It had apparently been severed from
the ground by an axe, was very ponderous, and as black as
ebony. Upon asking the carpenter for what purpose he had
procured it, he told me that it was to be sent to his brother,
a joiner at Farnham, who was to make use of it in cabinet-
work, by inlaying it along with whiter woods.

Those that are much abroad on evenings after it is dark, in
spring and summer, frequently hear a nocturnal bird passing
by on the wing, and repeating often a short, quick note. This
bird I have remarked myself, but never could make out till
lately. I am assured now that it is the stone-curlew {chara-
drius cedicneinus). Some of them pass over or near my house
almost every evening after it is dark, from the uplands of
the hill and North Fields, away down towards Dorton, where,
among the streams and meadows, they find a greater plenty
of food. Birds that fly by night are obliged to be noisy; their
notes often repeated become signals or watchwords to keep
them together, that they may not stray or lose each other in
the dark.

The evening proceedings and manoeuvres of the rooks are
curious and amusing in the autumn. Just before dusk they
return in long strings from the foraging of the day, and ren-
dezvous by thousands over Selborne Down, where they wheel
round in the air, and sport and dive in a playful manner, all
the while exerting their voices, and making a loud cawing,
which, being blended and softened by the distance that we
at the village are below them, becomes a confused noise or
chiding ; or rather a pleasing murmur, very engaging to the
imagination, and not unlike the cry of a pack of hounds in
hollow, echoing woods, or the rushing of the wind in tall trees,
or the tumbling of the tide upon a pebbly shore. When this

224 WHITE

ceremony is over, with the last gleam of day, they retire for
the night to the deep beechen woods of Tisted and Ropley.
We remember a little girl who, as she was going to bed, used
to remark on such an occurrence, in the true spirit of physico-
theology, that the rooks were saying their prayers ; and yet
this child was much too young to be aware that the Scriptures
have said of the Deity — that " He f eedeth the ravens who
call upon Him." I am, etc.

LETTER LX

In reading Dr. Huxam's " Observationes de Aere," etc.,
written at Plymouth, I find by those curious and accurate
remarks, which contain an account of the weather from the
year 1727 to the year 1748, inclusive, that though there is
frequent rain in that district of Devonshire, yet the quantity
falling is not great; and that some years it has been very small:
for in 1731 the rain measured only 17.266 in.; and in 1741,
20.354 in. ; ai^d again, in 1743, only 20.908 in. Places near
the sea have frequent scuds, that keep the atmosphere moist,
yet do not reach far up into the country ; making thus the
maritime situations appear wet, when the rain is not consider-
able. In the wettest years at Plymouth the Doctor measured
only once 36; and again once, viz., 1734, 37.114 in. — a
quantity of rain that has twice been exceeded at Selborne in
the short period of my observations. Dr. Huxam remarks
that frequent small rains keep the air moist ; while heavy ones
render it more dry by beating down the vapors. He is also
of opinion that the dingy, smoky appearance in the sky, in
very dry seasons, arises from the want of moisture sufficient
to let the light through, and render the atmosphere trans-
parent ; because he had observed several bodies more diapha-
nous when wet than dry ; and did never recollect that the air
had that look in rainy seasons.

My friend, who lives just beyond the top of the Down,
brought his three swivel guns to try them in my outlet, with
their muzzles towards the Hanger, supposing that the report
would have had a great effect; but the experiment did not

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 22$

answer his expectation. He then removed them to the alcove
on the Hanger, when the sound, rushing along the Lith and
Comb Wood, was very grand ; but it was at the hermitage that
the echoes and repercussions delighted the hearers ; not only-
filling the Lith with the roar, as if all the beeches were tear-
ing up by the roots ; but, turning to the left, they pervaded the
vale above Comb Wood ponds ; and after a pause seemed to take
up the crash again, and to extend round Harteley Hangers, and
to die away at last among the coppices and coverts of Ward le
Ham. It has been remarked before that this district is an
Anathoth, a place of responses or echoes, and therefore proper
for such experiments : we may farther add that the pauses in
echoes, when they cease and yet are taken up again, like the
pauses in music, surprise the hearers, and have a fine effect
on the imagination.

The gentleman above-mentioned has just fixed a barometer
in his parlor at Newton Valence. The tube was first filled here
(at Selborne) twice with care, when the mercury agreed and
stood exactly with my own ; but, being filled twice again at
Newton, the mercury stood, on account of the great elevation
of that house, three-tenths of an inch lower than the barometers
at this village, and so continues to do, be the weight of the
atmosphere what it may. The plate of the barometer at
Newton is figured as low as 27; because in stormy weather
the mercury there will sometimes descend below 28. We have
supposed Newton House to stand two hundred feet higher than
this house : but if the rule holds good which says that mercury
in a barometer sinks one-tenth of an inch for every hundred
feet elevation, then the Newton barometer, by standing three-
tenths lower than that of Selborne, proves that Newton House
must be three hundred feet higher than that in which I am
writing, instead of two hundred.

It may not be impertinent to add that the barometers at
Selborne stand three-tenths of an inch lower than the barome-
ters at South Lambeth : whence we may conclude that the
former place is about three hundred feet higher than the latter ;
and with good reason, because the streams that rise with us
run into the Thames at Weybridge, and so to London. Of
course therefore there must be lower ground all the way from
16

226 WHITE

Selborne to South Lambeth ; the distance between which, all
the windings and indentings of the stream considered, cannot
be less than a hundred miles.

I am, etc.

LETTER LXI

Since the weather of a district is undoubtedly part of its
natural history, I shall make no further apology for the four
following letters, which will contain many particulars concern-
ing some of the great frosts, and a few respecting some very
hot summers, that have distinguished themselves from the rest
during the course of my observations.

As the frost in January 1768 was, for the small time it lasted,
the most severe that we had then known for many years, and
was remarkably injurious to evergreens, some account of its
rigor, and reason of its ravages, may be useful, and not unac-
ceptable to persons that delight in planting and ornamenting ;
and may particularly become a work that professes never to
lose sight of utility.

For the last two or three days of the former year there were
considerable falls of snow, which lay deep and uniform on the
ground without any drifting, wrapping up the more humble
vegetation in perfect security. From the first day to the fifth
of the new year more snow succeeded ; but from that day the
air became entirely clear ; and the heat of the sun about noon
had a considerable influence in sheltered situations.

It was in such an aspect that the snow on the author's ever-
greens was melted every day, and frozen intensely every night ;
so that the laurestines, bays, laurels, and arbutuses looked, in
three or four days, as if they had been burnt in the fire ; while
a neighbor's plantation of the same kind, in a high, cold situa-
tion, where the snow was never melted at all, remained unin-
jured.

From hence I would infer that it is the repeated melting
and freezing of the snow that is so fatal to vegetation, rather
than the severity of the cold. Therefore it highly behooves
every planter who wishes to escape the cruel mortification of

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 22/

losing in a few days the labor and hopes of years, to bestir
himself on such emergencies ; and if his plantations are small,
to avail himself of mats, cloths, pease-haum, straw, reeds, or
any such covering, for a short time ; or, if his shrubberies arc
extensive, to see that his people go about with prongs and
forks, and carefully dislodge the snow from the boughs : since
the naked foliage will shift much better for itself, than where
the snow is partly melted and frozen again.

It may perhaps appear at first like a paradox ; but doubtless
the more tender trees and shrubs should never be planted in
hot aspects ; not only for the reason assigned above, but also
because, thus circumstanced, they are disposed to shoot earlier
in the spring, and to grow on later in the autumn than they
would otherwise do, and so are sufferers by lagging or early
frosts. For this reason also plants from Siberia will hardly
endure our climate ; because, on the very first advances of
spring, they shoot away, and so are cut off by the severe nights
of March or April.

Dr. Fothergill and others have experienced the same incon-
venience with respect to the more tender shrubs from North
America, which they therefore plant under north walls. There
should also perhaps be a wall to the east to defend them from
the piercing blasts from that quarter.

This observation might without any impropriety be carried
into animal life ; for discerning bee-masters now find that their
hives should not in the winter be exposed to the hot sun,
because such unseasonable warmth awakens the inhabitants
too early from their slumbers ; and, by putting their juices into
motion too soon, subjects them afterwards to inconveniences
when rigorous weather returns.

The coincidents attending this short but intense frost were,
that the horses fell sick with an epidemic distemper, which
injured the winds of many, and killed some ; that colds and
coughs were general among the human species ; that it froze
under people's beds for several nights ; that meat was so hard
frozen that it could not be spitted, and could not be secured
but in cellars ; that several redwings and thrushes were killed
by the frost ; and that the large titmouse continued to pull
straws lengthwise from the eaves of thatched houses and barns

228 WHITE

in a most adroit manner, for a purpose that has been explained
already.

On the 3rd January, Benjamin Martin's thermometer within
doors, in a close parlor where there was no fire, fell in the
night to 20°, and on the 4th, to 18°, and on the 7th, to 17^°,
a degree of cold which the owner never since saw in the same
situation ; and he regrets much that he was not able at that
juncture to attend his instrument abroad. All this time the
wind continued north and north-east ; and yet on the 8th roost-
cocks, which had been silent, began to sound their clarions, and
crows to clamor, as prognostic of milder weather ; and, more-
over, moles began to heave and work, and a manifest thaw
took place. From the latter circumstance we may conclude
that thaws often originate under ground from warm vapors
which arise ; else how should subterraneous animals receive
such early intimations of their approach .-' Moreover, we have
often observed that cold seems to descend from above ; for,
when a thermometer hangs abroad in a frosty night, the inter-
vention of a cloud shall immediately raise the mercury 10° ;
and a clear sky shall again compel it to descend to its former
gauge.

And here it may be proper to observe, on what has been
said above, that though frosts advance to their utmost severity
by somewhat of a regular gradation, yet thaws do not usually
come on by as regular a declension of cold ; but often take
place immediately from intense freezing ; as men in sickness
often mend at once from a paroxysm.

To the great credit of Portugal laurels and American juni-
pers, be it remembered that they remained untouched amidst
the general havoc: hence men should learn to ornament chiefly
with such trees as are able to withstand accidental severities,
and not subject themselves to the vexation of a loss which may
befall them once perhaps in ten years, yet may hardly be
recovered through the whole course of their lives.^

As it appeared afterwards, the ilexes were much injured,
the cypresses were half destroyed, the arbutuses lingered on
but never recovered ; and the bays, laurestines, and laurels
were killed to the ground ; and the very wild hollies, in hot
aspects, were so much affected that they cast all their leaves.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 229

By the 14th January the snow was entirely gone ; the tur-
nips emerged not damaged at all, save in sunny places ; the
wheat looked delicately, and the garden plants were well pre-
served ; for snow is the most kindly mantle that infant vege-
tation can be wrapped in : were it not for that friendly meteor
no vegetable life could exist at all in northerly regions. Yet
in Sweden the earth in April is not divested of snow for more
than a fortnight before the face of the country is covered with
flowers.

Note

^ At the same time the snow fell so fast and in such quantity, and lay
so long, that all the thick shrubs were bent to the ground with its weight,
and unless the snow was constantly shaken off the branches they per-
ished.— G. C. D.

LETTER LXII

There were some circumstances attending the remarkable
frost in January 1776, so singular and striking, that a short
detail of them may not be unacceptable.

The most certain way to be exact will be to copy the pas-
sages from my journal, which were taken from time to time,
as things occurred. But it may be proper previously to
remark that the first week in January was uncommonly wet,
and drowned with vast rains from every quarter : from whence
may be inferred, as there is great reason to believe is the case,
that intense frosts seldom take place till the earth is perfectly
glutted and chilled with water ; ^ and hence dry autumns are
seldom followed by rigorous winters.

January 7th. — Snow driving all the day, which was followed
by frost, sleet, and some snow, till the 12th, when a prodigious
mass overwhelmed all the works of men, drifting over the tops
of the gates and filling the hollow lanes.

On the 14th the writer was obliged to be much abroad; and
thinks he never before or since has encountered such rugged
Siberian weather. Many of the narrow roads were now filled
above the tops of the hedges ; through which the snow was
driven into most romantic and grotesque shapes, so striking

23P WHITE

to the imagination as not to be seen without wonder and pleas-
ure. The poultry dared not to stir out of their roosting places;
for cocks and hens are so dazzled and confounded by the glare
of snow that they would soon perish without assistance. The
hares also lay sullenly in their seats, and would not move till
compelled by hunger ; being conscious — poor animals — that
the drifts and heaps treacherously betray their footsteps, and
prove fatal to numbers of them.

From the 14th the snow continued to increase, and began
to stop the road wagons, and coaches, which could no longer
keep on their regular stages ; and especially on the western
roads, where the fall appears to have been deeper than in
the south. The company at Bath, that wanted to attend the
Queen's birthday, were strangely incommoded : many car-
riages of persons, who got in their way to town from Bath
as far as Marlborough, after strange embarrassments, here
met with a ne phts ultra. The ladies fretted, and offered large
rewards to laborers if they would shovel them a track to Lon-
don ; but the relentless heaps of snow were too bulky to be
removed; and so the i8th passed over, leaving the company
in very uncomfortable circumstances at the Castle and other
inns.

On the 20th the sun shone out for the first time since the
frost began ; a circumstance that has been remarked before
much in favor of vegetation. All this time the cold was not
very intense, for the thermometer stood at 29°, 28°, 25°, and
thereabout; but on the 21st it descended to 20°. The birds
now began to be in a very pitiable and starving condition.
Tamed by the season, skylarks settled in the streets of towns,
because they saw the ground was bare; rooks frequented dung-
hills close to houses; and crows watched horses as they passed,
and greedily devoured what dropped from them : hares now
came into men's gardens, and, scraping away the snow, de-
voured such plants as they could find.

On the 22nd the author had occasion to go to London
through a sort of Laplandian scene, very wild and grotesque
indeed. But the metropolis itself exhibited a still more singu-
lar appearance than the country ; for, being bedded deep in
snow, the pavement of the streets could not be touched by

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 23 1

the wheels or the horses' feet, so that the carriages ran about
without the least noise. Such an exemption from din and
clatter was strange, but not pleasant ; it seemed to convey an
uncomfortable idea of desolation : —

. . . " Ipsa silentia terrent."

On the 27th much snow fell all day, and in the evening the
frost became very intense. At South Lambeth, for the four
following nights, the thermometer fell to 11°, 7°, 6°, 6° ; and
at Selborne to 7°, 6°, 10° ; and on the 31st January, just before
sunrise, with rime on the trees and on the tube of the glass,
the quicksilver sank exactly to zero, being 32° below the freez-
ing point ; but by eleven in the morning, though in the shade,
it sprang up to 16^°,^ — a most unusual degree of cold this for
the south of England ! During these four nights the cold was
so penetrating that it occasioned ice in warm chambers and
under beds ; and in the day the wind was so keen that persons
of robust constitutions could scarcely endure to face it. The
Thames was at once so frozen over both above and below the
bridge that crowds ran about on the ice. The streets were now
strangely encumbered with snow, which crumbled and trod
dusty ; and, turning gray, resembled bay-salt ; what had fallen
on the roofs was so perfectly dry that, from first to last, it lay
twenty-six days on the houses in the city : a longer time than
had been remembered by the oldest housekeepers living. Ac-
cording to all appearances we might now have expected the
continuance of this rigorous weather for weeks to come, since
every night increased in severity ; but behold, without any
apparent cause, on the ist February a thaw took place, and
some rain followed before night, making good the observation
above, that frosts often go off as it were at once, without any
gradual declension of cold. On the 2nd February the thaw
persisted ; and on the 3rd swarms of little insects were frisk-
ing and sporting in a court-yard at South Lambeth, as if they
had felt no frost. Why the juices in the small bodies and
smaller limbs of such minute beings are not frozen is a mat-
ter of curious inquiry.

Severe frosts seem to be partial, or to run in currents ; for at
the same juncture, as the author was informed by accurate

232 WHITE

correspondents, at Lyndon, in the county of Rutland, the
thermometer stood at 19° ; at Blackburn, in Lancashire, at
19"; and at Manchester, at 21°, 20°, and 18°. Thus does
some unknown circumstance strangely overbalance latitude,
and render the cold sometimes much greater in the southern
than the northern parts of this kingdom.

The consequences of this severity were that in Hampshire,
at the melting of the snow, the wheat looked well, and the tur-
nips came forth little injured. The laurels and laurestines
were somewhat damaged, but only in hot aspects. No ever-
greens were quite destroyed ; and not half the damage sus-
tained that befell in January 1768. Those laurels that were
a little scorched on the south sides were perfectly untouched
on their north sides. The care taken to shake the snow day
by day from the branches seemed greatly to avail the author's
evergreens. A neighbor's laurel-hedge, in a high situation,
and facing to the north, was perfectly green and vigorous ; and
the Portugal laurels remained unhurt.

As to the birds, the thrushes and blackbirds were mostly
destroyed ; and the partridges, by the weather and poachers,
were so thinned that few remained to breed the following year.

Notes

^ The autumn preceding January 1768 was very wet, and particularly the
month of September, during which there fell at Lyndon, in the county of
Rutland, six inches and a half of rain. And the terrible long frost in 1739-40
set in after a rainy season, and when the springs were very high. — G. W.

"^ At Selborne the cold was greater than at any other place that the author
could hear of with certainty : though some reported at the time that at a
village in Kent the thermometer fell two degrees below zero, viz., thirty-
four degrees below the freezing point.

The thermometer used at Selborne was graduated by Benjamin Martin.
— G. W.

LETTER LXIII

As the frost in December 1784 was very extraordinary, you,
I trust, will not be displeased to hear the particulars ; and
especially when I promise to say no more about the severities
of winter after I have finished this letter.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 233

The first week in December was very wet, with the barom-
eter very low. On the 7th, with the barometer at 28.5°,
came on a vast snow, which continued all that day and the
next, and most part of the following night ; so that by the
morning of the 9th the works of men were quite overwhelmed,
the lanes filled so as to be impassable, and the ground covered
twelve or fifteen inches without any drifting. In the evening
of the 9th the air began to be so very sharp that we thought
it would be curious to attend to the motions of a thermometer ;
we therefore hung out two, one made by Martin and one
by Dollond, which soon began to show us what we were to
expect; for by ten o'clock they fell to 21°, and at eleven to 4°,
when we went to bed. On the loth, in the morning, the
quicksilver of Dollond's glass was down to half a degree
below zero; and that of Martin's, which was absurdly gradu-
ated only to four degrees above zero, sank quite into the brass
guard of the ball; so that when the weather became most
interesting this was useless. On the loth, at eleven at night,
though the air was perfectly still, Dollond's glass went down
to one degree below zero ! This strange severity of the
weather made me very desirous to know what degree of cold
there might be in such an exalted and near situation as New-
ton. We had, therefore, on the morning of the loth, written

to Mr. , and entreated him to hang out his thermometer,

made by Adams, and to pay some attention to it morning and
evening, expecting wonderful phenomena, in so elevated a
region, at two hundred feet or more above my house. But,
behold ! on the loth, at eleven at night, it was down only to
17°, and the next morning at 22°, when mine was at 10° ! We
were so^disturbed at this unexpected reverse of comparative
local cold, that we sent one of my glasses up, thinking that of

Mr. must, somehow, be wrongly constructed. But, when

the instruments came to be confronted, they went exactly to-
gether ; so that, for one night at least, the cold at Newton was
18° less than at Selborne, and, through the whole frost, 10°
or 12°; and indeed, v/hen we came to observe consequences,
we could readily credit this; for all my laurestines, bays,
ilexes, arbutuses, cypresses, and even my Portugal laurels, and
(which occasions more regret) my fine sloping laurel-hedge.

234 WHITE

were scorched up, while at Newton the same trees have not
lost a leaf.

We had steady frost on the 25th, when the thermometer in
the morning was down to 10° with us, and at Newton only to
21°. Strong frost continued till the 3 1 st, when some tendency
to thaw was observed; and, by January 3rd, 1785, the thaw
was confirmed, and some rain fell.

A circumstance that I must not omit, because it was new to
us, is that on Friday, December lOth, being bright sunshine,
the air was full of icy spicules, floating in all directions, like
atoms in a sunbeam let into a dark room. We thought them
at first particles of the rime falling from my tall hedges ; but
were soon convinced to the contrary, by making our observa-
tions in open places where no rime could reach us. Were they
watery particles of the air frozen as they floated, or were they
evaporations from the snow frozen as they mounted .■*

We were much obliged to the thermometers for the early
information they gave us ; and hurried our apples, pears, onions,
potatoes, etc., into the cellar, and warm closets ; while those
who had not, or neglected such warnings, lost all their store of
roots and fruits, and had their very bread and cheese frozen.

I must not omit to tell you that, during these two Siberian
days, my parlor cat was so electric, that had a person stroked
her, and been properly insulated, the shock might have been
given to a whole circle of people.

I forgot to mention before that, during the two severe days,
two men, who were tracing hares in the snow, had their feet
frozen, and two men, who were much better employed, had
their fingers so affected by the frost, while they were thrash-
ing in a barn, that a mortification followed, from which they
did not recover for many weeks.

This frost killed all the furze and most of the ivy, and in
many places stripped the hollies of all their leaves. It came
at a very early time of the year, before old November ended ;
and yet may be allowed from its effects to have exceeded any
since 1730-40.

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 235

LETTER LXIV

As the effects of heat are seldom very remarkable in the
northerly climate of England, where the summers are often
so defective in warmth and sunshine as not to ripen the fruits
of the earth so well as might be wished, I shall be more con-
cise in my account of the severity of a summer season, and
so make a little amends for the prolix account of the degrees
of cold, and the inconveniences that we suffered from some
late rigorous winters.

The summers of 1781 and 1783 were unusually hot and
dry; to them therefore I shall turn back in my journals, with-
out recurring to any more distant period. In the former of
these years my peach and nectarine trees suffered so much
from the heat that the rind on the bodies was scalded and came
off ; since which the trees have been in a decaying state. This
may prove a hint to assiduous gardeners to fence and shelter
their wall trees with mats or boards, as they may easily do,
because such annoyance is seldom of long continuance. Dur-
ing that summer also, I observed that my apples were coddled,
as it were, on the trees ; so that they had no quickness of flavor,
and would not keep in the winter. This circumstance put me
in mind of what I have heard travellers assert, that they never
ate a good apple or apricot in the south of Europe, where the
heats were so great as to render the juices vapid and insipid.

The great pests of a garden are wasps, which destroy all
the finer fruits just as they are coming into perfection. In
1 78 1 we had none; in 1783 there were myriads; which would
have devoured all the produce of my garden, had not we set
the boys to take the nests, and caught thousands with hazel-
twigs tipped with bird-lime : we have since employed the boys
to take and destroy the large breeding wasps in the spring.
Such expedients have a great effect on these marauders, and
will keep them under. Though wasps do not abound but in
hot summers, yet they do not prevail in every hot summer, as
I have instanced in the two years above-mentioned.

In the sultry season of 1783, honey-dews were so frequent
as to deface and destroy the beauties of my garden. My

236 WHITE

honeysuckles, which were one week the most sweet and lovely
objects that the eye could behold, became the next the most
loathsome; being enveloped in a viscous substance, and loaded
with black aphides, or smother-flies. The occasion of this
clammy appearance seems to be this, that in hot weather
the effluvia of flowers in fields and meadows and gardens are
drawn up in the day by a brisk evaporation, and then in
the night fall down again with the dews, in which they are
entangled ; that the air is strongly scented, and therefore
impregnated with the particles of flowers in summer weather,
our senses will inform us; and that this clammy sweet sub-
stance is of the vegetable kind we may learn from bees, to
whom it is very grateful : and we may be assured that it falls
in the night, because it is always first seen in warm still
mornings.^

On chalky and sandy soils, and in the hot villages about
London, the thermometer has been often observed to mount
as high as 83° or 84° ; but with us, in this hilly and woody dis-
trict, I have hardly ever seen it exceed 80° ; nor does it often
arrive at that pitch. The reason, I conclude, is that our
dense clayey soil, so much shaded by trees, is not so easily
heated through as those above-mentioned ; and, besides, our
mountains cause currents of air and breezes ; and the vast
effluvia from our wood-lands temper and moderate our heats.

Note

^ White's explanation of the origin of honey-dew is ingenious but incor-
rect. It is now ascertained to be an exudation from the aphides themselves.
It is by some called their excrement. — G. C. D.

LETTER LXV

The summer of the year 1783 was an amazing and por-
tentous one, and full of horrible phenomena ; for, besides
the alarming meteors and tremendous thunder-storms that
affrighted and distressed the different counties of this king-
dom, the peculiar haze, or smoky fog, that prevailed for many
weeks in this island, and in every part of Europe, and even

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 237

beyond its limits, was a most extraordinary appearance,

unlike anything known within the memory of man. By my

journal I find that I had noticed this strange occurrence from

June 23rd to July 20th inclusive, during which period the wind

varied to every quarter without making any alteration in the

air. The sun, at noon, looked as blank as a clouded moon,

and shed a rust-colored ferruginous light on the ground, and

floors of rooms ; but was particularly lurid and blood-colored

at rising and setting. All the time the heat was so intense

that butcher's meat could hardly be eaten on the day after it

was killed ; and the flies swarmed so in the lanes and hedges

that they rendered the horses half frantic, and riding irksome.

The country-people began to look with a superstitious awe at the

red, lowering aspect of the sun ; and indeed there was reason

for the most enlightened person to be apprehensive ; for, all

the while, Calabria and a part of the Isle of Sicily were torn

and convulsed with earthquakes ; and about that juncture a

volcano sprang out of the sea on the coast of Norway. On

this occasion Milton's noble simile of the sun, in his first book

of " Paradise Lost," frequently occurred to my mind ; and it

is indeed particularly applicable, because, towards the end, it

alludes to a superstitious kind of dread, with which the minds

of men are always impressed by such strange and unusual

phenomena.

. . . "As when the sun, new risen,

Looks through the horizontal, misty air,

Shorn of his beams ; or from behind the moon,

In dim eclipse, disastrous twilight sheds

On half the nations, and \si\.h. fear oi change

Perplexes monarchs." . . .

LETTER LXVI

We are very seldom annoyed with thunder-storms : and it
is no less remarkable than true, that those which arise in the
south have hardly been known to reach this village ; for,
before they get over us, they take a direction to the east or to
the west, or sometimes divide in two, go in part to one of those
quarters, and in part to the other ; as was truly the case in

238 WHITE

summer 1783, when, though the country round was continu-
ally harassed with tempests, and often from the south, yet we
escaped them all, as appears by my journal of that summer.
The only way that I can at all account for this fact — for such
it is — is that, on that quarter, between us and the sea, there
are continual mountains, hill behind hill, such as Nore Hill, the
Barnet, Butser Hill, and Ports Down, which somehow divert
the storms and give them a different direction. High prom-
ontories, and elevated grounds, have always been observed
to attract clouds and disarm them of their mischievous con-
tents, which are discharged into the trees and summits as soon
as they come in contact with those turbulent meteors ; while
the humble vales escape, because they are so far beneath
them.

But, when I say I do not remember a thunder-storm from
the south, I do not mean that we never have suffered from
thunder-storms at all; for on June 5th, 1784, the thermom-
eter in the morning being at 64°, and at noon at 70°, the
barometer at 29.6^° and the wind north, I observed a blue
mist, smelling strongly of sulphur, hanging along our sloping
woods, and seeming to indicate that thunder was at hand. I
was called in about two in the afternoon, and so missed seeing
the gathering of the clouds in the north ; which they who were
abroad assured me had something uncommon in its appear-
ance. At about a quarter after two the storm began in the
parish of Harteley, moving slowly from north to south : and
from thence it came over Norton Farm, and so to Grange
Farm, both in this parish. It began with vast drops of rain,
which were soon succeeded by round hail, and then by con-
vex pieces of ice, which measured three inches in girth. Had
it been as extensive as it was violent, and of any continuance
(for it was very short), it must have ravaged all the neighbor-
hood. In the parish of Harteley it did some damage to one
farm ; but Norton, which lay in the centre of the storm, was
greatly injured ; as was Grange, which lay next to it. It did
but just reach to the middle of the village, where the hail broke
my north windows, and all my garden-lights and hand-glasses,
and many of my neighbors' windows. The extent of the
storm was about two miles in length and one in breadth. We

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 239

were just sitting down to dinner ; but were soon diverted from
our repast by the clattering of tiles and the jingling of glass.
There fell at the same time prodigious torrents of rain on the
farms above-mentioned, which occasioned a flood as violent as
it was sudden ; doing great damage to the meadows and fal-
lows, by deluging the one and washing away the soil of the
other. The hollow lane towards Alton was so torn and dis-
ordered as not to be passable till mended, rocks being removed
that weighed two hundred-weight. Those that saw the effect
which the great hail had on ponds and pools say that the dash-
ing of the water made an extraordinary appearance, the froth
and spray standing up in the air three feet above the sur-
face. The rushing and roaring of the hail, as it approached,
was truly tremendous.

Though the clouds at South Lambeth, near London, were
at that juncture thin and light, and no storm was in sight, nor
within hearing, yet the air was strongly electric ; for the bells
of an electric machine at that place rang repeatedly, and
fierce sparks were discharged.

When I first took the present work in hand I proposed to
have added an "Annus Historico-naturalis," or "The Natural
History of the Twelve Months of the Year;" which would
have comprised many incidents and occurrences that have not
fallen in my way to be mentioned in my series of letters ; but,
as Mr. Aikin of Warrington has lately published somewhat
of this sort, and as the length of my correspondence has
sufficiently put your patience to the test, I shall here take a
respectful leave of you and natural history together, and am,

With all due deference and regard,

Your most obliged and most humble servant,

GIL. WHITE.
Selborne,
June 2-)th, 1785.

THE

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE

LETTER I

IT is reasonable to suppose that in remote ages this woody
and mountainous district was inhabited only by bears and
wolves. Whether the Britons ever thought it worthy their
attention is not in our power to determine ; but we may safely
conclude, from circumstances, that it was not unknown to the
Romans. Old people remember to have heard their fathers
and grandfathers say that, in dry summers and in windy
weather, pieces of money were sometimes found round the
verge of Wolmer Pond ; and tradition had inspired the forest-
ers with a notion that the bottom of that lake contained great
stores of treasure. During the spring and summer of 1740
there was little rain; and the following summer also, 1741,
was so uncommonly dry that many springs and ponds failed,
and this lake in particular, whose bed became as dusty as
the surrounding heaths and wastes. This favorable juncture
induced some of the forest-cottagers to begin a search, which
was attended with such success, that all the laborers in the
neighborhood flocked to the spot, and with spades and hoes
turned up great part of that large area. Instead of pots of
coins, as they expected, they found great heaps, the one lying
on the other, as if shot out of a bag ; many of which were in
good preservation. Silver and gold these inquirers expected
to find ; but their discoveries consisted solely of many hun-
dreds of Roman copper coins, and some medallions, all of the
lower empire. There was not much virtu stirring at that time
in this neighborhood ; however, some of the gentry and clergy
17 241

242 WHITE

around bought what pleased them best, and some dozens fell
to the share of the author.^

The owners at first held their commodity at a high price ;
but, finding that they were not likely to meet with dealers at
such a rate, they soon lowered their terms, and sold the fair-
est as they could. The coins that were rejected became
current, and passed for farthings at the petty shops. Of
those that we saw, the greater part were of Marcus Aurelius,
and the Empress Faustina, his wife, the father and mother
of Commodus. Some of Faustina were in high relief, and
exhibited a ver)'- agreeable set of features, which probably
resembled that lady, who was more celebrated for her beauty
than for her virtues. The medallions in general were of a
paler color than the coins. To pretend to account for the
means of their coming to this place would be spending time
in conjecture. The spot, I think, could not be a Roman camp,
because it is commanded by hills on two sides ; nor does it
show the least traces of entrenchments ; nor can I suppose that
it was a Roman town, because I have too good an opinion of
the taste and judgment of those polished conquerors to imagine
that they would settle on so barren and dreary a waste.

Note

^ In October 1873 two earthenware vessels were found two feet under the
surface of a field near Selborne containing about thirty thousand Roman
and Roman-British coins.

LETTER II

That Selborne was a place of some distinction and note in
the time of the Saxons we can give most undoubted proofs.
But, as there are few if any accounts of the villages before
Domesday, it will be best to begin with that venerable record.
" Ipse rex tenet Selesburne. Eddid regina tenuit, et nunquam
geldavit. De isto manerio dono dedit rex Radfredo presby-
tero dimidiam hidam cum ecclesia. Tempore regis Edwardi
et post, valuit duodecim solidos et sex denarios ; modo octo
solidos et quatuor denarios." Here we see that Selborne was
a royal manor: and that Editha, the queen of Edward the

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 243

Confessor, had been lady of that manor, and was succeeded
in it by the Conqueror, and that it had a church. Besides
these, many circumstances concur to prove it to have been
a Saxon village ; such as the name of the place itself,^ the
names of many fields, and some families,^ with a variety of
words in husbandry and common life, still subsisting among
the country-people.

What probably first drew the attention of the Saxons to this
spot was the beautiful spring or fountain called Well Head,^
which induced them to build by the banks of that perennial
current ; for ancient settlers loved to reside by brooks and
rivulets, where they could dip for their water without the
trouble and expense of digging wells and of drawing.

It remains still unsettled among the antiquaries at what
time tracts of land were first appropriated to the chase alone
for the amusement of the sovereign. Whether our Saxon
monarchs had any royal forests does not, I believe, appear
on record; but the " Constitutiones de Foresta" of Canute,
the Dane, are come down to us. We shall not, therefore,
pretend to say whether Wolmer Forest existed as a royal
domain before the conquest. If it did not, we may suppose
it was laid out by some of our earliest Norman kings, who
were exceedingly attached to the pleasures of the chase, and
resided much at Winchester, which lies at a moderate distance
from this district. The Plantagenet princes seem to have been
pleased with Wolmer, for tradition says that King John re-
sided just upon the verge, at Ward le Ham, on a regular and
remarkable mount, still called King John's Hill, and Lodge
Hill; and Edward III. had a chapel in his park, or enclosure,
at Kingsley.* Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, and Richard,
Duke of York, say my evidences, were both, in their turns,
wardens of Wolmer Forest, which seems to have served for
an appointment for the younger princes of the royal family,
as it may again.

I have intentionally mentioned Edward III. and the dukes
Humphrey and Richard, before King Edward II., because I
have reserved, for the entertainment of my readers, a pleas-
ant anecdote respecting that prince, with which I shall close
this letter.

244 WHITE

As Edward II. was hunting on Wolmer Forest, Morris Ken,
of the kitchen, fell from his horse several times, at which ac-
cidents the king laughed immoderately ; and, when the chase
was over, ordered him twenty shillings,^ an enormous sum for
those days ! Proper allowances ought to be made for the
youth of this monarch, whose spirits also, we may suppose,
were much exhilarated by the sport of the day ; but, at the
same time, it is reasonable to remark that, whatever might
be the occasions of Ken's first fall, the subsequent ones seem
to have been designed. The scullion appears to have been
an artful fellow, and to have seen the king's foible, which fur-
nishes an early specimen of that his easy softness and facility
of temper, of which the infamous Gaveston took such advan-
tages as brought innumerable calamities on the nation and
involved the prince at last in misfortunes and sufferings too
deplorable to be mentioned without horror and amazement.

Notes

1 Selesbiirne, Seleburne^ Selbiirti^ Selboiirn, Selborne, and Selborn, as it
has been variously spelt at different periods, is of Saxon derivation ; for Sel
signifies great, and biir7i torrens, a brook or rivulet : so that the name seems
to be derived from the great perennial stream that breaks out at the upper
end of the village. — Sel also signifies bonus, \\.Qxa. foecimdics, fer tills . "Sel
saepr-cun : fcectinda gramiiiis clausura ; fertile pasciiiun : a meadow in the
parish of Godelmitig is still called Sal-gars-ton.'''' Lye's Saxon Dictio7iary,
in the Sjipplemefit, by Mr. Manning. — G. W.

2 Thus, the name oiAldredsigmfits all-reverend, and that oiKemp means
a soldier. Thus we have a church-litten, or enclosure for dead bodies, and
not a church-yard ; there is also a Culver-croft near the Grange Farm, being
the enclosure where the priory pigeon-house stood, from culver a pigeon.
Again there are three steep pastures in this parish called the Lith, from
Hlithe, clivus. The wicker-work that binds and fastens down a hedge on
the top is called ether, from ether, a hedge. When the good women call
their hogs they cry sic, sic,* not knowing that sic is Saxon, or rather Celtic,
for a hog. Coppice or brushwood our countrymen call rise, from hris,
frondes ; and talk of a load oirise. Within the author's memory the Saxon
plurals, housen and peason, were in common use. But it would be endless
to instance in every circumstance : he that wishes for more specimens must
frequent a farmer's kitchen. I have therefore selected some words to show

* Si'ko, porcus apud Lacones; un Porceau chez les Lac6demoniens : ce mot a sans
doute est6 pris des Celtes, qui disent sic, pour marquer un porceau. Encore aujour'huy
quand le Bretons chassent ces animaux, ils ne disent autrement que sic, sic. AntiquiU
de la Nation et de la Langue des Celtes, par Pezron. — G. C. D.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 245

how familiar the Saxon dialect was to this district, since in more than seven
hundred years it is far from being obliterated. — G. W.

3 Well head signifies spring head, and not a deep pit from whence we
draw water. For particulars about which see Letter I. to Mr. Pennant. —
G. W.

* The parish of Kingsley lies between and divides Wolmer Forest from
Ayles Holt Forest. See Letter IX. to Mr. Pennant. — G. W.

s " Item, paid at the lodge at Wolmer, when the king was stag-hunting
there, to Morris Ken, of the kitchen, because he rode before the king and
often fell from his horse, at which the king laughed exceedingly — a gift, by
command, of twenty shillings." — A MS. in possession of Thomas Astle,
Esq., containing the private expenses of Edward II. — G. W.

LETTER III

From the silence of Domesday respecting churches, it has
been supposed that few villages had any at the time when
that record was taken ; but Selborne, we see, enjoyed the
benefit of one : hence we may conclude that this place was
in no abject state even at that very distant period. How
many fabrics have succeeded each other since the days of
Radfredrus the presbyter, we cannot pretend to say ; our
business leads us to a description of the present edifice, in
which we shall be circumstantial.

Our church, which was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, con-
sists of three aisles, and measures fifty-four feet in length by
forty-seven in breadth, being almost as broad as it is long.
The present building has no pretensions to antiquity, and is,
as I suppose, of no earlier date than the beginning of the
reign of Henry VII. It is perfectly plain and unadorned,
without painted glass, carved work, sculpture, or tracery. But
when I say it has no claim to antiquity, I would mean to be
understood the fabric in general; for the pillars, which sup-
port the roof, are undoubtedly old, being of that low, squat,
thick order usually called Saxon. These, I should imagine,
upheld the roof of a former church, which, falling into decay,
was rebuilt on those massy props, because their strength had
preserved them from the injuries of time.^ Upon these rest
blunt Gothic arches, such as prevailed in the reign above-

246 • WHITE

mentioned, and by which, as a criterion, we would prove the
date of the building.

At the bottom of the south aisle, between the west and
south doors, stands the font, which is deep and capacious,
and consists of three massy round stones, piled one on another,
without the least ornament or sculpture : the cavity at the
top is lined with lead, and has a pipe at the bottom to convey
off the water after the sacred ceremony is performed.

The east end of the south aisle is called the South Chancel,
and, till within these thirty years, was divided off by old carved
Gothic framework of timber, having been a private chantry.
In this opinion we are more confirmed by observing two Gothic
niches within the space, the one in the east wall and the other
in the south, near which there probably stood images and
altars.

In the middle aisle there is nothing remarkable : but I
remember when its beams were hung with garlands in honor
of young women of the parish, reputed to have died virgins ;
and recollect to have seen the clerk's wife cutting, in white
paper, the resemblances of gloves, and ribbons to be twisted
in knots and roses, to decorate these memorials of chastity.
In the church of Faringdon, which is the next parish, many
garlands of this sort still remain.

The north aisle is narrow and low, with a sloping ceiling,
reaching within eight or nine feet of the floor. It had origi-
nally a flat roof, covered with lead, till, within a century past^
a church-warden stripping off the lead, in order, as he said,
to have it mended, sold it to a plumber, and ran away with
the money. This aisle has no door, for an obvious reason ;
because the north side of the church-yard, being surrounded
by the vicarage-garden, affords no path to that side of the
church. Nothing can be more irregular than the pews of
this church, which are of all dimensions and heights, being
patched up according to the fancy of the owners ; but whoever
nicely examines them will find that the middle aisle had, on
each side, a regular row of benches of solid oak, all alike, with
a low back-board to each. These we should not hesitate to say
are coeval with the present church ; and especially as it is
to be observed that, at their ends, they are ornamented with

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 247

carved blunt Gothic niches, exactly correspondent to the arches
of the church, and to a niche in the south wall. The fourth
aisle also has a row of these benches ; but some are decayed
through age, and the rest much disguised by modern altera-
tions.

At the upper end of this aisle, and running out to the north,
stands a transept, known by the name of the North Chancel,
measuring twenty-one feet from south to north and nineteen
feet from east to west : this was intended, no doubt, as a private
chantry; and was also, till of late, divided off by a Gothic frame-
work of timber. In its north wall, under a very blunt Gothic
arch, lies perhaps the founder of this edifice, which, from the
shape of its arch, may be deemed no older than the latter end
of the reign of Henry VII. The tomb was examined some
years ago, but contained nothing except the skull and thigh-
bones of a large tall man, and the bones of a youth or woman,
lying in a very irregular manner, without any escutcheon or
other token to ascertain the names or rank of the deceased.
The grave was very shallow, and lined with stone at the bottom
and on the sides.

From the east wall project four stone brackets, which I con-
clude supported images and crucifixes. In the great thick
pilaster, jutting out between this transept and the chancel,
there is a very sharp Gothic niche, of older date than the
present chantry or church. But the chief pieces of antiquity
are two narrow stone coffin-lids, which compose part of the
floor, and lie from west to east, with the very narrow ends
eastward : these belong to remote times ; and, if originally
placed here, which I doubt, must have been part of the pave-
ment of an older transept. At present there are no coffins
under them, whence I conclude they have been removed to
this place from some part of a former church. One of these
lids is so eaten by time, that no sculpture can be discovered
upon it ; or, perhaps, it may be the wrong side uppermost; but
on the other, which seems to be of stone of a closer and harder
texture, is to be discerned a discus, with a cross on it, at the
end of a staff or rod, the well-known symbol of a Knight
Templar.2

This order was distinguished by a red cross on the left

248 WHITE

shoulder of their cloak, and by this attribute in their hand.
Now, if these stones belonged to Knights Templars, they must
have lain here many centuries ; for this order came into Eng-
land early in the reign of King Stephen in 1 1 1 3 ; and was dis-
solved in the time of Edward II. in 13 12, having subsisted only
one hundred and thirty-nine years. Why I should suppose
that Knights Templars were occasionally buried at this church
will appear in some future letter, when we come to treat more
particularly concerning the property they possessed here and
the intercourse that subsisted between them and the priors of
Selborne.

We must now proceed to the chancel, properly so-called,
which seems to be coeval with the church, and is in the same
plain, unadorned style, though neatly kept. This room meas-
ures thirty-one feet in length, and sixteen feet and a half in
breadth, and is wainscoted all round, as high as to the bottom
of the windows. The space for the communion table is raised
two steps above the rest of the floor, and railed in with oaken
balusters. Here I shall say somewhat of the windows of the
chancel in particular, and of the whole fabric in general. They
are mostly of that simple and unadorned sort called lancet,
some single, some double, and some in triplets. At the east
end of the chancel are two of a moderate size, near each
other ; and in the north wall two very distant small ones, un-
equal in length and height : and in the south wall are two, one
on each side of the chancel door, that are broad and squat,
and of a different order. At the east end of the south aisle of
the church there is a large lancet window in a triplet ; and two
very small, narrow, single ones in the south wall, and a broad
squat window beside, and a double lancet one in the west end ;
so that the appearance is very irregular. In the north aisle are
two windows, made shorter when the roof was sloped ; and in
the north transept a large triple window, shortened at the time
of a repair in 1 72 1 , when over it was opened a round one of
considerable size, which affords an agreeable light, and renders
that chantry the most cheerful part of the edifice.

The church and chancels have all covered roofs, ceiled about
the year 1633 ; before which they were open to the tiles and
shingles, showing the naked rafters, and threatening the con-

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 249

gregation with the fall of a spar, or a blow from a piece of loose
mortar.

On the north wall of the chancel is fixed a large oval white
marble monument, with the following inscription ; and at the
foot of the wall, over the deceased, and inscribed with his
name, age, arms, and time of death, lies a large slab of black
marble : —

Prope hunc parietem sepelitur

GILBERTUS WHITE, SAMSONIS WHITE, de

Oxon, militis filius tertius, Collegii Magdale-
-nensis ibidem alumnus, & socius. Tandem faven-
-te collegio ad hanc ecclesiam promotus ; ubi prim^e-
-va morum simplicitate, et diffusa erga omnes bene-
-volentia feliciter consenuit.
Pastor fidelis, comis, affabilis,
Maritus, et pater amantissimus,
A conjuge invicem, et liberis, atque
A parochianis impensd dilectus.
Pauperibus ita beneficus
ut decimam partem census

moribundus
piis usibus consecravit.
Meritis demum juxta et annis plenus
ex hac vita migravit Feb. 13^
anno salutis 172I
^tatis suae "jf
Hoc posuit Rebecca
Conjux illius mtestissiraa,
mox secutura.

On the same wall is newly fixed a small square table monu-
ment of white marble, inscribed in the following manner : —

Sacred to the memory

of the Revd. ANDREW ETTY, B.D.

23 Years Vicar of this parish :

In whose character

The conjugal, the parental, and the sacerdotal virtues

were so happily combined

as to deserve the imitation of mankind.

And if in any particular he followed more invariably

the steps of his blessed Master,

It was in his humility.

250 WHITE

His parishioners,

especially the sick and necessitous,

as long as any traces of his memory shall remain,

must lament his death.

To perpetuate such an example, this stone is erected ;

as while living he was a preacher of righteousness,

so, by it, he being dead yet speaketh.

He died April 8'**, 1784, aged 66 years.

Note

1 In the same manner, to compare great things with small, did Wykeham,
when he new built the cathedral at Winchester, from the tower westward
apply to his purpose the old piers or pillars of Bishop Walkelin's church,
by blending Saxon and Gothic architecture together. See Lowth's Life
of Wykeham. — G.W.

2 See DuGDALE, Monasttcon AngUcanum, Vol. II., where there is a fine
engraving of a Knight Templar, by Hollar. — G. W.

LETTER IV

We have now taken leave of the inside of the church, and
shall pass by a door at the west end of the middle aisle into
the belfry. This room is part of a handsome square embat-
tled tower of forty-five feet in height, and of much more mod-
ern date than the church ; but old enough to have needed a
thorough repair in 1781, when it was neatly stuccoed at a con-
siderable expense, by a set of workmen who were employed on
it for the greatest part of the summer. The old bells, three
in number, loud and out of tune, were taken down in 1735,
and cast into four ; to which Sir Simon Stuart, the grand-
father of the present baronet, added a fifth at his own ex-
pense ; and, bestowing it in the name of his favorite daughter,
Mrs. Mary Stuart, caused it to be cast with the following motto

round it : « ciara puella dedit, dixitque mihi esto Maria :
lUius et laudes nomen ad astra sono."

The day of the arrival of this tunable peal was observed as
a high festival by the village, and rendered more joyous by an
order from the donor that the treble bell should be fixed bottom
upward in the ground and filled with punch, of which all present
were permitted to partake.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 251

The porch of the church, to the south, is modern, and would
not be worthy attention did it not shelter a fine sharp Gothic
doorway. This is undoubtedly much older than the present
fabric ; and, being found in good preservation, was worked into
the wall, and is the grand entrance into the church ; nor are the
folding doors to be passed over in silence ; since, from their
thick and clumsy structure, and the rude flourished work of
their hinges, they may possibly be as ancient as the doorway
itself.

The whole roof of the south aisle, and the south side of the
roof of the middle aisle, is covered with oaken shingles instead
of tiles, on account of their lightness, which favors the ancient
and crazy timber-frame. And, indeed, the consideration of
accidents by fire excepted, this sort of roofing is much more
eligible than tiles. For shingles well-seasoned, and cleft from
quartered timber, never warp, nor let in drifting snow ; nor do
they shiver with frost ; nor are they liable to be blown off, like
tiles ; but, when nailed down, last for a long period, as experi-
ence has shown us in this place, where those that face to the
north are known to have endured, untouched, by undoubted
tradition, for more than a century.

Considering the size of the church, and the extent of the
parish, the church-yard is very scanty ; and especially as all
wish to be buried on the south side, which is become such a
mass of mortality that no person can be there interred without
disturbing or displacing the bones of his ancestors. There
is reason to suppose that it once was larger, and extended to
what is now the vicarage court and garden ; because many
human bones have been dug up in those parts several yards
without the present limits. At the east end are a few graves ;
yet none till very lately on the north side ; but, as two or three
families of best repute have begun to bury in that quarter, prej-
udice may wear out by degrees, and their example be followed
by the rest of the neighborhood.

In speaking of the church, I have all along talked of the
east and west ends, as if the chancel stood exactly true to those
points of the compass ; but this is by no means the case, for
the fabric bears so much to the north of the east that the four
corners of the tower, and not the four sides, stand to the four

252 WHITE

cardinal points. The best method of accounting for this
deviation seems to be that the workmen, who probably were
employed in the longest days, endeavored to set the chancels
to the rising of the sun.

Close by the church, at the west end, stands the vicarage-
house ; an old, but roomy and convenient, edifice. It faces
very agreeably to the morning sun, and is divided from the
village by a neat and cheerful court. According to the man-
ner of old times, the hall was open to the roof ; and so con-
tinued, probably, till the vicars became family men, and began
to want more conveniences ; when they flung a floor across,
and, by partitions, divided the space into chambers. In this
hall we remember a date, some time in the reign of Elizabeth ;
it was over the door that leads to the stairs.

Behind the house is a garden of an irregular shape, but well
laid out ; whose terrace commands so romantic and picturesque
a prospect, that the first master in landscape might contemplate
it with pleasure, and deem it an object well worthy of his pencil.

LETTER V

In the church-yard of this village is a yew-tree, whose aspect
bespeaks it to be of a great age : it seems to have seen several
centuries, and is probably coeval with the church, and therefore
may be deemed an antiquity : the body is squat, short, and
thick, and measures twenty-three feet in the girth, supporting
a head of suitable extent to its bulk. This is a male tree, which
in the spring sheds clouds of dust, and fills the atmosphere
around with its farina.

As far as we have been able to observe, the males of this
species become much larger than the females ; and it has so
fallen out that most of the yew-trees in the church-yards of this
neighborhood are males : but this must have been matter of
mere accident, since men, when they first planted yews, little
dreamed that there were sexes in trees.

In a yard, in the midst of the street, till very lately, grew a
middle-sized female tree of the same species, which commonly

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 253

bore great crops of berries. By the high winds usually pre-
vailing about the autumnal equinox, these berries, then ripe,
were blown down into the road, where the hogs ate them. And
it was very remarkable that, though barrow-hogs and young
sows found no inconvenience from this food, yet milch-sows
often died after such a repast : a circumstance that can be
accounted for only by supposing that the latter, being much
exhausted and hungry, devoured a larger quantity.

While mention is making of the bad effects of yew-berries,
it may be proper to remind the unwary that the twigs and
leaves of yew, though eaten in a very small quantity, are cer-
tain death to horses and cows, and that in a few minutes. A
horse tied to a yew-hedge, or to a faggot-stack of dead yew,
shall be found dead before the owner can be aware that any
danger is at hand ; and the writer has been several times a
sorrowful witness to losses of this kind among his friends ;
and in the island of Ely had once the mortification to see nine
young steers or bullocks of his own all lying dead in a heap
from browsing a little on a hedge of yew in an old garden, into
which they had broken in snowy weather. Even the clippings
of a yew-hedge have destroyed a whole dairy of cows, when
thrown inadvertently into a yard. And yet sheep and tur-
keys and, as park-keepers say, deer will crop these trees with
impunity.

Some intelligent persons assert that the branches of yew,
while green, are not noxious ; and that they will kill only when
dead and withered, by lacerating the stomach ; but to this
assertion we cannot by any means assent, because, among the
number of cattle that we have known fall victims to this deadly
food, not one has been found, when it was opened, but had a
lump of green yew in its paunch. True it is, that yew-trees
stand for twenty years or more in a field, and no bad conse-
quences ensue ; but at some time or other cattle, either from
wantonness when full, or from hunger when empty (from both
which circumstances we have seen them perish), will be med-
dling, to their certain destruction ; the yew seems to be a very
improper tree for a pasture-field.

Antiquaries seem much at a loss to determine at what period
this tree first obtained a place in church-yards. A statute passed

254 WHITE

A.D. 1307 and 35 Edward I., the title of which is " Ne rector
arbores in cemeterio prosternat." Now if it is recollected that
we seldom see any other very large or ancient tree in a church-
yard but yews, this statute must have principally related to this
species of tree ; and consequently their being planted in church-
yards is of much more ancient date than the year 1307.

As to the use of these trees, possibly the more respect-
able parishioners were buried under their shade before the
improper custom was introduced of burying within the body
of the church, where the living are to assemble. Deborah,
Rebekah's nurse,^ was buried under an oak ; the most honor-
able place of interment probably next to the cave of Mach-
pelah,2 which seems to have been appropriated to the remains
of the patriarchal family alone.

The farther use of yew-trees might be as a screen to churches,
by their thick foliage, from the violence of winds ; perhaps also
for the purpose of archery, the best long-bows being made of
that material ; and we do not hear that they are planted in the
church-yards of other parts of Europe, where long-bows were
not so much in use. They might also be placed as a shelter
to the congregation assembling before the church doors were
opened, and as an emblem of mortality by their funereal appear-
ance. In the south of England every church-yard almost has
its tree, and some two ; but in the north, we understand, few
are to be found.

The idea of R. C, that the yew-tree afforded its branches
instead of palms for the processions on Palm Sunday, is a good
one and deserves attention. See "Gent. Mag.," Vol. L., p. 128.

Notes
1 Gen. XXXV. 8. — G. W. 2 Cen. xxiii. 9. — G. W.

LETTER VI

The living of Selborne was a very small vicarage ; but,
being in the patronage of Magdalen College, in the Univer-
sity of Oxford, that society endowed it with the great tithes
of Selborne, more than a century ago; and since the year

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 255

1758 again with the great tithes of Oakhanger, called Bane's
parsonage ; so that, together, it is become a respectable piece
of preferment, to which one of the fellows is always pre-
sented. The vicar holds the great tithes, by lease, under the
college. The great disadvantage of this living is that it has
not one foot of glebe near home.^

ITS PAYMENTS ARE:— £ S. d.

King's books 821

Yearly tenths 0162^-

Yearly procurations for Blackmore and Oakhanger

Chap, with acquit 017

Selborne procurations and acquit 090

I am unable to give a complete list of the vicars of this
parish till towards the end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth ;
from which period the registers furnish a regular series.

In Domesday we find thus — " De isto manerio dono dedit
Rex Radfredo presbytero dimidiam hidam cum ecclesia." So
that before Domesday, which was compiled between the years
1 08 1 and 1086, here was an officiating minister at this place.

After this, among my documents, I find occasional mention
of a vicar here and there ; the first is —

Roger, instituted in 1254.

In 14 10 John Lynne was vicar of Selborne.

In 141 1 Hugo Tybbe was vicar.

The presentations to the vicarage of Selborne generally
ran in the name of the prior and the convent ; but Tybbe
was presented by Prior John Wynechestre only.

June 29th, 1528, William Fisher, vicar of Selborne, resigned
to Miles Peyrson.

1594, William White appears to have been vicar to this
time. Of this person there is nothing remarkable, but that
he hath made a regular entry twice in the register of Sel-
borne of the funeral of Thomas Cowper, Bishop of Winches-
ter, as if he had been buried at Selborne ; yet this learned
prelate, who died 1594, was buried at Winchester, in the cathe-
dral, near the episcopal throne.^

1595, Richard Boughton, vicar.

1596, William Inkforbye, vicar.
May 1606, Thomas Phippes, vicar.

256 WHITE

June 163 1, Ralph Austine, vicar.

July 1632, John Longworth. This unfortunate gentleman,
living in the time of Cromwell's usurpation, was deprived of
his preferment for many years, probably because he would
not take the league and covenant; for I observe that his
father-in-law, the Reverend Jethro Beal, rector of Faringdon,
which is the next parish, enjoyed his benefice during the
whole of that unhappy period. Longworth, after he was dis-
possessed, retired to a little tenement about one hundred and
fifty yards from the church, where he earned a small pittance
by the practice of physic. During those dismal times it was
not uncommon for the deposed clergy to take up a medical
character; as was the case in particular, I know, with the Rev-
erend Mr. Yalden, rector of Compton, near Guildford, in the
county of Surrey. Vicar Longworth used frequently to men-
tion to his sons, who told it to my relations, that, the Sunday
after his deprivation, his puritanical successor stepped into the
pulpit with no small petulance and exultation : and began his
sermon from Psalm xx. 8, ''They are brought down and fallen ;
but we are risen and stand upright." This person lived to be
restored in 1660, and continued vicar for eighteen years; but
was so impoverished by his misfortunes, that he left the vicar-
age-house and premises in a very abject and dilapidated state.

July 1678. Richard Byfield, who left eighty pounds by
will, the interest to be applied to apprentice out poor chil-
dren ; but this money, lent on private security, was in danger
of being lost, and the bequest remained in an unsettled state
for near twenty years, till 1 700 ; so that little or no advantage
was derived from it. About the year 1759 it was again in the
utmost danger by the failure of a borrower ; but, by prudent
management, has since been raised to one hundred pounds
stock in the three per cents reduced. The trustees are the
vicar and the renters or owners of Temple, Priory, Grange,
Blackmore, and Oakhanger House, for the time being. This
gentleman seemed inclined to have put the vicarial premises
in a comfortable state ; and began by building a solid stone
wall round the front court, and another in the lower yard,
between that and the neighboring garden ; but was inter-
rupted by death from fulfilling his laudable intentions.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 257

April 1680, Barnabas Long became vicar.

June 1 68 1. This living was now in such low estimation in
Magdalen College that it descended to a junior fellow, Gilbert
White, M.A., who was instituted to it in the thirty-first year
of his age. At his first coming he ceiled the chancel, and also
floored and wainscoted the parlor and hall, which before were
paved with stone, and had naked walls ; he enlarged the kitchen
and brewhouse, and dug a cellar and well ; he also built a large
new barn in the lower yard, removed the hovels in the front
court, which he laid out in walks and borders ; and entirely
planned the back garden, before a rude field with a stone-pit
in the midst of it. By his will he gave and bequeathed " the
sum of forty pounds to be laid out in the most necessary
repairs of the church ; that is, in strengthening and securing
such parts as seem decaying and dangerous." With this sum
two large buttresses were erected to support the east end of
the south wall of the church, and the gable-end wall of the
west end of the south aisle was new built from the ground.

By his will also he gave " one hundred pounds to be laid
out on lands ; the yearly rents whereof shall be employed in
teaching the poor children of Selbourn parish to read and
write, and say their prayers and catechism, and to sew and
knit ; — and be under the direction of his executrix as long as
she lives ; and, after her, under the direction of such of his
children and their issue, as shall live in or within five miles of
the said parish ; and on failure of any such, then under the
direction of the vicar of Selbourn for the time being ; but still
to the uses above-named." With this sum was purchased, of
Thomas Turville, of Hawkeley, in the county of Southampton,
yeoman, and Hannah his wife, two closes of freehold land,
commonly called Collier's, containing, by estimation, eleven
acres, lying in Hawkeley aforesaid. These closes are let at
this time, 1785, on lease, at the rate of three pounds by the
year.

This vicar also gave by will two hundred pounds towards
the repairs of the highways ^ in the parish of Selborne. That
sum was carefully and judiciously laid out in the summer of
the year 1730, by his son John White, who made a solid and
firm causeway from Rood Green, all down Honey Lane, to a

iS

258 WHITE

farm called Oak Woods, where the sandy soil begins. This
miry and gulfy lane was chosen as worthy of repair, because
it leads to the forest, and thence through the Holt to the town
of Farnham in Surrey, the only market in those days for men
who had wheat to sell in this neighborhood. This causeway
was so deeply bedded with stone, so properly raised above the
level of the soil, and so well drained, that it has, in some de-
gree, withstood fifty-four years of neglect and abuse ; and
might, with moderate attention, be rendered a solid and com-
fortable road. The space from Rood Green to Oak Woods
measures about three-quarters of a mile.

In 1727 William Henry Cane, B.D., became vicar, and,
among several alterations and repairs, new built the back front
of the vicarage-house.

On February ist, 1740, Buncombe Bristowe, D.D., was insti-
tuted to this living. What benefactions this vicar bestowed on
the parish will be best explained by the following passages
from his will: — "Item, I hereby give and bequeath to the
minister and church-wardens of the parish of Selbourn, in the
county of Southampton, a mahogany table, which I have or-
dered to be made for the celebration of the Holy Communion ;
and also the sum of thirty pounds, in trust, to be applied in
manner following ; that is, ten pounds towards the charge of
erecting a gallery at the west end of the church ; and ten
pounds to be laid out for cloathing, and such like necessaries,
among the poor (and especially among the ancient and infirm)
of the said parish : and the remaining ten pounds to be dis-
tributed in bread, at twenty shillings a week, at the discretion
of John White, Esq., or any of his family, who shall be resi-
dent in the said parish."

On November 12th, 1758, Andrew Etty, B.D., became vicar.
Among many useful repairs he new roofed the body of the
vicarage-house ; and wainscoted, up to the bottom of the win-
dows, the whole of the chancel ; to the neatness and decency
of which he always paid the most exact attention.

On September 25th, 1784, Christopher Taylor, B.D., was
inducted into the vicarage of Selborne.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 259

Notes

^ At Bene's or Bin's parsonage there is a house and stout barn, and seven
acres of glebe; Bene's parsonage is three miles from the church. — G. W.

2 See "Godwin de Praesulibus," Folio Cant. 1743, p. 239. — G. W.

3 " Such legacies were very common in former times, before any effectual
laws were made for the repairs of highways." Sir John Culliwi's Hawsted,
p. 15. — G. W.

LETTER VII

I SHALL now proceed to the Priory, which is undoubtedly the
most interesting part of our history.

The Priory of Selborne was founded by Peter de la Roche,
or de Rupibus,^ one of those accomplished foreigners that
resorted to the court of King John, where they were usually
caressed, and met with a more favorable reception than ought,
in prudence, to have been shown by any monarch to strangers.
This adventurer was a Poictevin by birth, had been bred to
arms in his youth, and distinguished by knighthood. His-
torians all agree not to speak very favorably of this remark-
able man ; they allow that he was possessed of courage and
fine abilities, but then they charge him with arbitrary princi-
ples, and violent conduct. By his insinuating manners he soon
rose high in the favor of John ; and in 1205, early in the reign
of that prince, was appointed bishop of Winchester. In 12 14,
he became lord chief justiciary of England, the first magistrate
of the state, and a kind of viceroy, on whom depended all the
civil affairs in the kingdom. After the death of John, and dur-
ing the minority of his son Henry, this prelate took upon him
the entire management of the realm, and was soon appointed
protector of the king and kingdom.

The barons saw with indignation a stranger possessed of all
the power and influence, to part of which they thought they
had a claim ; they therefore entered into an association against
him, and determined to wrest some of that authority from him,
which he had so unreasonably usurped. The bishop discerned
the storm at a distance ; and, prudently resolving to give way
to that torrent of envy which he knew not how to withstand.

26o WHITE

withdrew quietly to the Holy Land, where he resided some
time.

At this juncture a very small part of Palestine remained in
the hands of the Christians ; they had been by Saladin dis-
possessed of Jerusalem, and all the internal parts, near forty
years before ; and with difficulty maintained some maritime
towns and garrisons ; yet the busy and enterprising spirit of
De Rupibus could not be at rest ; he distinguished himself by
the splendor and magnificence of his expenses, and amused
his mind by strengthening fortresses and castles, and by re-
moving and endowing of churches. Before his expedition to
the East he had signalized himself as the founder of convents,
and as a benefactor to hospitals and monasteries.

In the year 1231 he returned again to England; and the
very next year, in 1232, began to build and endow the Priory
of Selborne. As this great work followed so close upon his
return, it is not improbable that it was the result of a vow made
during his voyage, and especially as it was dedicated to the
Virgin Mary. Why the bishop made choice of Selborne for
the scene of his munificence can never be determined now ;
it can only be said that the parish was in his diocese, and lay
almost midway between Winchester and Farnham, or South
Waltham and Farnham ; from either of which places he could
without much trouble overlook his workmen, and observe what
progress they made ; and that the situation was retired, with
a stream running by it, and sequestered from the world, amidst
woods and meadows, and so far proper for the site of a relig-
ious house.2

The first person with whom the founder treated about the
purchase of land was Jacobus de Achangre, or Ochangre, a
gentleman of property who resided in that hamlet, and, as
appears, at the house now called Oakhanger House. With
him he agreed for a croft, or little close of land, known by the
name of La liega, or La lyge, which was to be the immediate
site of the Priory.

De Achangre also accommodated the bishop at the same
instant with three more adjoining crofts, which for a time was
all the footing that this institution obtained in the parish. The
seller in the conveyance says, " Warantizabimus, defendemus,

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 261

et aequietabimus contra oinnes gentes ; " viz., " We will warrant
the thing sold against all claims from any quarter." In
modern conveyancing this would be termed a covenant for
further assurance. Afterwards is added — " Pro hac autem
donacione, etc., dedit mihi pred. Episcopus sexdecem marcas
argenti in Gersuniam^' i.e. " The bishop gave me sixteen sil-
ver marks as a consideration for the thing purchased."

As the grant from Jac. de Achangre was without date,^ and
the next is circumstanced in the same manner, we cannot say
exactly what interval there was between the two purchases ;
but we find that Jacobus de Nortun, a neighboring gentleman,
also soon sold to the bishop of Winchester some adjoining
grounds, through which our stream passes, that the Priory
might be accommodated with a mill, which was a common
necessary appendage to every manor ; he also allowed access
to these lands by a road for carts and wagons. — "Jacobus
de Nortun concedit Petro Winton episcopo totum cursum aque
que descendit de Molendino de Durton usq ; ad boscum Will.
Mauduit, et croftam terre vocat : Edriche croft, cum extensione
ejusdem et abuttamentis ; ad fundandam domum religiosam
de ordine Sti. Augustini. Concedit etiam viam ad carros, et
caretas," etc. This vale, down which runs the brook, is now
called the Long Lith, or Lyth. Bating the following par-
ticular expression, this grant runs much in the style of the
former : " Dedit mihi episcopus predictus triginta quinque
marcas argenti ad me acqiiietandum versus JndcBos ; " that is,
" The bishop advanced me thirty-five marks of silver to pay
my debts to the Jews," who were then the only lenders of
money.

Finding himself still straitened for room, the founder ap-
plied to his royal master, Henry, who was graciously pleased to
bestow certain lands in the manor of Selborne on the new Priory
of his favorite minister. These grounds had been the property
of Stephen de Lucy ; and, abutting upon the narrow limits of
the convent, became a very commodious and agreeable acqui-
sition. This grant, I find, was made on March 9th, in the
eighteenth year of Henry, viz., 1234, being two years after
the foundation of the monastery. The royal donor bestowed
his favor with good grace, by adding to it almost every immu-

262 WHITE

nity and privilege that could have been specified in the law-
language of the times. — " Quare volumus prior, etc., habeant
totam terram, etc., cum omnibus libertatibus in bosco et piano,
in viis et semitis, pratis et pascuis ; aquis et piscariis ; infra
burgum, et extra burgum, cum soka et saca, Thol et Them,
Infangenethef et Utfangenethef, et hamsocne et blodwite, et
pecunia que dari solet pro murdro et forstal, et flemenestrick,
et cum quietancia de omni scotto et geldo, et de omnibus
auxiliis regum, vicecomitum, et omn : ministralium suorum ; et
hidagio et exercitibus, et scutagiis, et tallagiis, et shiris et hun-
dredis, et placitis et querelis, et warda et wardpeny, et opibus
castellorum et pontium, et clausuris parcorum, et omni carcio
et sumagio, et domor : regal : edificatione, et omnimoda repa-
ratione, et cum omnibus aliis libertatibus." This grant was
made out by Richard bishop of Chichester, then chancellor, at
the town of Northampton, before the lord chief justiciary, who
was the founder himself.

The charter of foundation of the Priory, dated 1233, comes
next in order to be considered ; but being of some length, I
shall not interrupt my narrative by placing it here. This my
copy, taken from the original, I have compared with Dugdale's
copy, and find that they perfectly agree ; except that in the
latter the preamble and the names of the witnesses are omitted.
Yet I think it proper to quote a passage from this charter :
" Et ipsa domus religiosa a aijuslibet alterius domils religioscB
subjectione libera permaneat, et in omnibus absoluta," to show
how much Dugdale was mistaken when he inserted Selborne
among the alie)i priories ; forgetting that this disposition of
the convent contradicted the grant that he had published. In
the " Monasticon Anglicanum," in English, p. 1 19, is part of
his catalogue of alien priories, suppressed 2 Henry V., viz.,
1414, where may be seen as follows : —

S.

Sele, Sussex,

SELEBURN.

S/it'rdttrn.

This appeared to me from the first to have been an over-
sight, before I had seen my authentic evidences. For priories
alien, a few conventual ones excepted, were little better than

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 263

granges to foreign abbeys, and their priors little more than bail-
iffs removable at will; whereas the Priory of Selborne pos-
sessed the valuable estates and manors of Selborne, Achangre,
Norton, Brompden, Bassinges, Basingstoke, and Natele ; and
the prior challenged the right of pillory, thurcet, and furcas,
and every manorial privilege.

I find next a grant from Jo. de Venur, or Venuz, to the prior
of Selborne, — " deto ta mora [a moor or bog] ubi Beme
oritur, usque ad campum vivarii, et de prato voc. Sydenmeade
cum abutt : et de cursu aque molendini." And also a grant in
reversion "unius virgate terre " (a yard land), in Achangre at
the death of Richard Actedene his sister's husband, who had
no child. He was to present a pair of gloves of one penny
value to the prior and canons, to be given annually by the said
Richard ; and to quit all claim to the said lands in reversion,
provided the prior and canons would engage annually to pay
to the king, through the hands of his bailiffs of Aulton, ten
shillings at four quarterly payments, " pro omnibus serviciis,
consuetudinibus, exactionibus, et demandis."

This Jo. de Venur was a man of property at Oakhanger, and
lived probably at the spot now called Chapel Farm. The grant
bears date the 17th year of the reign of Henry HI. (viz., 1233).

It would be tedious to enumerate every little grant for lands
or tenements that might be produced from my vouchers. I
shall therefore pass over all such for the present, and conclude
this letter with a remark that must strike every thinking per-
son with some degree of wonder. No sooner had a monastic
institution got a footing, but the neighborhood began to be
touched with a secret and religious awe. Every person round
was desirous to promote so good a work ; and either by sale,
by grant, or by gift in reversion, was ambitious of appearing
a benefactor. They who had not lands to spare gave roads
to accommodate the infant foundation. The religious were not
backward in keeping up this pious propensity, which they ob-
served so readily influenced the breasts of men. Thus did the
more opulent monasteries add house to house, and field to field,
and by degrees manor to manor, till at last " there was no place
left ; " but every district around became appropriated to the
purposes of their founders, and every precinct was drawn into
the vortex.

264 WHITE

Notes

* See "Godwin de Prassulibus Angliae." Folio. London, 1743, p. 217.
— G. W.

2 The institution at Selborne was a priory of black canons of the order
of St. Augustine, called also canons regular. Regular canons were such as
lived in a conventual manner under one roof, had a common refectory and
dormitory, and were bound by vows to observe the rules and statutes of their
order : in fine, they were a kind of religious, whose discipline was less rigid
than the monks. The chief rule of these canons was that of St. Augustine,
who was constituted bishop of Hippo, a.d. 395 ; but they were not brought
into England till after the conquest ; and seem not to have obtained the
appellation of Augustine canons till some years after. Their habit was a
long black cassock, with a white rochet over it ; and over that a black cloak
and hood. The monks were always shaved ; but these canons wore their
hair and beards, and caps on their heads. There were of these canons, and
women of the same order called Canonesses, about 175 houses. — G. W.

3 The custom of affixing dates to deeds was not become general in the
reign of Henry HI. — G. W.

LETTER VIII

Our forefathers in this village were no doubt as busy and
bustling, and as important, as ourselves : yet have their names
and transactions been forgotten from century to century, and
have sunk into oblivion ; nor has this happened only to the
vulgar, but even to men remarkable and famous in their gen-
eration. I was led into this train of thinking by linding in my
vouchers that Sir Adam Gurdon was an inhabitant of Selborne,
and a man of the first rank and property in the parish. By
Sir Adam Gurdon I would be understood to mean that leading
and accomplished malcontent in the Mountfort faction, who
distinguished himself by his daring conduct in the reign of
Henry III. The first that we hear of this person in my papers
is that with two others he was bailiff of Alton before the six-
teenth of Henry III., viz., about 123 1, and then not knighted.
Who Gurdon was, and whence he came, does not appear : yet
there is reason to suspect that he was originally a mere soldier
of fortune, who had raised himself by marrying women of
property. The name of Gurdon does not seem to be known
in the south ; but there is a name so like it in an adjoining
kingdom, and which belongs to two or three noble families,

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 265

that it is probable this remarkable person was a North Briton ;
and the more so, since the Christian name of Adam is a dis-
tinguished one to this day among the family of the Gordons.
But, be this as it may. Sir Adam Gurdon has been noticed by
all the writers of English history for his bold disposition and
disaffected spirit, in that he not only figured during the suc-
cessful rebellion of Leicester but kept up the war after the de-
feat and death of that baron, entrenching himself in the woods
of Hampshire, towards the town of Farnham. After the battle
of Evesham, in which Mountfort fell, in the year 1265, Gur-
don might not think it safe to return to his house for fear of
a surprise ; but cautiously fortified himself amidst the forests
and wood-lands with which he was so well acquainted. Prince
Edward, desirous of putting an end to the troubles which had
so long harassed the kingdom, pursued the arch-rebel into his
fastnesses, attacked his camp, leaped over the entrenchments,
and, singling out Gurdon, ran him down, wounded him, and
took him prisoner.^

There is not perhaps in all history a more remarkable in-
stance of command of temper, and magnanimity, than this
before us : that a young prince, in the moment of victory,
when he had the fell adversary of the crown and royal family
at his mercy, should be able to withhold his hand from that
vengeance which the vanquished so well deserved. A cow-
ardly disposition would have been blinded by resentment ;
but this gallant heir apparent saw at once a method of con-
verting a most desperate foe into a lasting friend. He raised
the fallen veteran from the ground, he pardoned him, he
admitted him into his confidence, and introduced him to the
queen, then lying at Guildford, that very evening. This un-
merited and unexpected lenity melted the heart of the rugged
Gurdon at once ; he became in an instant a loyal and useful
subject, trusted and employed in matters of moment by
Edward when king, and confided in till the day of his death.

Note
^ M. Paris, p. 675, and Triveti Annale.

266 WHITE

LETTER IX

It has been hinted in a former letter that Sir Adam Gur-
don had availed himself by marrying women of property.
By my evidences it appears that he had three wives, and
probably in the following order : Constantia, Ameria, and
Agnes. The first of these ladies, who was the companion of
his middle life, seems to have been a person of considerable
fortune, which she inherited from Thomas Makerel, a gentle-
man of Selborne, who was either her father or uncle. The
second, Ameria, calls herself the quondam wife of Sir Adam,
" quae fui uxor," etc., and talks of her sons under age. Now
Gurdon had no son : and beside, Agnes, in another document,
says, "Ego Agnes quondam uxor Domini Adcs Gurdon in
pura et ligea viduitate mea : " but Gurdon could not leave
two widows ; and therefore it seems probable that he had
been divorced from Ameria, who afterwards married and had
sons. By Agnes Sir Adam had a daughter Johanna, who
was his heiress, to whom Agnes in her lifetime surrendered
part of her jointure : he had also a bastard son.

Sir Adam seems to have inhabited the house now called
Temple, lying about two miles east of the church, which had
been the property of Thomas Makerel.

In the year 1262 he petitioned the prior of Selborne in his
own name, and that of his wife Constantia only, for leave to
build him an oratory in his manor-house, "in curia sua."
Licenses of this sort were frequently obtained by men of fort-
une and rank from the bishop of the diocese, the archbishop,
and sometimes, as I have seen instances, from the Pope ; not
only for convenience' sake, and on account of distance, and
the badness of the roads, but as a matter of state and dis-
tinction. Why the owner should apply to the prior, in prefer-
ence to the bishop of the diocese, and how the former became
competent to such a grant, I cannot say ; but that the priors
of Selborne did take that privilege is plain, because some years
afterwards, in 1280, Prior Richard granted to Henry Water-
ford and his wife Nicholaa, a license to build art oratory in
their court-house, " curia sua de Waterford," in which they

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 26/

might celebrate divine service, saving the rights of the mother
church of Basynges. Yet all the while the prior of Selborne
grants with such reserve and caution, as if in doubt of his
power, and leaves Gurdon and his lady answerable in future
to the bishop, or his ordinary, or to the vicar for the time
being, in case they should infringe the rights of the mother
church of Selborne.

The manor-house, called " Temple," is at present a single
building, running in length from south to north, and has been
occupied as a common farmhouse from time immemorial. The
south end is modern, and consists of a brewhouse, and then a
kitchen. The middle part is a hall twenty-seven feet in length
and nineteen feet in breadth ; and has been formerly open to
the top, but there is now a floor above it, and also a chimney
in the western wall. The roofing consists of strong massive
rafter work ornamented with carved roses. I have often looked
for the lamb and flag, the arms of the Knights Templars, with-
out success ; but in one corner found a fox with a goose on his
back, so coarsely executed that it required some attention to
make out the device.

Beyond the hall to the north is a small parlor with a vast
heavy stone chimney-piece, and at the end of all the chapel or
oratory, whose massive thick walls and narrow windows at once
bespeak great antiquity. This room is only sixteen feet by six-
teen feet eight inches, and full seventeen feet nine inches in
height. The ceiling is formed of vast joists, placed only five
or six inches apart. Modern delicacy would not much approve
of such a place of worship ; for it has at present much more
the appearance of a dungeon than of a room fit for the recep-
tion of people of condition. The field on which this oratory
abuts is called Chapel Field. The situation of this house is very
particular, for it stands upon the immediate verge of a steep,
abrupt hill.

Not many years since this place was used for a hop-kiln, and
was divided into two stories by a loft, part of which remains
at present and makes it convenient for peat and turf, with
which it is stowed.

268 . WHITE

LETTER X

The Priory at times was much obliged to Gurdon and his
family. As Sir Adam began to advance in years he found his
mind influenced by the prevailing opinion of the reasonableness
and efficacy of prayers for the dead ; and therefore, in con-
junction with his wife Constantia, in the year 1271, granted to
the prior and convent of Selborne all his right and claim to a
certain place, placea, called " La Playstow," in the village
aforesaid, " in liberam, ptiram, et perpetiiavt elemosmam."
This Pleystow,^ locus liidorum, or play-place, is a level area
near the church of about forty-four yards by thirty-six, and is
known now by the name of the Plestor.^

It continues still, as it was in old times, to be the scene of
recreation for the youths and children of the neighborhood ;
and impresses an idea on the mind that this village, even in
Saxon times, could not be the most abject of places, when the
inhabitants thought proper to assign so spacious a spot for the
sports and amusements of its young people.^

As soon as the prior became possessed of this piece of
ground, he procured a charter for a market "* from King
Henry III., and began to erect houses and stalls, " seldas,"
around it. From this period Selborne became a market town ;
but how long it enjoyed that privilege does not appear. At
the same time, Gurdon reserved to himself, and his heirs, a
way through the said Plestor to a tenement and some crofts
at the upper end, abutting on the south corner of the church-
yard. This was in old days the manorial house of the street
manor, though now a poor cottage, and is known at present
by the modern name of Elhot's. Sir Adam also did, for the
health of his own soul and that of his wife Constantia, their
predecessors and successors, grant to the prior and canons
quiet possession of all the tenements and gardens, " ciirtilla-
gia" which they had built and laid out on the lands in Sel-
borne, on which he and his vassals, "homines,'' had undoubted
right of common ; and moreover did grant to the convent
the full privilege of that right of common, and empowered
the religious to build tenements and make gardens along the
king's highway in the village of Selborne.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 269

From circumstances put together, it appears that the above
were the first grants obtained by the Priory in the village of
Selborne after it had subsisted about thirty-nine years ; more-
over, they explain the nature of the mixed manor still remain-
ing in and about the village, where one field or tenement shall
belong to Magdalen College in the University of Oxford, and
the next to Norton Powlet, Esq., of Rotherfield House, and so
down the whole street. The case was, that the whole was
once the property of Gurdon, till he made his grants to the
convent, since which some belongs to the successors of Gurdon
in the manor, and some to the college ; and this is the occasion
of the strange jumble of property. It is remarkable that the
tenement and crofts which Sir Adam reserved at the time of
granting the Plestor should still remain a part of the Gurdon
Manor, though so desirable an addition to the vicarage, that
is not as yet possessed of one inch of glebe at home ; but of
late, viz., in January 1785, Magdalen College purchased that
little estate, which is life-holding, in reversion, for the gener-
ous purpose of bestowing it, and its lands, being twelve acres
(three of which abut on the church-yard and vicarage garden)
as an improvement hereafter to the living, and an eligible
advantage to future incumbents.

The year after Gurdon had bestowed the Plestor on the
Priory, viz., in 1272, Henry HI., King of England, died, and
was succeeded by his son Edward. This magnanimous prince
continued his regard for Sir Adam, whom he esteemed as a
brave man, and made him warden, " ciistos" of the forest of
Wolmer.^ Though little emolument might hang to this ap-
pointment, yet are there reasons why it might be highly accept-
able ; and, in a few reigns after, it was given to princes of the
blood. ^ In old days gentry resided more at home on their
estates, and, having fewer resources of elegant indoor amuse-
ment, spent most of their leisure hours in the field and the
pleasures of the chase. A large domain, therefore, at little
more than a mile distance, and well stocked with game, must
have been a very eligible acquisition, affording him influence
as well as entertainment ; and especially as the manorial house
of Temple, by its exalted situation, could command a view of
near two-thirds of the forest.

270 WHITE

That Gurdon, who had lived some years the life of an out-
law and at the head of an army of insurgents, was for a con-
siderable time in high rebellion against his sovereign, should
have been guilty of some outrages, and should have committed
some depredations, is by no means matter of wonder. Accord-
ingly we find a distringas against him, ordering him to restore
to the bishop of Winchester some of the temporalities of that
see, which he had taken by violence and detained, viz., some
lands in Hocheleye, and a mill.''' By a breve ^ or writ, from the
king, he is also enjoined to readmit the bishop of Winchester,
and his tenants of the parish and town of Farnham, to pasture
their horses, and other larger cattle, ^' averia,'' in the forest of
Wolmer, as has been the usage from time immemorial. This
writ is dated in the tenth year of the reign of Edward, viz.,
1282.

All the king's writs directed to Gurdon are addressed in the
following manner, " Edwardus Dei gratia, etc., dilecto et fideli
suo Ade Gurdon salutem ; " and again, "Custodi foreste sue
de Wolvemere."

In the year 1293 a quarrel between the crews of an Eng-
lish and a Norman ship about some trifle brought on by
degrees such serious consequences, that in 1293 a war broke
out between the two nations. The French king, Philip the
Hardy, gained some advantages in Gascony ; and, not con-
tent with those, threatened England with an invasion, and by
a sudden attempt took and burnt Dover.

Upon this emergency, Edward sent a writ to Gurdon, order-
ing him and four others to enlist three thousand soldiers in the
counties of Surrey, Dorset, and Wiltshire, able-bodied men,
" tarn sagittare quam balistare potentes ; " and to see that they
were marched by the feast of All Saints, to Winchelsea, there
to be embarked aboard the king's transports.

The occasion of this armament appears also from a sum-
mons to the bishop of Winchester to Parliament, part of which
I shall transcribe on account of the insolent menace which is
said therein to have been denounced against the English Ian-,
guage : — " qualiter rex Franciae de terra nostra Gascon nos
fraudulenter et cautelose decepit, eam nobis nequiter deti-
nendo . . . vero predictis fraude et nequitia non contentus,

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 271

ad expugnationem regni nostri classe maxima et bellatorum
copiosa multitudine congregatis, cum quibus regniim nostrum
et regni ejusdem incolas hostiliter jam invasurus, lingiiam
Anglicain si concepte iniquitatis proposito detestabili potestas
correspondeat, quod Deus avertat omnino de terra delere pro-
ponit" Dated 30th September, in the year of King Edward's
reign xxiii.^

The above are the last traces that I can discover of Gurdon's
appearing and acting in public. The first notice that my evi-
dences give of him is that in 1232, being the i6th of Henry
III., he was the king's bailiff, with others, for the town of
Alton. Now, from 1232 to 1295 is a space of sixty-three
years, a long period for one man to be employed in active life !
Should any one doubt whether all these particulars can relate
to one and the same person, I should wish him to attend to the
following reasons why they might. In the first place, the docu-
ments from the Priory mention but one Sir Adam Gurdon, who
had no son lawfully begotten ; and in the next, we are to recol-
lect that he must have probably been a man of uncommon
vigor, both of mind and body, since no one unsupported by
such accomplishments could have engaged in such adventures,
or could have borne up against the difficulties which he some-
times must have encountered ; and moreover, we have modern
instances of persons that have maintained their abilities for
near that period.

Were we to suppose Gurdon to be only twenty years of age
in 1232, in 1295 he would be eighty-three; after which ad-
vanced period it could not be expected that he should live
long. From the silence, therefore, of my evidences, it seems
probable that this extraordinary person finished his life in
peace, not long after, at his mansion of Temple. Gurdon's
seal had for its device — a man, with a helmet on his head,
drawing a cross-bow ; the legend, ''Sigilliun Ade de Gurdon ; "
his arms were, " Goulis, iii floures argent issant de testes de
leopards." ^

If the stout and unsubmitting spirit of Gurdon could be so
much influenced by the belief and superstition of the times,
much more might the hearts of his ladies and daughter. And
accordingly we find that Ameria, by the consent and advice

272 WHITE

of her sons, though said to be all under age, makes a grant
forever of some lands down by the stream at Durton ; and
also of her right of the common of Durton itself.^'' Johanna,
the daughter and heiress of Sir Adam, was married, I find, to
Richard Achard; she also grants to the prior and convent
lands and tenements in the village of Selborne, which her
father obtained from Thomas Makerel ; and also all her goods
and chattels in Selborne for the consideration of two hundred
pounds sterling. This last business was transacted in the first
year of Edward II., viz., 1307. It has been observed before
that Gurdon had a natural son ; this person was called by the
name of John Dastard, alias Wastard, but more probably Bas-
tard ; since bastardy, in those days, was not deemed any dis-
grace, though dastardy was esteemed the greatest. He was
married to Gunnorie Duncun ; and had a tenement and some
land granted him in Selborne by his sister Johanna.

Notes

^ In Saxon Plegestow, or Plegstow. — G. W.

2 At this juncture probably the vast oak was planted by the prior, as an
ornament to his new-acquired market-place. According to this supposition
the oak was aged 432 years when blown down. — G. W.

3 For more circumstances respecting the Plestor, see Letter II. to Mr.
Pennant. — G. W.

* Bishop Tanner, in his " Notitia Monastica," has made a mistake re-
specting the market and fair at Selborne ; for in his references to Dodsworth,
cart. 54 Hen. III. m. 3., he says, '•'• De inercatu, et feria de Selebttrn.'''' But
this reference is wrong; for, instead of Seleburn, it proves that the place
there meant was Lekeborne, or Legeborne, in the county of Lincoln. This
error was copied from the index of the Cat. MSS. Angl. It does not appear
that there ever was a chartered fair at Selborne. For several particulars
respecting the present fair at Selborne, see Letter XXVI. of these Antiqui-
ties.—G. W.

^ Since the letters respecting Wolmer Forest and Aylesholt were printed,
the author has been favored with the following extracts : —

"In the 'Act of Resumption, i Hen. VII.' it was provided, that it be not
prejudicial to ' Harry at Lode,' ranger of our forest of Wolmere, to him by
oure letters patents before tyme gevyn." — Rolls of Pari., Vol. VI., p. 370.

" In the 1 1 Hen. VII., 1495, ' Warlham (Ward le Ham) and the office of
forest (forester) of Wolmere,' were held by Edmund, duke of Suffolk." —
Rolls, ib. 474.

"Act of general pardon, 14 Hen. VIII., 1523, not to extend to ' Rich. Bp.
of Wynton (Bishop Fox) for any seizure or forfeiture of liberties, etc., within
the forest of Wolmer, Alysholt, and Newe Forest ; nor to any person for

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 273

waste, etc., within the manor of Wardlam, or parish of Wardlam (Ward le
Ham) ; nor to abusing, etc., of any ofiSce or fee, within the said forests of
Wolmer or Alysholt, or the said park of Wardlam.' " County Suth't. —
Rolls prefixt to ist Vol. of Journals of the Lords., p. xciii. b.

To these may be added some other particulars, taken from a book lately
published, entitled "An Account of all the Manors, Messuages, Lands, etc.,
in the Different Counties of England and Wales, held by Lease from the
Crown ; as contained in the Report of the Commissioners appointed to
inquire into the State and Condition of the Royal Forests, etc." London,

17S7.

" Southampton.

P. 64. "A fee-farm rent of ;^3i is. \\d. out of the manors of East and
West Ward le Ham ; and also the office of lieutenant or keeper of the forest
or chase of Aliceholt, and Wolmer, with all offices, fees, commodities, and
privileges thereto belonging.

"Names of lessees, William, Earl of Dartmouth, and others (in trust).

"Date of the last lease, March 23rd, 1780; granted for such term as
would fill up the subsisting term to 31 years.

"Expiration March 23rd, 181 1.

'•'Southampton.
" Hundreds — Selborne and Finchdeane.
" Honors and manors, etc.

" Aliceholt Forest, three parks there.

" Bensted and Kingsley ; a petition of the parishioners concerning the
three parks in Aliceholt forest."

William, first earl of Dartmouth, and paternal grandfather to the present
Lord Stawel, was a lessee of the forests of Aliceholt and Wolmer before
brigadier-general Emanuel Scroope Howe. — G. W.

^ See Letter II. of these Antiquities. — G. W.

■^ Hocheleye, now spelt Hawkley, is in the hundred of Selborne, and has
a mill at this day. — G. W.

* Reg. Winton, Stratford, but query Stratford ; for Stratford was not
bishop of Winton till 1323, near thirty years afterwards. — G. W.

^ From the collection of Thomas Martin, Esq., in the " Antiquarian Rep-
ertory'," p. 109, No. XXXI. — G. W.

1° Durton, now called Dorton, is still a common for the copyholders of
Selborne Manor. — G. W.

LETTER XI

The Knights Templars,^ who have been mentioned in a
former letter, had considerable property in Selborne ; and also
a preceptory at Sudington, now called Southington, a hamlet
lying one mile to the east of the village. Bishop Tanner men-
tions only two such houses of the Templars in all the county
19

274 WHITE

of Southampton, viz., Godesfield, founded by Henry de Blois,
bishop of Winchester, and South Badeisley, a preceptory of
the Knights Templars, and afterwards of St. John of Jeru-
salem, valued at one hundred and eighteen pounds sixteen
shillings and sevenpence per annum. Here then was a
preceptory unnoticed by antiquaries, between the village and
Temple. Whatever the edifice of the preceptory might have
been, it has long since been dilapidated ; and the whole ham-
let contains now only one mean farmhouse, though there were
two in the memory of man.

It has been usual for the religious of different orders to fall
into great dissensions, and especially when they were near
neighbors. Instances of this sort we have heard of between
the monks of Canterbury ; and again between the old abbey
of St. Swythun, and the comparatively new minster of Hyde
in the city of Winchester.^ These feuds arose probably from
different orders being crowded within the narrow limits of a
city, or garrison town, where every inch of ground was pre-
cious and an object of contention. But with us, as far as my
evidences extend, and while Robert Saunford was master,^
and Richard Carpenter was preceptor, the Templars and the
priors lived in an intercourse of mutual good offices.

My papers mention three transactions, the exact time of
which cannot be ascertained, because they fell out before
dates were usually inserted ; though probably they happened
about the middle of the thirteenth century, not long after
Saunford became master. The first of these is that the Tem-
plars shall pay to the Priory of Selborne, annually, the sum
of ten shillings at two half-yearly payments from their cham-
ber, " camera," at Sudington, " per manum preceptoris, vel
ballivi nostri, qui pro tempore fuerit ibidem," till they can
provide the prior and canons with an equivalent in lands or
rents within four or five miles of the said convent. It is also
further agreed that, if the Templars shall be in arrears for
one year, then the prior shall be empowered to distrain upon
their live-stock in Bradeseth. The next matter was a grant
from Robert de Sunford to the Priory forever, of a good and
sufficient road, " cheminum," capable of admitting carriages,
and proper for the drift of their larger cattle, from the way

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 2/5

which extends from Sudington towards Blakemere, on to the
lands which the convent possesses in Bradeseth.

The third transaction (though for want of dates we cannot
say which happened first and which last) was a grant from
Robert Samford to the Priory of a tenement and its appurte-
nances in the village of Selborne, given to the Templars by
Americus de Vasci.* This property, by the manner of de-
scribing it, — " totum tenementum cum omnibus pertinentiis
suis, scilicet in terris, & hominibus, in pratis & pascuis, &
nemoribus," etc., seems to have been no inconsiderable pur-
chase, and was sold for two hundred marks sterling, to be
applied for the buying of more land for the support of the
holy war.

Prior John is mentioned as the person to whom Vasci's
land is conveyed. But in Willis's list there is no Prior John
till 1339, several years after the dissolution of the order of
the Templars in 13 12, so that, unless Willis is wrong, and
has omitted a Prior John since 1262 (that being the date of
his first prior), these transactions must have fallen out before
that date.

I find not the least traces of any concerns between Gurdon
and the Knights Templars ; but probably after his death his
daughter Johanna might have, and might bestow. Temple on
that order in support of the holy land ; and, moreover, she
seems to have been removing from Selborne, when she sold
her goods and chattels to the Priory, as mentioned above.

Temple, no doubt, did belong to the Knights, as may be
asserted, not only from its name, but also from another cor-
roborating circumstance of its being still a manor, tithe-free ;
"for, by virtue of their order," says Blackstone, "the lands
of the Knights Templars were privileged by the Pope with a
discharge from tithes."

Antiquaries have been much puzzled about the terms pre-
ceptores and preccptoritini, not being able to determine what
officer or edifice was meant. But perhaps all the while the
passage quoted above from one of my papers, " per manum
preceptoris vel ballivi nostri, qui pro tempore fuerit, ibidem,"
may help to explain the difficulty. For if it be allowed here
that preceptor and ballivus' are synonymous words, then the

2/6 WHITE

brother who took on him that office resided in the house of
the Templars at Sudington, a preceptory ; where he was their
preceptor, superintended their affairs, received their money,
and, as in the instance there mentioned, paid from their cham-
ber, ^'camera,'' as directed; so that, according to this expla-
nation, a preceptor was no other than a steward, and a precep-
toriiim was his residence. I am well aware that, according
to strict Latin, the vel should have been seii or sive, and the
order of the words *^ preceptoris nostri, vel ballivi, qui" — et
^^ ibidem'' should have been ibi ; ibidem necessarily having
reference to two or more persons ; but it will hardly be thought
fair to apply the niceties of classic rules to the Latinity of the
thirteenth century, the writers of which seem to have aimed
at nothing farther than to render themselves intelligible.

There is another remark that we have made, which, I think,
corroborates what has been advanced ; and that is, that Richard
Carpenter, preceptor of Sudington, at the time of the transac-
tions between the Templars and Selborne Priory, did always
sign last as a witness in the three deeds ; he calls himself
frater, it is true, among many other brothers, but subscribes
with a kind of deference, as if, for the time being, his office
rendered him an inferior in the community.^

Notes
1 The Military Orders of the Religious

The Knights Hospitalers of St. John of Jerusalem, afterwards called
Knights of Rhodes, now of Malta, came into England about the year i loo,
I Hen. I.

The Knights Templars came into England pretty early in Stephen''s reign,
which commenced 1135. The order was dissolved in 131 2, and their estates
given by Act of Parliament to the Hospitalers in 1323 (all in Edw. H.),
though many of their estates were never actually enjoyed by the said Hos-
pitalers.— Vid. Tanner, p. 24, 10.

The commanderies of the Hospitalers, and preceptories of Templars, were
each subordinate to the principal house of their respective religion in London.
Although these are the different denominations, which Tanner at p. 37
assigns to the cells of these different orders, yet throughout the work very
frequent instances occur of preceptories attributed to the Hospitalers ; and
if in some passages of "Notitia Monast." commanderies are attributed to the
Templars, it is only where the place afterwards became the property of the
Hospitalers, and so is there indifferently styled preceptory or commandery ;
see pp. 243, 263, 276, 577, 678. But, to account for the first observed inac-

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 2/7

curacy, it is probable the preceptories of the Templars, when given to the
Hospitalers, were still vulgarly, however, called by their old name of pre-
ceptories ; whereas in propriety societies of the Hospitalers were indeed
(as has been said) commanderies. And such deviation from the strictness
of expression in this case might occasion those societies of Hospitalers also
to be indifferently called preceptories, which had originally been vested in
them, having never belonged to the Templars at all. — See in Archer,
p. 609; Tanner, p. 300, col. i, 720, n. e.

It is observable that the very statute for the dissolution of the Hospitalers
holds the same language ; for there, in the enumeration of particulars occur
" commanderies, preceptories." Codex, p. 1 190. Now this intercommunity
of names, and that in an Act of Parliament too, made some of our ablest
antiquaries look upon a preceptory and commandery as strictly synonymous ;
accordingly we find Camden, in his " Britannia," explaining prasceptoria in
the text by a commandery in the margin, pp. 356, 510. — J. L.

Commandery, a manor or chief messuage with lands, etc., belonging to
the Priory of St. John of Jerusalem; and he who had the government of
such house was called the commander, who could not dispose of it but to
the use of the Priory, only taking thence his own sustenance, according
to his degree, who was usually a brother of the same Priory. — Cowell.
He adds (confounding these with preceptories) they are in many places
termed temples, as Temple Bruere in Lincolnshire, etc. Preceptories were
possessed by the more eminent sort of Templars, whom the chief master
created and called Praeceptores Templi. — Cowell, who refers to Stephens's
Dejtirisd. lib. iv. c. 10, no. 27.

Placita de juratis et assis coram Salom. de Roff et sociis suis justic.
Itiner. apud Wynton, etc., anno regni R. Edwardi fil. Reg. Hen. octavo. —
" et Magr. Milicie Templi in Angl. ht emendasse panis, et suis [cerevisias]
in Sodington, et nescint q°. war. et — et magist. Milicie Templi non ven io
distr." Chapter House, IVesiminster. — G. W.

2 NOTITIA MONASTICA, p. 155

" Winchester, Newminster. King Alfred founded here first only a house
and chapel for the learned monk Grimbald, whom he had brought out of
Flanders ; but afterwards projected, and by his will ordered, a noble church
or religious house to be built in the cemetery on the north side of the old
minster or cathedral, and designed that Grimbald should preside over it.
This was begun a.d. 901, and finished to the honor of the Holy Trinity,
Virgin Mary, and St. Peter, by his son King Edward, who placed therein
secular canons, but a.d. 963 they were expelled, and an abbot and monks
put in possession by Bishop Ethelwold.

" Now the churches and habitations of these two societies being so very
near together, the differences which were occasioned by their singing, bells,
and other matters arose to so great a height, that the religious of the new
monastery thought fit, about a.d. 1119, to remove to a better and more
quiet situation without the walls, on the north part of the city called Hyde,
where King Edward I., at the instance of Will. GiflTord, bishop of Winton,
founded a stately abbey for them. St. Peter was generally accounted patron,

2/8 WHITE

though it is sometimes called the monastery of St. Grimbald, and sometimes
of St. Barnabas," etc. — G. W.

A few years since a county bridewell, or house of correction, has been
built on the immediate site of Hyde Abbey. In digging up the old founda-
tions the workmen found the head of a crosier in good preservation. —
G. C. D.

8 Robert Saunforde was master of the Temple in 1241 ; Guido de Foresta
was the next in 1292. The former is fifth in a list of the masters, in a MS.
"Bib. Cotton. Nero. E. VI." — G. W.

* Americus Vasci, by his name, must have been an Italian, and had been
probably a soldier of fortune, and one of Gurdon's captains. Americus
Vespucio, the person who gave name to the new world, was a Florentine.
— G. W.

^ In two or three ancient records relating to St. Oswald's Hospital in the
city of Worcester, printed by Dr. Nash, pp. 227, 228, of his collections for
the history of Worcestershire, the words preceptorium and preceptoria signify
the mastership of the said hospital : " ad preceptorium sive magisterium
presentavit — preceptorii sive magisterii patronas . Vacavit dicta preceptoria
seu magisterium — ad preceptoriam et regimen dicti hospitalis — Te pre-
ceptorem sive magistrum prefecimus."

Where preceptorium denotes a building or apartment it may probably
mean the master's lodgings, or at least the preceptor's apartment, whatsoever
may have been the office or employment of the said preceptor.

A preceptor is mentioned inThoresby's "Ducatus Leodiensis," or "His-
tory of Leeds," p. 225, and a deed witnessed by the preceptor and chaplain
before dates were inserted. — Du Fresne's Supplement : " Preceptorias, prae-
dia preceptoribus assignata." Cowell, in his " Law Dictionary," enumerates
sixteen preceptoria, or preceptories, in England ; but Sudington is not
among them. — It is remarkable that Gurtlerus, in his "Historia Teni-
plariorum," Amstel. 1691, never once mentions the words preceptor or
preceptorium. — G. W.

LETTER XII

The ladies and daughter of Sir Adam Gurdon were not th^
only benefactresses to the Priory of Selborne ; for, in the year
1 28 1, Ela Longspee obtained masses to be performed for her
soul's health ; and the prior entered into an engagement that
one of the convent should every day say a special mass for-
ever for the said benefactress, whether living or dead. She
also engaged within five years to pay to the said convent one
hundred marks of silver for the support of a chantry and chantry
chaplain, who should perform his masses daily in the parish
church of Selborne.^ In the east end of the south aisle there

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 279

are two sharp-pointed Gothic niches ; one of these probably
was the place under which these masses were performed ;
and there is the more reason to suppose as much, because, till
within these thirty years, this space was fenced off with a
Gothic wooden railing, and was known by the name of the
South Chancel.^

The solicitude expressed by the donor plainly shows her piety
and firm persuasion of the efficacy of prayers for the dead ; for
she seems to have made every provision for the payment of
the sum stipulated within the appointed time, and to have felt
much anxiety lest her death, or the neglect of her executors
or assigns, might frustrate her intentions. — " Et si contingat
me in solucione perdicte pecunie annis predictis in parte aut
in toto deficere, quod absit ; concedo et obligo pro me et assigna-
tis meis, quod Vice-Comes . . . Oxon et . . . qui pro tempore
fuerint, per omnes terras et tenementa, et omnia bona mea
mobilia et immobilia ubicunque in balliva sua fuerint inventa
ad solucionem predictam faciendam possent nos compellere."
And again — " Et si contingat dictos religiosos labores seu
expensas facere circa predictam pecuniam, seu circa partem
dicte pecunie ; volo quod dictorum religiosorum impense et
labores levantur ita quod predicto priori vel uni canonicorum
suorum super hiis simplici verbo credatur sine alterius honere
probacionis ; et quod utrique predictorum virorum in unam
marcam argenti pro cujuslibet distrincione super me facienda
tenear. — Dat. apud Wareborn die sabati proxima ante fes-
tum St. Marci evangeliste, anno regni regis Edwardi tertio
decimo."^

But the reader, perhaps, would wish to be better informed
respecting this benefactress, of whom as yet he has heard no
particulars.

The Ela Longspee, therefore, above-mentioned, was a lady
of high birth and rank, and became countess to Thomas de
Newburgh, the sixth earl of Warwick : she was the second
daughter of the famous Ela Longspee, Countess of Salisbury,
by William Longspee, natural son of King Edward IL, by
Rosamond.

Our lady, following the steps of her illustrious mother,* " was
a great benefactress to the University of Oxford, to the canons

280 WHITE

of Oseney, the nuns of Godstow, and other religious houses in
Oxfordshire. She died very aged, in the year 1 300,^ and was
buried before the high altar in the abbey church of Oseney,
at the head of the tomb of Henry d'Oily, under a flat marble,
on which was inlaid her portraiture, in the habit of a vowess,
engraved on a copper-plate." — Edmondson's " History and
Genealogical Account of the Grevilles," p. 23.

Notes

^ A chantry was a chapel joined to some cathedral or parish church, and
endowed with annual revenues for the maintenance of one or more priests
to sing mass daily for the soul of the founder and others. — G. W.

2 For what is said more respecting this chantry, see Letter III. of these
Antiquities. — Mention is made of a Nicholas Langrish, capellanus de Sel-
borne, in the time of Henry VIII. Was he chantry-chaplain to Ela Longspee,
whose masses were probably continued to the time of the Reformation ?
More will be said of this person hereafter. — G. W.

^ Ancient deeds are often dated on a Sunday, having been executed in
churches and church-yards for the sake of notoriety, and for the conveniency
of procuring several witnesses to attest. — G. W.

* Ela Longspee, Countess of Salisbury, in 1232 founded a monastery at
Lacock, in the county of Wilts, and also another at Hendon, in the county
of Somerset, in her widowhood, to the honor of the Blessed Virgin and St.
Bernard. — Camden.

^ Thus she survived the foundation of her chantry at Selborne fifteen
years. About this lady and her mother consult Dugdale's " Baronage," i.
72, 175, 177; Dugdale's " Warwickshire," i. 383 ; Leland's "Itin.," ii. 45.—
G, W.

LETTER Xni

The reader is here presented with the titles of five forms
respecting the choosing of a prior. " Charta petens licen-
tiam elegendi prelatum a Domino episcopo Wintoniensi:" —
*' Forma licentie concesse : " — " Forma decreti post electionem
conficiendi : " — 108. " Modus procedendi ad electionem per
formam scrutinii : " — et " Forma ricte presentandi electum."
Such evidences are rare and curious, and throw great light
upon the general niotiastico-ecclesiastical history of this king-
dom, not yet sufficiently understood.

Jn the year 1324 there was an election for a prior at Selborne,

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 28 1

when, some difficulties occurring and a devolution taking place,
application was made to Stratford, who was bishop of Win-
chester at that time, and of course the visitor and patron of
the convent at the spot above-mentioned.^

An Extract from " Reg. Stratford." Winton.

P. 4. " Commissio facta sub-priori de Selebourne," by the
bishop enjoining him to preserve the discipline of the order in
the convent during the vacancy made by the late death of the
prior, (" nuper pastoris solatio destituta,") dated 4th kal. Maii.
ann. 2do sc. of his consecration. [Sc. 1324.]

P. 6. "CustodiaPrioratusdeSeleburnevacantis," committed

by the bishop to Nicholas de la , a layman, it belonging

to the bishop, " ratione vacationis ejusdem," in July 1324, ibid,
"negotium electionis de Selebourne. Acta coram Johanne
Episcopo, &c., 1324 in negotio electionis de fratre Waltero de
Insula concanonico prioratus de Selebourne," lately elected by
the sub-prior and convent, by way of scrutiny ; that it appeared
to the bishop, by certificate from the dean of Alton, that solemn
citation and proclamation had been made in the church of the
convent where the election was held that any who opposed the
said election or elected should appear. Some difficulties were
started, which the bishop overruled, and confirmed the election,
and admitted the new prior sub Jiac forma : —

" In Dei nomine Amen. Ego Johannes permissione divina,
&c., te Walterum de Insula ecclesie de Selebourne nostre dio-
ceseos nostrique patronatus vacantis, canonicum et cantorem,
virum utique providum, et discretum, litcrarum scientia pre-
ditum, vita moribus et conversatione merito commendatum, in
ordine sacerdotali et etate legitima constitutum, de legitime
matrimonio procreatum, in ordine et religione Sancti Augustini
de Selebourne expresse professum, in spiritualibus et tempo-
ralibus circumspectum, //^r^ nobis hac devoluto in hac parte, in
dicte ecclesie de Selebourne perfectum priorem ; curam et ad-
ministrationem ejusdem tibi in spiritualibus et temporalibus
committentes. Dat. apud Selebourne XIII. kalend. Augusti
anno supradicto."

There follows an order to the sub-prior and convent pro
obedientia :

282 WHITE

A mandate to Nicholas above-named to release the Priory
to the new prior :

A mandate for the induction of the new prior.

Note

^ Stratford was bishop of Winchester from 1323 to 1333, when he was
translated to Canterbury. — G. W.

LETTER XIV

"In the year 1373 Wykeham, bishop of Winchester, held
a visitation of his whole diocese ; not only of the secular clergy
through the several deaneries, but also of the monasteries, and
religious houses of all sorts, which he visited in person. The
next year he sent his commissioners with power to correct and
reform the several irregularities and abuses which he had dis-
covered in the course of his visitation.

" Some years afterwards, the bishop, having visited three
several times all the religious houses throughout his diocese,
and being well informed of the state and condition of each,
and of the particular abuses which required correction and
reformation, besides the orders which he had already given,
and the remedies which he had occasionally applied by his
commissioners, now issued his injunctions to each of them.
They were accommodated to their several exigencies, and
intended to correct the abuses introduced, and to recall them
all to a strict observation of the rules of their respective orders.
Many of these injunctions are still extant, and are evident
monuments of the care and attention with which he discharged
this part of his episcopal duty." ^

Some of these injunctions I shall here produce ; and they
are such as will not fail, I think, to give satisfaction to the
antiquary, both as never having been published before, and
as they are a curious picture of monastic irregularities at that
time.

The documents that I allude to are contained in the " Nota-
bilis Visitatio de Seleburne," held at the Priory of that place,
by Wykeham in person, in the year 1387.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 283

This evidence, in the original, is written on two skins of
parchment ; the one large, and the other smaller, and consists
of a preamble, thirty-six items, and a conclusion, which alto-
gether evince the patient investigation of the visitor, for which
he had always been so remarkable in all matters of moment,
and how much he had at heart the regularity of those institu-
tions, of whose efficacy in their prayers for the dead he was
so firmly persuaded. As the bishop was so much in earnest,
we may be assured that he had nothing in view but to correct
and reform what he found amiss, and was under no bias to
blacken or misrepresent as the commissioners of Thomas
Lord Cromwell seem in part to have done at the time of the
Reformation.^ We may therefore with reason suppose that
the bishop gives us an exact delineation of the morals and
manners of the canons of Selborne at that juncture; and that
what he found they had omitted he enjoins them ; and for
what they have done amiss, and contrary to their rules and
statutes, he reproves them ; and threatens them with punish-
ment suitable to their irregularities.

The visitatio is of considerable length, and cannot be intro-
duced into the body of this work ; we shall therefore refer the
reader to the Appendix, where he will find every particular,
while we shall take some notice, and make some remarks on
the most singular items as they occur.

In the preamble the visitor says — " Considering the charge
lying upon us, that your blood may not be required at our
hands, we came down to visit your Priory, as our office required :
and every time we repeated our visitation we found something
still not only contrary to regular rules but also repugnant to
religion and good reputation."

In the first article after the preamble — "he commands them
on their obedience, and on pain of the greater excommunica-
tion, to see that the canonical hours by night and by day be
sung in their choir, and the masses of the Blessed Mary, and
other accustomed masses, be celebrated at the proper hours
with devotion, and at moderate pauses; and that it be not
allowed to any to absent themselves from the hours and
masses, or to withdraw before they are finished."

Item 2nd. He enjoins them to observe that silence to which

284 WHITE

they are so strictly bound by the rule of St. Augustine at
stated times, and wholly to abstain from frivolous conversation.

Item 4th. " Not to permit such frequent passing of secular
people of both sexes through their convent, as if a thorough-
fare, from whence many disorders may and have arisen."

Item 5th. " To take care that the doors of their church
and priory be so attended to that no suspected and disorderly
females, 'suspectae et aJiae inhonestae,' pass through their choir
and cloister in the dark ; " and to see that the doors of their
church between the nave and the choir, and the gates of their
cloister opening into the fields, be constantly kept shut until
their first choir service is over in the morning, at dinner time,
and when they meet at their evening collation.^

Item 6th mentions that several of the canons are found to
be very ignorant and illiterate, and enjoins the prior to see
that they be better instructed by a proper master.

Item 8th. The canons are here accused of refusing to ac-
cept of their statutable clothing year by year, and of demand-
ing a certain specified sum of money, as if it were their annual
rent and due. This the bishop forbids, and orders that the
canons shall be clothed out of the revenue of the priory, and
the old garments be laid by in a chamber and given to the
poor according to the rule of St. Augustine.

In Item 9th is a complaint that some of the canons are given
to wander out of the precincts of the convent without leave ;
and that others ride to their manors and farms, under pretence
of inspecting the concerns of the society, when they please,
and stay as long as they please. But they are enjoined never
to stir either about their own private concerns or the business
of the convent without leave from the prior : and no canon is
to go alone, but to have a brave brother to accompany him.

The injunction in Item loth at this distance of time appears
rather ludicrous ; but the visitor seems to be very serious on
the occasion, and says that it has been evidently proved to him
that some of the canons, living dissolutely after the flesh, and
not after the spirit, sleep naked in their beds without their
breeches and shirts, "absque femoralibus et camisiis."* He
enjoins that these culprits shall be punished by severe fasting,
especially if they shall be found to be faulty a third time ; and

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 28$

threatens the prior and sub-prior with suspension if they do
not correct this enormity.

In Item nth the good bishop is very wroth with some of
the canons, whom he finds to be professed hunters and sports-
men, keeping hounds and pubHcly attending hunting-matches.
These pursuits, he says, occasion much dissipation, danger to
the soul and body, and frequent expense ; he, therefore, wish-
ing to extirpate this vice wholly from the convent, " radicibus
extirparc,'' does absolutely enjoin the canons never intention-
ally to be present at any public noisy tumultuous himtings ; or
to keep any hounds, by themselves or by others, openly or by
stealth, within the convent, or without.^

In Item 12th he forbids the canons in office to make their
business a plea for not attending the service of the choir ; since
by these means either divine worship is neglected or their
brother canons are overburdened.

By Item 14th we are informed that the original number of
canons at the Priory of Selborne was fourteen ; but that at
this visitation they were found to be let down to eleven. The
visitor therefore strongly and earnestly enjoins them that, with
all due speed and diligence, they should proceed to the elec-
tion of proper persons to fill up the vacancies, under pain of
the greater excommunication.

In Item 17th the prior and canons are accused of suffer-
ing, through neglect, notorious dilapidations to take place
among their manorial houses and tenements, and in the walls
and enclosures of the convent itself, to the shame and scandal
of the institution ; they are therefore enjoined, under pain of
suspension, to repair all defects within the space of six months.

Item 1 8th charges them with grievously burthening the
said Priory by means of sales, and grants of liveries ^ and
corrodies."

The bishop, in Item 19th, accuses the canons of neglect
and omission with respect to their perpetual chantry-services.

Item 20th. The visitor here conjures the prior and canons
not to withhold their original alms, '' eleemosynas ; " nor those
that they were enjoined to distribute for the good of the souls
of founders and benefactors ; he also strictly orders that the
fragments and broken victuals, both from the hall of their

286 WHITE

prior and their common refectory, should be carefully col-
lected together by their eleemosynarins, and given to the
poor without any diminution, the officer to be suspended for
neglect or omission.

Item 23rd. He bids them distribute their pittances, '' pitan-
cias,'' ^ regularly on obits, anniversaries, festivals, etc.

Item 25th. All and every one of the canons are hereby in-
hibited from standing godfather to any boy for the future,
"ne compatres alicujus piieri de cetero fieri presumatis,"
unless by express license from the bishop obtained ; because
from such relationship favor and affection, nepotism, and
undue influence arise, to the injury and detriment of religious
institutions.^

Item 26th. The visitor herein severely reprimands the
canons for appearing publicly in what would be called in the
universities an unstatutable manner, and for wearing of boots,
" caligse de Burneto, et sotttlarium — in ocrearum loco, ad
modum sotularium." ^'^

It is remarkable that the bishop expresses more warmth
against this than any other irregularity; and strictly enjoins
them, under pain of ecclesiastical censures, and even impris-
onment if necessary (a threat not made use of before), for
the future to wear boots, "ocreis seu botis," according to
the regular usage of their ancient order.

Item 29th. He here again, but with less earnestness, for-
bids them foppish ornaments, and the affectation of appear-
ing like beaux, with garments edged with costly furs, with
fringed gloves, and silken girdles trimmed with gold and
silver. It is remarkable that no punishment is annexed to
this injunction.

Item 31st. He here singly and severally forbids each
canon not admitted to a cure of souls to administer extreme
unction, or the sacrament, to clergy or laity ; or to perform
the service of matrimony, till he has taken out the license of
the parish priest.

Item 32nd. The bishop says in this item that he had ob-
served and found, in his several visitations, that the sacra-
mental plate and cloths of the altar, surplices, etc., were
sometimes left in such an uncleanly and disgusting condition

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 287

as to make the beholders shudder with horror : — " Quod ali-
quibus sunt horrori : " ^^ he therefore enjoins them for the
future to see that the plate, cloths, and vestments be kept
bright, clean, and in decent order : and, what must surprise
the reader, adds that he expects for the future that the
sacrist should provide for the sacrament good wine, pure and
unadulterated ; and not, as had often been the practice, that
which was sour, and tending to decay : — he says farther, that
it seems quite preposterous to omit in sacred matters that at-
tention to decent cleanliness, the neglect of which would dis-
grace a common convivial meeting.^^

Item 33rd says that, though the relics of saints, the plate,
holy vestments, and books of religious houses are forbidden
by canonical institutes to be pledged or lent out upon
pawn, yet, as the visitor finds this to be the case in his sev-
eral visitations, he therefore strictly enjoins the prior forth-
with to recall those pledges, and to restore them to the con-
vent ; and orders that all the papers and title-deeds thereto
belonging should be safely deposited, and kept under three
locks and keys.

In the course of the " Visitatio Notabilis " the constitutions
of Legate Ottobonus are frequently referred to. Ottobonus
was afterwards Pope Adrian V., and died in 1276. His con-
stitutions are in Lyndewood's "Provinciale," and were drawn
up in the 52nd of Henry III.

In the "Visitatio Notabilis" the usual punishment is fast-
ing on bread and beer ; and in cases of repeated delinquency
on bread and water. On these occasions qiiarta feria, et sexta
feria, are mentioned often, and are to be understood of the
days of the week numerically on which such punishment is
to be inflicted.

Notes

1 See Lowth's "Life of Wykeham." — G. W.

2 Letters of this sort from Dr. Layton to Thomas Lord Cromwell are still
extant. — G. W.

8 A collation was a meal or repast on a fast-day in lieu of a supper. —
G. W.

* The rule alluded to in Item loth, of not sleeping naked, was enjoined
the Knights Templars, who were also subject to the rules of St. Augustine.
See GuRTLERi, Hist. Templarioriitn. — G. W.

288 WHITE

^ Considering the strong propensity in human nature towards the pleasures
of the chase, it is not to be wondered that the canons of Canterbury should
languish after hunting, when from their situation, so near the precincts of
Wolmer Forest, the king's hounds must have been often in hearing, and
sometimes in sight from their windows. If the bishop was so offended at
these sporting canons, what would he have said to our modern fox-hunting
divines! — G. W.

^ " Liberationes, or liberaturse, allowances of corn, etc., to servants, de-
livered at certain times and in certain quantities, as clothes, were among the
allowances from religious houses to their dependants. See the corrodies
granted by Croyland Abbey. — Hist, of Cray land, Appendix, No. XXXIV.

" It is not improbable that the word in after ages came to be confined to
the uniform of the retainers or servants of the great, who were hence called
livery servants." Sir John Cullum's Hist, of Hawsted. — G. W.

■^ A corrody is an allowance to a servant living in an abbey or priory. —
G. W.

8 Pitancia, an allowance of bread and beer, or other provision to any pious
use, "especially to the religious in a monastery, etc., for augmentation of
their commons." Gloss, to Kennefs Par. Ant. — G. W.

^ The relationship between sponsors and their god-children, who were
called spiritual sons and daughters, was formerly esteemed much more sacred
than at present. The presents at christenings were sometimes very con-
siderable : the connection lasted through life, and was closed with a legacy.
This last mark of attention seems to have been thought almost indispen-
sable : for, in a will from whence no extracts have been given, the testator
left every one of his god-children a bushel of barley." — Sir John Cullum's
Hist, of Hawsted.

" De Margaretae filias regis primogenitae, quam filiolam, quia ejus in bap-
tismo compater fuit, appellat, cyphum aureum et quadraginta libras, legavit."
Archbishop Parker de Antiqtdtate Eccles. Brit., speaking of Archbishop
Morton. — Q. W.

^° De Fresne is copious on caligae of several sorts, " Hoc item de Clericis,
presertim beneficiatis : caligis scacatis (chequered) rubeis, et viridibus pub-
lice utentibus dicimus esse censendum." — Stattit. Eccles. Tiitel. The cheq-
uered boots seem to be the highland plaid stockings. — " Burnetum, /.^.
Brunetum, pannus non ex lana nativi coloris confectus." — " Sotularium,
i.e. subtalaris, quia sub talo est. Peculium genus, quibus maxime Monachi
nocte utebantur in aestate ; in hyeme vero Soccis."

This writer gives many quotations concerning Sotularia, which were not
to be made too shapely ; nor were the caligae to be laced on too nicely.
— G. W.

11 "Men abhorred the offering of the Lord." — i Sam. ii. 17. Strange
as this account may appear to modern delicacy, the author, when first in
orders, twice met with similar circumstances attending the sacrament at two
churches belonging to two obscure villages. In the first he found the inside
of the chalice covered with birds' dung; and in the other the communion
cloth soiled with cabbage and the greasy drippings of a gammon of bacon.
The good dame at the great farmhouse, who was to furnish the cloth,

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 289

being a notable woman, thought it best to save her clean linen, and so sent

a foul cloth that had covered her own table for two or three Sundays

before.

^^ . . . " ne turpe toral, ne sordida mappa

Corruget nares : ne non et cantharus, et lanx

Ostendat tibi te." — G. W.

LETTER XV

Though Bishop Wykeham appears somewhat stern and
rigid in his visitatorial character towards the Priory of Sel-
borne, yet he was on the whole a liberal friend and benefactor
to that convent, which, like every society or individual that
fell in his way, partook of the generosity and benevolence of
that munificent prelate.

"In the year 1377 William of Wykeham, out of his mere
good will and liberality, discharged the whole debts of the
prior and convent of Selborne, to the amount of one hundred
and ten marks eleven shillings and sixpence ; ^ and, a few
years before he died, he made a free gift of one hundred marks
to the same Priory : on which account the prior and convent
voluntarily engaged for the celebration of two masses a day
by two canons of the convent for ten years, for the bishop's
welfare, if he should live so long ; and for his soul if he should
die before the expiration of this term." ^

At this distance of time it seems a matter of great wonder
to us how these societies, so nobly endowed, and whose mem-
bers were exempt by their very institution from every means
of personal and family expense, could possibly run in debt
without squandering their revenues in a manner incompatible
with their function.

Religious houses might sometimes be distressed in their rev-
enues by fires among their buildings or large dilapidations from
storms, etc. ; but no such accident appears to have befallen
the Priory of Selborne. Those situate on public roads, or in
great towns where there were shrines of saints, were liable
to be intruded on by travellers, devotees, and pilgrims ; and
were subject to the importunity of the poor, who swarmed at
their gates to partake of doles and broken victuals. Of these
20

290 WHITE

disadvantages some convents used to complain, and especially"
those at Canterbury ; but this Priory, from its sequestered
situation, could seldom be subject to either of these inconven-
iences, and therefore we must attribute its frequent debts
and embarrassments, well endowed as it was, to the bad con-
duct of its members, and a general inattention to the interests

of the institution.

Notes

1 Yet in ten years' time we find, by the " Notabilis Visitatio," that all
their relics, plate, vestments, title-deeds, etc., were in pawn. — G. W.

2 Lowth's " Life of Wykeham." — G. W.

LETTER XVI

Beaufort was bishop of Winchester from 1405 to 1447 ;
and yet, notwithstanding this long episcopate, only torn. i. of
Beaufort's " Register " is to be found. This loss is much to
be regretted, as it must unavoidably make a gap in the history
of Selborne Priory, and perhaps in the list of its priors.

In 1410 there was an election for a prior, and again in 141 1.

In Vol. I., p. 24, of Beaufort's " Register," is the instrument
of the election of John Wynchestre to be prior — the sub-
stance as follows : —

Richard Elstede, senior canon, signifies to the bishop that
brother Thomas Weston, the late prior, died October i8th,
1410, and was buried November nth. That the bishop's
license to elect having been obtained he and the whole con-
vent met in the chapter-house, on the same day about the hour
of vespers, to consider of the election ; that brother John Wyn-
chestre, then sub-prior, with the general consent, appointed
the 1 2th November, ad horani ejiisdem did capitularefn, for
the business ; when they met in the chapter-house, post mis-
sain de sancto Spiritii, solemnly celebrated in the church ; —
to wit, Richard Elstede, Thomas Halyborne, John Lemyng-
ton, sacrista ; John Stepe, cantor ; Walter Ff arnham, Richard
Putworth, celerarius ; Hugh London, Henry Brampton, alias
Brompton ; John Wynchestre, senior, John Wynchestre, jun-
ior; then "Proposito primitis verbo Dei," and then hymno

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 291

"Veni Creator Spiritus " being solemnly sung, cum "versi-
culo et oratione," as usual, and his letter of license, with the
appointment of the hour and place of election being read, alta
voce, in valvis of the chapter-house ; John Wynchestre, senior,
the sub-prior, in his own behalf and that of all the canons,
and by their mandate, " quasdam monicionem et protestacio-
nem in scriptis redactas fecit, legit, interposuit" — that all
persons disqualified, or not having right to be present, should
immediately withdraw, and protesting against their voting,
etc. ; that then having read the constitution of the general
council " Quia propter," and explained the modes of proceed-
ing to election, they agreed unanimously to proceed " per viam
seu formam simplicis compromissi ; " when John Wynchestre,
sub-prior, and all the others (the commissaries under-named
excepted) named and chose brothers Richard Elstede, Thomas
Halyborne, John Lemyngton, the sacrist, John Stepe, chantor,
and Richard Putworth, canons, to be commissaries, who were
sworn each to nominate and elect a fit person to be prior, and
empowered by letters patent under the common seal, to be in
force only until the darkness of the night of the same day ;
that they, or the greater part of them, should elect for the
whole convent, within the limited time from their own number,
or from the rest of the convent ; that one of them should pub-
lish their consent in common before the clergy and people :
they then all promised to receive as prior the person these
five canons should fix on. These commissaries seceded from
the chapter-house to the refectory of the Priory, and were
shut in with Master John Penkester, bachelor of laws, and
John Couke and John Lynne, perpetual vicars of the parish
churches of Newton and Selborne, and with Sampson May-
cock, a public notary, where they treated of the election ; when
they unanimously agreed on John Wynchestre, and appointed
Thomas Halyborne to choose him in common for all, and to
publish the election as customary, and returned long before
it was dark to the chapter-house, where Thomas Halyborne
read publicly the instrument of election ; when all the brothers,
the new prior excepted, singing solemnly the hymn " Te Deum
\2iwd2imvis,'' fecenmt deportari novum electuvi, by some of the
brothers from the chapter-house to the high altar of the

292 WHITE

church ; ^ and the hymn being sung, dictisqiie versiculo et
oratione coiistietis m hac parte, Thomas Halyborne, inox tunc
ibidem, before the clergy and people of both sexes solemnly
published the election in vidgari. Then Richard Elstede, and
the whole convent by their proctors and nuncios appointed
for the purpose, Thomas Halyborne and John Stepe, required
several times the assent of the elected ; " et tandem post
diutinas interpellationes, et deliberationes, et deliberationem
providam penes se habitam, in hac parte divine nolens, ut
asseruit, resistere voluntati," within the limited time he signi-
fied his acceptance in the usual written form of words. The
bishop is then supplicated to confirm their election, and do
the needful, under common seal, in the chapter-house. No-
vember 14th, 1410.

The bishop, January 6th, 14 10, apud Esher in camera infe-
riori, declared the election duly made, and ordered the new
prior to be inducted ; for this the archdeacon of Winchester
was written to ; " stallumque in choro, et locum in capitulo
juxta morem preteriti temporis," to be assigned to him, and
everything beside necessary to be done.

Beaufort's " Register," Vol. I

P. 2. Taxatio spiritualis Decanatus de Aulton, Ecclesia de
Selebourn, cum Capella, xxx marc, decima xlib. iii. fol. Vicaria
de Selebourn non taxatur propter exilitatem.

P. 9. Taxatio bonorum temporalium religiosorum in Archi-
diac. Wynton.

Prior de Selebourn habet meneria de

Bromdene taxat. ad xxx s. ii d.

Apud Schete ad xvii s.

P. Selebourne ad vi lib.

In civitate Wynton de reddit vi lib. viii ob.

Tannaria sua taxat ad x lib. s.

Sunrtma tax. xxxviii lib. xiiii d. ob. Inde decima . vi lib. s. q. ob.

Note

^ It seems here as if the canons used to chair their new-elected prior from
the chapter-house to the high altar of their convent church. In Letter
XXI., on the same occasion it is said — "et sic canentes dictum electum
ad majus altare ecclesie deduximus, ut apud nos moris est." — G. W.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 293

LETTER XVII

Information being sent to Rome respecting the havoc and
spoil that was carrying on among the revenues and lands of
the Priory of Selborne, as we may suppose by the bishop of
Winchester, its visitor, Pope Martin,^ as soon as the news
of these proceedings came before him, issued forth a bull, in
which he enjoins his commissary immediately to revoke all the
property that had been alienated.

In this instrument his holiness accuses the prior and canons
of having granted away (they themselves and their predeces-
sors) to certain clerks and laymen their tithes, lands, rents,
tenements, and possessions, to some of them for their lives, to
others for an undue term of years, and to some again for a
perpetuity, to the great and heavy detriment of the monas-
tery; and these leases were granted, he continues to add, under
their own hands, with the sanction of an oath and the renun-
ciation of all right and claims, and under penalties, if the right
was not made good. — But it will be best to give an abstract
from the bull.

N. 298. Pope Martin's bull touching the revoking of cer-
taine things alienated from the Priory of Seleburne. Pontif.
sui ann. i.

" Martinus Eps. servus servorum Dei. Dilecto filio Priori de
Suthvale ^ Wyntonien, dioc. Salutem & apostolicam ben. Ad
audientiam nostram pervenit quam tam dilecti filii prior et
conventus monasterii de Seleburn per Priorem soliti guber-
nari ordinis S". Augustini Winton, dioc. quam de predeces-
sores eorum decimas, terras, redditus, domos, possessiones,
vineas,^ et quedam alia bona ad monasterium ipsum spectan-
tia, datis super hoc litteris, interpositis juramentis, factis re-
nuntiationibus, et penis adjectis, in gravem ipsius monasterii
lesionem nonnullis clericis et laicis, aliquibus eorum ad vitam,
quibusdam vero ad non modicum tempus, & aliis perpetuo ad
firmam, vel sub censu annuo concesserunt ; quorum aliqui
dicunt super hiis a sede aplica in communi forma confirma-
tionis litteras impetrasse. Quia vero nostra interest lesis mo-
nasteriis subvenire [He the Pope here commands] ea ad jus
et proprietatem monasterii studeas legitime revocare," etc.

294 WHITE

The conduct of the religious had now for some time been
generally bad. Many of the monastic societies, being very
opulent, were become voluptuous and licentious, and had
deviated entirely from their original institutions. The laity
saw with indignation the wealth and possessions of their pious
ancestors perverted to the service of sensuality and indul-
gence, and spent in gratifications highly unbecoming the
purposes for which they were given. A total disregard to
their respective rules and discipline drew on the monks and
canons a heavy load of popular odium. Some good men
there were who endeavored to oppose the general delin-
quency ; but their efforts were too feeble to stem the torrent
of monastic luxury. As far back as the year 1381, Wyclif's
principles and doctrines had made some progress, were well
received by men who wished for a reformation, and were
defended and maintained by them as long as they dared, till
the bishops and clergy began to be so greatly alarmed, that
they procured an act to be passed by which the secular arm
was empowered to support the corrupt doctrines of the
Church; but the first Lollard was not burnt until the year
1401.

The wits also of those times did not spare the gross morals
of the clergy, but boldly ridiculed their ignorance and prof-
ligacy. The most remarkable of these were Chaucer, and
his contemporary Robert Langelande, better known by the
name of Piers Plowman. The laughable tales of the former
are familiar to almost every reader ; while the visions of the
latter are but in few hands. With a quotation from the
" Passus Decimus"of this writer I shall conclude my letter;
not only on account of the remarkable prediction therein
contained, which carries with it somewhat of the air of a
prophecy, but also as it seems to have been a striking picture
of monastic insolence and dissipation, and a specimen of one
of the keenest pieces of satire now perhaps subsisting in any
language, ancient or modern.

" Now is religion a rider, a romer by streate ;
A leader of love-days, and a loud beggar ;
A pricker on a palfrey from maner to maner,
A heape of hounds at his arse, as he a lord were.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 295

And but if his knave kneel, that shall his cope bring,
He loureth at him, and asketh him who taught him curtesie,
Little had lords to done, to give lands from her heirs,
To religious that have no ruth if it rain on her altars.
In many places ther they persons be, by himself at ease :
Of the poor have they no pity, and that is her charitie ;
And they letten hem as lords, her lands lie so broad.
And there shal come a king,* and confess you religious ;
And beate you, as the bible telleth, for breaking your rule,
And amend monials, and monks, and chanons.
And put hem to her penaunce ad pristinum statum ire.''''

Notes

1 Pope Martin V., chosen about 141 7. He attempted to reform the
church, but died in 1431, just as he had summoned the Council of Basil.

— G. W.

2 Should have been no doubt Southwick, a priory under Portsdown.

— G. VV.

8 Mr. Barrington is of opinion that anciently the English vinea was in
almost every instance an orchard ; not perhaps always of apples merely,
but of other fruits ; as cherries, plums, and currants. We still say a plum
or cherry orchard. — See Archceologia, Vol. III.

In the instance above, the pope's secretary' might insert vineas merely
because they were a species of cultivation familiar to him in Italy. — G. W.

* F. 1. a. "This prediction, although a probable conclusion concerning
a king who after a time would suppress the religious houses, is remarkable.
I imagined it might have been foisted into the copies in the reign of King
Henry VIII., but it is to be found in MSS. of this poem, older than the
year 1400." — fol. 1. a. b.

"Again, where he. Piers Plowman, alludes to the Knights Templars,
lately suppressed, he says, —

. . . " '■ Men of holie kirk
Shall turn as Templars did ; the tyme approacheth nere.'

"This, I suppose, was a favorite doctrine in Wyclifs discourses."
Warton's Hist of English Poetry^ Vol. I., p. 282. — G. W.

LETTER XVIII

William of Waynflete became bishop of Winchester in the
year 1447, and seems to have pursued the generous plan of
Wykeham in endeavoring to reform the Priory of Selborne.

When Waynflete came to the see he found Prior Stype, alias

296 WHITE

Stepe, still living, who had been elected as long ago as the year
1411.

Among my documents I find a curious paper of the things
put into the custody of Peter Bernes, the sacrist, and especially
some relics : the title of this evidence is " No. 50, Indentura
prioris de Selborne quorundam tradit Petro Bernes, sacrista
ibidem, ann. Hen. VI. . . . una cum confiss. ejusdem Petri
script." The occasion of this catalogue, or list of effects, being
drawn between the prior and sacrist, does not appear, nor the
date when ; only that it happened in the reign of Hen. VI.
This transaction probably took place when Bernes entered on
his office ; and there is the more reason to suppose that to be
the case because the list consists of vestments and implements
and relics, such as belonged to the church of the Priory and
fell under the care of the sacrist. For the numerous items I
shall refer the curious reader to the Appendix, and shall just
mention the relics, although they are not all specified ; and
the state of the live-stock of the monastery at that juncture.

" Item 2. oscillator, argent.

" Item I . osciilatoritim cum osse digiti auricular. — Sti.Johan-
nis Baptistce}

"Item I. parvam crucem cum V, reliquiis.

"Item I. anulum argent, et deauratum St. Edmundi?

" Item 2. osculat. de coper.

"Item I. junctorium St. Ricardi^

"Item I. pecten St. Ricardi.'"^

The staurum, or live-stock, is quite ridiculous, consisting only
of " 2 vacce, i sus, 4 hoggett. et 4 porcell." viz., two cows, one
sow, four porkers, and four pigs.

Notes

1 How the convent came by the bone of the little finger of St. John the
Baptist does not appear: probably the founder, while in Palestine, pur-
chased it among the Asiatics, who were at that time great traders in relics.
We know from the best authority that as soon as Herod had cruelly be-
headed that holy man "his disciples came and took up the body and buried
it, and went and told Jesus." Matt. iv. 12. Farther would be difficult to
say. — G. W.

2 November 20th in the calendar, Edmund, king and martyr, in the 9th
century. See also a Sanctus Edmundus in Godwin, among the archbishops
of Canterbury, in the 13th century; his surname Rich, in 1234. — G. W.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 297

' April 3rd, ibid. Richard, bishop of Chichester, in the 13th century,
his surname De la Wich, in 1245.

Junctorium. perhaps a joint or limb of St. Richard ; but what particular
joint the religious were not such osteologists as to specify. This barbarous
word was not to be found in any dictionary consulted by the author. — G. W.

* " Pecten inter ministeria sacra recensetur, quo scil. sacerdotes ac clerici,
antequam in ecclesiam procederent, crines pecterent. E quibus coUigitur
monachos, tunc temporis. non omnino tonsos fuisse." — Du Fresne.

The author remembers to have seen in great farmhouses a family comb
chained to a post for the use of the hinds when they came in to their meals.
— G. W.

LETTER XIX

Stepe died towards the end of the year 1453, as we may
suppose pretty far advanced in life, having been prior forty-
four years.

On the very day that the vacancy happened, viz., January
26th, 1453-4, the sub-prior and convent petitioned the visitor
— " vos unicum levam en nostrum, et spem unanimiter roga-
mus, quatinus eligendum ex nobis unum confratrem de gremio
nostro, in nostra religione probatum et expertem, licenciam
vestram paternalem cum plena libertate nobis concedere dig-
nemini graciose." — Reg. Waynflete, tom. I.

Instead of the license requested we find next a commission
" custodie prioratus de Selebourne durante vacatione," ad-
dressed to brother Peter Berne, canon regular of the Priory
of Selborne, and of the order of St. Augustine, appointing
him keeper of the said Priory, and empowering him to collect
and receive the profits and revenues and " alia bona " of the
said Priory ; and to exercise in every respect the full power
and authority of a prior; but to be responsible to the visitor
finally, and to maintain this superiority during the bishop's
pleasure only. This instrument is dated from the bishop's
manor-house in South wark, March ist, 1453-4, and the
seventh of his consecration.

After this transaction it does not appear that the chapter
of the Priory proceeded to any election ; on the contrary,
we find that at six months' end from the vacancy the
visitor declared that a lapse had taken place ; and that there-

298 WHITE

fore he did confer the priorship on canon Peter Berne —
" Prioratum vacantem et ad nostram collationem, seu pro-
visionem jure ad nos in hac parte per lapsum temporis legitime
devoluto spectantem, tibi (sc. P. Berne) de legitime matrimonio
procreate, etc., — conf erimus," etc. This deed bears date July
28th, 1454. — Reg. Waynflete, tom. I. p. 69.

On February 8th, 1462, the visitor issued out a power of
sequestration against the Priory of Selborne on account of
notorious dilapidations which threatened manifest ruin to the
roofs, walls, and edifices of the said convent ; and appointing
John Hammond, B.D., rector of the parish church of Hetlegh,
John Hylling, vicar of the parish church of Newton Valence,
and Walter Gorfin, inhabitant of the parish of Selborne, his
sequestrators, to exact, collect, levy, and receive all the profits
and revenues of the said convent : he adds " ac ea sub arcto,
et tuto custodiatis, custodirive faciatis ; " as they would answer
it to the bishop at their peril.

In consequence of these proceedings Prior Berne, on the last
day of February, and the next year, produced a state of the
revenues of the Priory, No. 381, called "A paper conteyning
the value of the manors and lands pertayning to the Priory of
Selborne, 4 Edward III., with a note of charges yssuing out
of it."

This is a curious document, and will appear in the Appendix.
From circumstances in this paper it is plain that the seques-
tration produced good effect ; for in it are to be found bills of
repairs to a considerable amount.

By this evidence also it appears that there were at that
juncture only four canons at the Priory ; ^ and that these, and
their four household servants, during this sequestration for
their clothing, wages, and diet, were allowed per annum xxx
lib. ; and that the annual pension of the lord prior, reside where
he would, was to be x lib.

In the year 1468, Prior Berne, probably wearied out by the
dissensions and want of order that prevailed in the convent,
resigned his priorship into the hands of the bishop. — Reg.
Waynflete, tom. I., pars i™'., fol. 157.

March 28th, a.d. 1468. " In quadam alta camera juxta mag-
nam portam manerii of the Bishop of Wynton de Waltham

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 299

coram eodem rev. patre ibidem tunc sedente, Peter Berne,
prior of Selborne, ipsum prioratum in sacras, et vcnerabiles
manus of the bishop, viva voce libere resignavit : and his
resignation was admitted before two witnesses and a notary-
public. In consequence, March 29th, before the bishop, in
capella manerii sui ante dicti pro tribunali sedente, comparu-
erunt fratres " Peter Berne, Thomas London, William Wyn-
desor, and William Paynell, alias Stretford, canons regular of
the Priory, "capitulum, et conventum ejusdem ecclesie faci-
entes; ac jus et voces in electione futura prioris dicti prioratus
solum et in solidum, ut asseruerunt, habentes ; " and after the
bishop had notified to them the vacancy of a prior, with his
free license to elect, deliberated awhile, and then, by way of
compromise, as they affirmed, unanimously transferred their
right of election to the bishop, before witnesses. In conse-
quence of this the bishop, after full deliberation, proceeded,
April 7th, "in capella manerii suide Waltham," to the election
of a prior ; " et fratrem Johannem Morton, priorem ecclesie
conventualis de Reygate dicti ordinis S". Augustini Wynton.
dioc. in priorem vice et nomine omnium et singulorum canoni-
corum predictorum elegit, in ordine sacerdotali, et etate licita
constitutum, etc." And on the same day, in the same place,
and before the same witnesses, John Morton resigned to the
bishop the priorship of Reygate viva voce. The bishop then
required his consent to his own election : " qui licet in parte
renitens tanti reverendi patris se confirmans," obeyed, and
signified his consent oraculo vive vocis. Then was there a
mandate citing any one who would gainsay the said election
to appear before the bishop or his commissary in his chapel
at Farnham on the second day of May next. The dean of the
deanery of Aulton then appeared before the chancellor, his
commissary, and returned the citation or mandate dated April
22nd, 1468, with signification, in writing, of his having pub-
lished it as required, dated Newton Valence, May ist, 1468.
This certificate being read, the four canons of Selborne ap-
peared and required the election to be confirmed ; et ex super
abundanti appointed William Long their proctor to solicit in
their name that he might be canonically confirmed. John
Morton also appeared, and proclamation was made ; and no

300 WHITE

one appearing against him, the commissary pronounced all
absentees contumacious, and precluded them from objecting
at any other time ; and, at the instance of John Morton and
the proctor, confirmed the election by his decree, and directed
his mandate to the rector of Hedley and the vicar of Newton
Valence to install him in the usual form.

Thus, for the first time, was a person, a stranger to the
convent of Selborne, and never canon of that monastery,
elected prior ; though the style of the petitions in former
elections used to run thus, — " Vos . . . rogamus quatinus
eligendum ex nobis unum cojifratrem de gremio nostra, — li-
centiam vestram, — nobis concedere dignemini."

Note

^ If Bishop Wykeham was so disturbed (see "Notab. Visitatio") to find
the number of canons reduced from fourteen to eleven, what would he have
said to have seen it diminished below one-third of that number? — G. W.

LETTER XX

Prior Morton dying in 1401, two canons, by themselves,
proceeded to election, and chose a prior ; but two more (one
of them Berne) complaining of not being summoned, objected
to the proceedings as informal ; till at last the matter was
compromised that the bishop should again, for that turn, nom-
inate as he had before. But the circumstances of this elec-
tion will be best explained by the following extract : —

Reg. Waynflete, tom. II., pars I"'^, fol. 7
Memorandum, a.d. 1471. August 22nd

William Wyndesor, a canon regular of the Priory of Sel-
borne, having been elected prior on the death of brother John,
appeared in person before the bishop in his chapel at South
Waltham. He was attended on this occasion by Thomas
London and John Bromesgrove, canons, who had elected him.
Peter Berne and William Stratfeld, canons, also presented
themselves at the same time, complaining that in this busi-
ness they had been overlooked, and not summoned ; and that

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 3OI

therefore the validity of the election might with reason be
called in question, and quarrels and dissensions might prob-
ably arise between the newly chosen prior and the parties
thus neglected.

After some altercation and dispute they all came to an
agreement with the new prior, that what had been done should
be rejected and annulled ; and that they would again, for this
turn, transfer to the bishop their power to elect, order, and
provide them another prior, whom they promised unanimously
to admit.

The bishop accepted of this offer before witnesses ; and on
September 27th, in an inner chamber near the chapel above-
mentioned, after full deliberation, chose brother Thomas
Fairwise, vicar of Somborne, a canon regular of St. Augus-
tine in the Priory of Bruscough, in the diocese of Coventry
and Litchfield, to be prior of Selborne. The form is nearly
as above in the last election. The canons are again enumer-
ated ; W. Wyndesor, sub-prior, P. Berne, T. London, W. Strat-
feld, J. Bromesgrove, who had formed the chapter, and had
requested and obtained license to elect, but had unanimously
conferred their power on the bishop. In consequence of this
proceeding, the bishop taking the business upon himself, that
the Priory might not suffer detriment for want of a governor,
appoints the aforesaid T. Fairwise to be prior. A citation was
ordered as above for gainsayers to appear October 4th, before
the bishop or his commissaries at South Waltham ; but none
appearing, the commissaries admitted the said Thomas, or-
dered him to be installed, and sent the usual letter to the con-
vent to render him due obedience.

Thus did the bishop of Winchester a second time appoint a
stranger to be prior of Selborne, instead of one chosen out of
the chapter. For this seeming irregularity the visitor had no
doubt good and sufficient reasons, as probably may appear
hereafter.

LETTER XXI

Whatever might have been the abilities and disposition of
Prior Fairwise, it could not have been in his power to have

302 WHITE

brought about any material reformation in the Priory of Sel-
borne, because he departed this life in the month of August,
1472, before he had presided one twelvemonth.

As soon as their governor was buried the chapter applied to
their visitor for leave to choose a new prior, which being
granted, after deliberating for a time they proceeded to an
election by a scrutiny. But as this mode of voting has not been
described but by the mere form in the Appendix, an extract
from the bishop's register, representing the manner more fully,
may not be disagreeable to several readers.

Wayneflete Reg. torn. II., pars i"\, fol. 15

"Reverendo, etc., ac nostro patrono graciosissimo vestri
humiles, et devote obedientie filii," etc.

To the right reverend Father in God, and our most gracious
patron, we, your obedient and devoted sons, William Wyndesor,
president of the chapter of the Priory of Selborne, and the con-
vent of that place, do make known to your lordship, that our
priorship being lately vacant by the death of Thomas Fairwise,
our late prior, who died August nth, 1472, having committed
his body to decent sepulture, and having requested, according
to custom, leave to elect another, and having obtained it under
your seal, we, William Wyndesor, president of the convent on
the 29th August, in our chapter-house assembled, and making
a chapter, taking to us in this business Richard ap Jenkyn, and
Galfrid Bryan, chaplains, that our said priory might not by
means of this vacancy incur harm or loss, unanimously agreed
on August the last for the day of election ; on which day, hav-
ing first celebrated mass, " De sancto spiritu," at the high altar,
and having called a chapter by tolling a bell about ten o' the
clock, we, William Wyndesor, president, Peter Berne, Thomas
London, and William Stratfeld, canons, who alone had voices,
being the only canons, about ten o' the clock, first sung " Veni
Creator," the letters and license being read in the presence
of many persons there. Then William Wyndesor, in his own
name, and that of all the canons, made solemn proclamation,
enjoining all who had no right to vote to depart out of the
chapter-house. When all were withdrawn except Guyllery de
Lacuna, in decretis Baccalarius, and Robert Peverell, notary

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 303

public, and also the two chaplains, the first was requested to
stay, that he might direct and inform us in the mode of elec-
tion ; the other, that he might record and attest the transac-
tions ; and the two last that they might be witness to them.

Then, having read the constitution of the general council
" Quia propter," and the forms of elections contained in it
being sufficiently explained to them by De Lacuna, as well in
Latin as the vulgar tongue, and having deliberated in what
mode to proceed in this election, they resolved on that of
scrutiny. Three of the canons, Wyndesor, Berne, and London,
were made scrutators ; Berne, London, and Stratfeld, choosing
Wyndesor; Wyndesor, London, and Stratfeld choosing Berne ;
Wyndesor, Berne, and Stratfeld choosing London.

They were empowered to take each other's vote, and then
that of Stratfeld ; " et ad inferiorem partem angularem " of the
chapter-house, "juxta ostium ejusdem declinentes," with the
other persons (except Stratfeld, who stayed behind), proceeded
to voting, two swearing, and taking the voice of the third, in
succession, privately. Wyndesor voted first ; " Ego credo
Petrum Berne meliorem et utiliorem ad regimen istius ecclesie,
et in ipsum consentio, ac eum nomino," etc. Berne was next
sworn, and in like manner nominated Wyndesor ; London nom-
inated Berne ; Stratfeld was then called and sworn, and nomi-
nated Berne.

" Quibus in scriptis redactis," by the notary public, they
returned to the upper part of the chapter-house, where by
Wyndesor "sic purecta fecerunt in communi," and then sol-
emnly, in form written, declared the election of Berne ; when
all, " antedicto nostro electo excepto, approbantes et ratifi-
cantes, cepimus decantare solemniter 'Tc Daan laiidamus,' et
sic canentes dictum electum ad majusaltare ecclesie deduximus,
ut apud nos est moris. Then Wyndesor electionem clero et
populo infra chorum dicte ecclesie congregatis publicavit, et
personam electi publice et personaliter ostendit." We then
returned to the chapter-house, except our prior ; and Wyndesor
was appointed by the other two their proctor, to desire the
assent of the elected, and to notify what had been done to the
bishop ; and to desire him to confirm the election, and do what-
ever else was necessary. Then their proctor, before the wit-

304 WHITE

nesses, required Berne's assent in the chapter-house ; " qui
quidem instanciis et precibus multiplicatis devictus," consented,
"licet indignus electus," in writing. They therefore request
the bishop's confirmation of their election " sic canonice et so-
lemniter celebrata," etc., etc. Sealed with their common seal,
and subscribed and attested by the notary. Dat. in the chapter-
house September 5th, 1472.

In consequence, September nth, 1472, in the bishop's
chapel at Esher, and before the bishop's commissary, appeared
W. Wyndesor, and exhibited the above instrument, and a
mandate from the bishop for the appearance of gainsayers of
the election there on that day ; — and no one appearing, the
absentees were declared contumacious and the election con-
firmed ; and the vicar of Aulton was directed to induct and
install the prior in the usual manner.

Thus did Canon Berne, though advanced in years, reassume
his abdicated priorship for the second time, to the no small
satisfaction, as it may seem, of the bishop of Winchester, who
professed, as will be shown not long hence, a high opinion of
his abilities and integrity.

LETTER XXII

As Prior Berne, when chosen in 1454, held his priorship
only to 1468, and then made a voluntary resignation, wearied
and disgusted, as we may conclude, by the disorder that pre-
vailed in his convent ; it is no matter of wonder that, when
re-chosen in 1472, he should not long maintain his station ; as
old age was then coming fast upon him, and the increasing
anarchy and misrule of that declining institution required un-
usual vigor and resolution to stem that torrent of profligacy
which was hurrying it on to its dissolution. We find, accord-
ingly, that in 1478 he resigned his dignity again into the hands
of the bishop.

Waynflete Reg. fol. 55
Resignatio Prions de Seleboriie

May 14th, 1478. Peter Berne resigned the priorship. May
i6th, the bishop admitted his resignation "in manerio suo de

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 305

Waltham," and declared the priorship void; " et priorat. sola-
cio destitutum esse; " and granted his letters for proceeding
to a new election ; when all the religious, assembled in the
chapter-house, did transfer their power under their seal to the
bishop, by the following public instrument : —

"In Dei nomine Amen," etc., a.d. 1478, Mail 19. In the
chapter-house for the election of a prior for that day, on the
free resignation of Peter Berne, having celebrated in the first
place mass at the high altar " De spiritu sancto," and having
called a chapter by tolling a bell, /// uioris est ; in the presence
of a notary and witnesses appeared personally Peter Berne,
Thomas Ashford, Stephen Clydgrove, and John Ashton, pres-
byters, and Henry Canwood,^ in chapter assembled ; and after
singing the hymn " ' Ve7ii Creator Spiritus^ cum versiculo et
oratione 'Dens qui corda ; ' declaratque licentia Fundatoris et
patroni ; futurum priorem eligendi concessa, et constitutione
consilii generalis que incipit 'Quia propter' declaratis: viisque
per quas possent ad banc electionem procedere," by the de-
cretonun doctorem, whom the canons had taken to direct them
— they all and every one "dixerunt et affirmarunt se nolle ad
aliquam viam procedere ; " — but for this turn only, renounced
their right, and unanimously transferred their power to the
bishop, the ordinary of the place, promising to receive whom
he should provide ; and appointed a proctor to present the
instrument to the bishop under their seal ; and required their
notary to draw it up in due form, etc., subscribed by the
notary.

After the visitor had fully deliberated on the matter, he pro-
ceeded to the choice of a prior, and elected, by the following
instrument, John Sharp, alias Glastonbury.

Fol. 56. Provisio Prioris per Epm.

Willmus, etc., to our beloved brother in Christ, John Sharp,
alias Glastonbury, Ecclesie conventualis de Bruton, of the order
of St. Austin, in the diocese of Bath and Wells, canon regular
— salutem, etc., " De tue circumspectionis industria plurimum
confidentes, te virum providum et discretum, literarum scientia,
et moribus merito commendandum," etc. — do appoint you
21

306 WHITE

prior — under our seal. " Dat in manerio nostro de Suthwal-
tham, May 20," 1478, "et nostre Consec. 31."

Thus did the bishop, three times out of the four that he was
at liberty to nominate, appoint a prior from a distance, a stranger
to the place, to govern the convent of Selborne, hoping by this
method to have broken the cabal, and to have interrupted that
habit of mismanagement that had pervaded the society ; but he
acknowledges, in an evidence lying before us, that he never did
succeed to his wishes with respect to those late governors, —
" quos tamen male se habuisse, et inutiliter administrare, et
administrasse usque ad presentia tempora post debitam inves-
tigationem, etc., invenit." The only time that he appointed
from among the canons, he made choice of Peter Berne, for
whom he had conceived the greatest esteem and regard.

When Prior Berne first relinquished his priorship, he re-
turned again to his former condition of canon, in which he
continued for some years ; but when he was re-chosen, and had
abdicated a second time, we find him in a forlorn state, and in
danger of being reduced to beggary, had not the bishop of
Winchester interposed in his favor, and with great humanity
insisted on a provision for him for life. The reason for this
difference seems to have been that, in the first case, though
in years, he might have been hale and capable of taking his
share in the duty of the convent ; in the second he was broken
with age, and no longer equal to the functions of a canon.

Impressed with this idea, the bishop very benevolently inter-
ceded in his favor, and laid his injunctions on the new-elected
prior in the following manner : —

Fol. 56. " In Dei nomine Amen. Nos Willmus, etc., con-
siderantes Petrum Berne," late prior, "in administratione
spiritualium et temporalium prioratus laudabiliter vixisse et
rexisse ; ipsumque senio et corporis debilitate confractum ; ne
in opprobrium religionis metidicari cogattir ; — eidem annuam
pensionem a Domino Johanne Sharpe, alias Glastonbury,
priore moderno," and his successors, and, from the priory or
church, to be paid every year during his life, "de voluntate et
ex consensu expressis " of the said John Sharp, " sub ea que
sequitur forma verborum — assignamus : " —

I St. That the said prior and his successors, for the time

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 307

being, honeste exhibebunt of the fruits and profits of the prior-
ship, " eidem esculenta et poculenta," while he remained in
the Priory, " sub consimiH portione eorundem prout conveni-
entur priori," for the time being, ministrari contigerit ; and in
like manner tmi faimdo, whom he should choose to wait on
him, as to the servientibiis of the prior.

Item. " Invenient seu exhibebunt eidem unam honestam
cameram," in the Priory, "cum socialibus necessariis seu oppor-
tunis ad eundem."

Item. We will, ordain, etc., to the said P. Berne an annual
pension of ten marks, from the revenue of the Priory, to be
paid by the hands of the prior quarterly.

The bishop decrees farther that John Sharp, and his suc-
cessors, shall take an oath to observe this injunction, and that
before their installation.

" Lecta et facta sunt haec in quodam alto oratorio," belong-
ing to the bishop at Suthwaltham, May 25th, 1478, in the pres-
ence of John Sharp, who gave his assent, and then took the
oath before witnesses, with the other oaths before the chan-
cellor, who decreed he should be inducted and installed, as
was done that same day.

How John Sharp, alias Glastonbury, acquitted himself in his
priorship, and in what manner he made a vacancy, whether by
resignation, or death, or whether he was removed by the visitor,
does not appear ; we only find that sometime in the year 1484
there was no prior, and that the bishop nominated Canon Ash-
ford to fill the vacancy.

Note

^ Here we see that all the canons were changed in six years ; and that
there was quite a new chapter, Berne excepted, between 1472 and 1478 ; for,
instead of Wyndesor, London, and Stratfeld. we find Ashford, Clydgrove,
Ashton, and Canwood, all new men, who were soon gone in their turn off
the stage, and are heard of no more. For, in six years after, there seem to
have been no canons at all. — G. W.

LETTER XXIII

This Thomas Ashford was most undoubtedly the last prior
of Selborne ; and, therefore, here will be the proper place to

308 WHITE

say something concerning a list of the priors, and to endeavor
to improve that already given by others.

At the end of Bishop Tanner's " Notitia Monastica," the
folio edition, among Brown Willis's " Principals of Religious
Houses," occur the names of eleven of the priors of Selborne,
with dates. But this list is imperfect, and particularly at the
beginning; for though the Priory was founded in 1232, yet it
commences with Nich. de Cantia, elected in 1262, so that, for
the first thirty years, no prior is mentioned ; yet there must have
been one or more. We were in hopes that the register of Peter
de Rupibus would have rectified this omission; but, when it was
examined, no information of the sort was to be found. From
the year 1410 the list is much corrected and improved, and the
reader may depend on its being thenceforward very exact.

A List of the Priors of Selborne Priory, from Brown
Willis's "Principals of Religious Houses," with
Additions within [ ] by the Author

[John .... was prior, sine dat.y-

Nich. de Cantia el 1262

[Peter was prior in 1271]

[Richard was prior in 1280]

Will. Basing was prior in 1299

Walter de Insula el. in 1324

[Some difficulties and a devolution; but the
election confirmed by Bishop Stratford.]

John de Wint<?n 1339

Thomas Weston 1377

John Winchester [Wynchestre] 14 10

[Elected by Bishop Beaufort " per viam vel
formam simplicis compromissi."]

[John Stype, alias Stepe, in 141 1]

Peter Bene [alias Berne or Bernes, appointed
keeper, and, by lapse to Bishop Waynflete,

prior] in 1454

[He resigns in 1468.]

John Morton [prior of Reygate] in 1468

[The canons by compromise transfer the power of
election to the bishop.]

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 309

Will. Winsor [Wyndesor, prior for a few days] . . 147 1
[But removed on account of an irregular elec-
tion.]
Thomas Farvvill [Fairwise, vicar of Samborne] . 1471

[By compromise again elected by the bishop.]
[Peter Berne, re-elected by scrutiny in ... . 1472]

[Resigns again in 1478.]
John Sharper [Sharp], alias Glastonbury . . . 1478
[Canon reg. of Bruton, elected by the bishop
by compromise.]
[Thomas Ashford, canon of Selborne, last prior
elected by the bishop of Winchester, some-
time in the year 1484

And deposed at the dissolution.]

Note

1 See, in Letter XI. of these Antiquities the reason why Prior John, . . .
who had transactions with the Knights Templars, is placed in the list before
the year 1262. — G. W.

LETTER XXIV

Bishop Waynflete's efforts to continue the Priory still
proved unsuccessful ; and the convent, without any canons,
and for some time without a prior, was tending swiftly to its
dissolution.

When Sharp's, alias Glastonbury's, priorship ended does not
appear. The bishop says that he had been obliged to remove
some priors for maladministration ; but it is not well explained
how that could be the case with any unless with Sharp, because
all the others chosen during his episcopate died in their office,
— viz., Morton and Fairwise, — Berne only excepted, who re-
linquished twice voluntarily, and was, moreover, approved of
by Waynflete as a person of integrity. But the way to show
what ineffectual pains the bishop took, and what difficulties
he met with, will be to quote the words of the libel of his
proctor, Rudolphus Langley, who appeared for the bishop in
the process of the impropriation of the Priory of Selborne.
The extract is taken from an attested copy.

3IO WHITE

" Tlem — that the said bishop, dicto prioratui et personis
ejusdem pie compatiens, sollicitudines pastorales, labores, et
dihgentias gravissimas quam plurimas, tam per se quam per
suos, pro reformatione premissorum impendebat ; et aliquando
illius loci prioribus, propter malam et inutilem administra-
tionem, et dispensationem bonorum predicti prioratus, suis
demeritis exigentibus, amotis ; alios priores in quorum circum-
spectione et diligentia confidebat, prefecit ; quos tamen male
se habuisse ac inutiliter administrare, et administrasse, usque
ad presentia tempora post debitam investigationem, &c., in-
venit." So that he despaired with all his care ; " statum ejus-
dem reparare vel restaurare ; et considerata temporis malicia,
et preteritis timendo et conjecturando, futura, de aliqua bona
et sancta religione ejusdem ordinis, &c., juxta piam intentionem
primevi fundatoris ibidem habend. desperatur."

William Wainfleet, bishop of Winchester, founded his col-
lege of St. Mary Magdalene, in the University of Oxford, in
or about the year 1459; but the revenues proving insuffi-
cient for so large and noble an establishment, the college sup-
plicated the founder to augment its income by putting it in
possession of the estates belonging to the Priory of Selborne,
now become a deserted convent, without canons or prior. The
president and fellows state the circumstances of their numer-
ous institutions and scanty provision, and the ruinous and
perverted condition of the Priory. The bishop appoints com-
missaries to inquire into the state of the said monastery ; and,
if found expedient, to confirm the appropriation of it to the
college, which soon after appoints attorneys to take posses-
sion, September 24th, 1484. But the way to give the reader a
thorough insight respecting this transaction will be to tran-
scribe a farther proportion of the process of the impropria-
tion, from the beginning, which will lay open the manner of
proceeding and show the consent of the parties.

Impropriatio Selborne, 1485

" Universis sancte matris ecclesie filiis, &c. Ricardus Dei
gratia prior ecclesie conventualis de Novo Loco, &c.,^ ad uni-
versitatem vestre notitie deducimus, &c., quod coram nobis
commissario predicto in ecclesia parochiali S" Georgii de Esher

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 311

Diet. Winton. dioc. 3°. die Augusti, a.d. 1485, Indictione
tertia pontificat. Innocenti 8 . ann. i™". judicialiter comparuit
venerabilis vir Jacobus Preston, S.T.P. infrascriptus, et exhi-
buit literas comissionis — quas quidem per magistrum Thomam
Somercotes notarium publicum, &c., legi fecimus, tenorem
sequentem in se continentes." The same as in No. 103, but
dated — "In manerio nostro de Esher, Augusti i . a.d. 1485,
et nostre confec. anno. 39." [No. 103 is repeated in a book
containing the like process in the preceding year by the same
commissary, in the parish church of St. Andrew the Apostle,
at Farnham, Sept. 6th, anno 1434.] " Post quarum literarum
lecturam — dictus magister Jacobus Preston, quasdam pro-
curatorias literas mag. Richardi Mayhewe presidentis, ut
asseruit, collegii beate Marie Magdalene, &c., sigillo rotundo
communi, &c., in cera rubea impresso sigillatas realiter ex-
hibuit, &c., et pro eisdem dnis suis &c., fecit se partem, ac
nobis supplicavit ut juxta formam in eisdem traditam procedere
dignaremur," &c. After these proclamations no contradictor
or objector appearing — " ad instantem petitionem ipsius mag.
Jac. Preston, procuratoris, &c., procedendum fore decrevimus
vocatis jure vocandis; nee non mag. Tho. Somercotes, &c., in
actorum nostrorum scribam nominavimus. Consequenter et
ibidem tunc comparuit magister Michael Clyff, &c., et exhibuit
in ea parte procuratorium suum," for the prior and convent
of the cathedral of Winton, " et fecit se partem pro eisdem.
Deinde comperuit coram nobis, &c., honestus vir Willmus Cow-
per," proctor for the bishop as patron of the Priory of Selborne,
and exhibited his procuratorium, &c. After these were read
in the presence of Clyff and Cowper, " Preston, viva voce,"
petitioned the commissary to annex and appropriate the Priory
of Selborne to the college — " propter quod f ructus, redditus,
et proventus ejusdem coll. adeo tenues sunt, et exiles, quod
ad sustentationem ejus, &c., non sufficiunt." The commissary,
" ad libellandum et articulandum in scriptis," — adjourned the
court to the 5th August, then to be held again in the parish
church of Esher.

W. Cowper being then absent, Radulphus Langley appeared
for the bishop, and was admitted his proctor. Preston pro-
duced his libel or article in scriptis for the union, &c. ; " et

312 WHITE

admitti petiit eundem cum effectu ; cujus libelli tenor sequitur.
— In Dei nomine, Amen. Coram nobis venerabili in Christo
patre Richardo, priore, &c., de Novo Loco, &c., commissario,"
&c. Part of the College of Magd. dicit. allegat, and in his
" scriptis proponit," &c.

^^ Imprimis — that said college consists of a president and
eighty scholars, besides sixteen choristers, thirteen servientes
inibi altissimo famulantibus, et in scientiis plerisque liberali-
bus, presertim in sacra theologia studentibus, nedum ad ipso-
rum presidentis et scholarium pro presenti et imposterum,
annuente deo, incorporandorum in eodem relevamen ; verum
etiam ad omnium et singulorum tam scholarium quam religio-
sorum cujuscunque ordinis undequaque illuc confiuere pro
salubri doctrina volentium utilitatem multiplicem ad incre-
menta virtutis fideique catholice stabilimentum. Ita videlicet
quod omnes et singuli absque personarum seu nationum de-
lectu illuc accedere volentes, lecturas publicas et doctrinas
tam in grammatica in loco ad collegium contiguo, ac philoso-
phiis morali, et naturali quam in sacra theologia in eodem col-
legio perpetuis temporibus continuandas libere atque gratis
audire valeant et possint, ad laudem gloriam et honorem Dei,
&c., extitit fundatum et stabilitum."

For the first item in this process see the beginning of this
letter. Then follows item the second — " that the revenues
of the college non sufficiunt his diebus." "Item — that the
premises are true, &c., et super eisdem laborarunt, et labo-
rante publica vox et fama. Unde facta fide petit pars eorun-
dem that the priory be annexed to the college : ita quod dicto
prioratu vacante liceat iis ex tunc to take possession," &c.
This libel, with the express consent of the other proctors, we,
the commissary, admitted, and appointed the 6th August for
Proctor Preston to prove the premises.

Preston produced witnesses, W. Gyfford, S.T.P., John Nele,
A.M., John Chapman, chaplain, and Robert Baron, literatus,
who were admitted and sworn, when the court was prorogued
to the 6th August; and the witnesses, on the same 5th Au-
gust, were examined by the commissary, "in capella infra
manerium de Esher situata secrete et singillatim." Then
follow the"literae procuratoriae :" first that of the college,

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 313

appointing Preston and Langport their proctors, dated August
30th, 1484; then that of the prior and convent of the cathe-
dral of Winton, appointing David Husband and Michael
Cleve, dated September 4th, 1484, then that of the bishop,
appointing W. Gyfford, Radulphus Langley and Will.
Cowper, dated September 3rd, 1484. Consec. 38°. — " Quo
die adveniente in dicta ecclesia parochiali," appeared, " coram
nobis," James Preston to prove the contents of his libel, and
exhibited some letters testimonial with the seal of the bishop,
and these were admitted ; and consequenter Preston produced
two witnesses, viz., Dominum Thomam Ashforde, nuper
priorem dicti prioratus, et Willm. Rabbys, Hteratum, who
were admitted and sworn, and examined as the others, by the
commissary ; " tunc & ibidem assistente scriba secrete &
singillatim; " and their depositions were read and made pub-
lic, as follows : —

Mr. W. Gyfford, S.T.P., aged 57, of the state of Magd.
Coll., etc., etc., as before.

Mr. John Nele, aged 57, proves the articles also.

Robert Baron, aged 56.

Johannes Chapman, aged 35, also affirmed all the five
articles.

Dompnus Thomas Ashforde, aged 72 years — " dicit 2'*"'".
3*"". 4""". articulos in eodem libello contentos, concernentes
statum dicti prioratus de Selbourne, fuisse et esse veros."

W. Rabbys, setat 40 ann., agrees with Gyfford, etc.

Then follows the letter from the bishop, " in subsidium pro-
bationis," above-mentioned — "Willmus, &c., salutem, &c.,
noverint universitas vestra, quod licet nos prioratui de Sel-
bourne, &c., pie compacientes sollicitudines pastorales, labores,
diligentias quam plurimas per nos & commissarios nostros pro
reformatione status ejus impenderimus, justicia id poscente ;
nihilominus tamen," etc., as in the article — to " desperatur,"
dated "in manerio nostro de Esher, Aug. 3rd, 1485, & consec.
39." Then on the sixth August, Preston, in the presence of
the other proctors, required that they should be compelled to
answer; when they all allowed the articles, "fuisse & esse
vera ; " and the commissary, at the request of Preston, con-
cluded the business, and appointed Monday, August 8th, for

314 WHITE

giving his decree in the same church of Esher, and it was
that day read, and contains a recapitulation, with the sentence
of union, etc., witnessed and attested.

As soon as the president and fellows of Magdalen College
had obtained the decision of the commissary in their favor,
they proceeded to supplicate the pope and to entreat his
holiness that he would give his sanction to the sentence of
union. Some difficulties were started at Rome; but they
were surmounted by the college agent, as appears by his
letters from that city. At length Pope Innocent VIII., by a
bulP bearing date 8th June, in the year of our Lord i486,
and in the second year of his pontificate, confirmed what had
been done and suppressed the convent.

Thus fell the considerable and well-endowed Priory of Sel-
borne after it had subsisted about two hundred and fifty-four
years; about seventy-four years after the suppression of
priories alien by Henry V., and about fifty years before the
general dissolution of monasteries by Henry VIII. The
founder, it is probable, had fondly imagined that the sacred-
ness of the institution, and the pious motives on which it was
established, might have preserved it inviolate to the end of
time — yet it fell —

" To teach us that God attributes to place
No sanctity, if none be thither brought
By men, who there frequent, or therein dwell."

— Milton's Paradise Lost.
Notes

^ Ecclesia Conventualis de Novo Loco was the monastery afterwards
called the New Minster, or Abbey of Hyde, in the city of Winchester.
Should any intelligent reader wonder to see that the prior of Hyde Abbey
was commissary to the bishop of Winton, and should conclude that there
was a mistake in titles and that the abbot must have been here meant, he
will be pleased to recollect that this person was the second in rank ; for,
" next under the abbot, in every abbey, was the prior." Pref. to Notit.
Monast.^ p. 29. Besides, abbots were great personages and too high in
station to submit to any office under the bishop. — G. W.

2 There is nothing remarkable in this bull of Pope Innocent, except the
statement of the annual revenue of the Priory of Selborne, which is therein
estimated at 160 flor. auri ; whereas Bishop Godwin sets it at ^^337 15^. (i\d.
Now a florin, so named, says Camden, because made by Florentius, was a
gold coin of King Edward III., in value 6j-., whereof 160 is not one-seventh
part of ^337 15J. (i\d. — G. W.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 315

LETTER XXV

Wainfleet did not long enjoy the satisfaction arising from
this new acquisition, but departed this life in a few months
after he had effected the union of the Priory with his late
founded college ; and was succeeded in the see of Winchester
by Peter Courtney, sometime towards the end of the year
i486.

In the beginning of the following year, the new bishop
released the president and fellows of Magdalen College from
all actions respecting the Priory of Selborne, and the Priory
and convent of St. Swithun, as the chapter of Winchester
cathedral confirmed the release. ^

N. 293. " Relaxatio Petri epi Winton, Ricardo Mayew,
Presidenti omnium actionum occasione indempnitatis sibi
debite pro unione Prioratus de Selborne dicto collegio. Jan.
2, 1487, et translat. anno i°."

N. 374. " Relaxatio prioris et conventus Sti. Swithini Win-
ton confirmans relaxationem Petri ep. Winton." 1487, Jan. 13.

Ashforde, the deposed prior, who had appeared as an evi-
dence for the impropriation of the Priory, at the age of seventy-
two years, that he might not be destitute of a maintenance
was pensioned by the college to the day of his death ; and
was living on till 1490, as appears by his acquittances.

Reg. a. ff. 46

" Omnibus Christi fidelibus ad quos presens scriptum per-
venerit, Richardus Mayew, presidens, &c., et scolares, salutem
in Domino.

" Noveritis nos prefatos presidentem et scolares, dedisse,
concessisse, et hoc presenti scripto confirmasse Thome Ash-
forde, capellano, quendam annualem redditum sex librarum
tresdecim solidorum et quatuor denariorum bone et legalis
monete Anglie — ad terminum vite prefati Thome" — to be
paid from the possessions of the college in Basingstoke. —
" In cujus rei testimonium sigillum nostrum commune presen-
tibus apponimus. Dat. Oxon. in coll. nostro supra dicto primo
die mensis Junii anno regis Ricardi tertii secundo," viz. 1484.

I

3l6 WHITE

The college, in their grant to Ashforde, style him only capel-
lamis ; but the annuitant very naturally, and with a becoming
dignity, asserts his late title in his acquittances, and identifies
himself by the addition of the miper priorem, or late prior.

As, according to the persuasion of the times, the depriving
the founder and benefactors of the Priory of their masses and
services would have been deemed the most impious of frauds,
Bishop Wainfleet, having by statute ordained four obits for
himself to be celebrated in the chapel of Magdalen College,
enjoined in one of them a special collect for the anniversary
of Peter de Rupibus, with a particular prayer — " Dens In-
diilgentiarum.^ '

The college also sent Nicholas Langrish, who had been a
chantry priest at Selborne, to celebrate mass for the souls of
all that had been benefactors to the said Priory and college,
and for all the faithful who had departed this life.

N. 356. Thomas Knowles, presidens, etc. — " damns et con-
cedimus Nicholao Langrish quandum capellaniam, vel sala-
rium, sive alio quocunque nomine censeatur, in prioratu qnon-
dam de Selborne pro termino 40 annorum, si tam diu vixerit.
Ubi dictus mag. Nicholaus celebrabit pro animabus omnium
benefactorum dicti prioratus et coll. nostri, et omnium fidelium
defunctorum. Insuper nos, &c., concedimus eidem ibidem cele-
branti in sustentationem suam quandam annualem pensionem
sive annuitatem octo librarum, &c. — in dicta capella dicti
prioratus — concedimus duas cameras contiguas ex parte bo-
reali dicte capelle, cum una coqiiina, et cum uno stabulo con-
veniente pro tribus equis, cum pomerio eidem adjacente voc. le
Orcheyard — Preterea 26s. 8d. per ann. ad inveniendum unum
clericum ad serviendum sibi ad altare, et aliis negotiis neces-
sariis ejus." — His wood to be granted him by the president
on the progress. — He was not to absent himself beyond a
certain time ; and was to superintend the coppices, wood, and
hedges. — Dat. 5'°. die Julii. an°. Hen. VHI". 36°." [viz.

1546.]

Here we see the Priory in a new light, reduced, as it were,
to the state of a chantry, without prior and without canons,
and attended only by a priest, who was also a sort of bailiff or
woodman, his assistant clerk, and his female cook. Owen

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 317

Oglethorpe, president, and Magd. Coll. in the fourth year of
Edward VI., viz. 1551, granted an annuity of ten pounds a
a year for life to Nich. Langrish, who, from the preamble,
appears then to have been fellow of that society, but, being
now superannuated for business, this pension is granted him
for thirty years, if he should live so long. It is said of him —
"cum jam sit provectioris etatis qua mut," etc.

Laurence Stubb, president of Magd. Coll., leased out the
Priory lands to John Sharp, husbandman, for the term of twenty
years, as early as the seventeenth year of Henry VIII., viz.,
1526 : and it appears that Henry Newlyn had been in posses-
sion of the lease before, probably towards the end of the reign
of Henry VII. Sharp's rent was vi". perann. — Regist. B.,p.43.

By an abstract from a lease lying before me, it appears that
Sharp found a house, two barns, a stable, and a duf-house
[dove-house] built, and standing on the south side of the old
Priory, and late in the occupation of Newlyn. In this abstract
also are to be seen the names of all the fields, many of which
continue the same to this day.^ Of some of them I shall take
notice, where anything singular occurs.

And here first we meet with Paradyss [Paradise] mede.
Every convent had its paradise ; which probably was an en-
closed orchard, pleasantly laid out, and planted with fruit trees.
Tyle-house grove, so distinguished from having a tiled house
near it.^ Butt-wood close; here the servants of the priory and
the village swains exercised themselves with their long-bows,
and shot at a mark against a butt, or bank.^ — Cundyth [con-
duit] wood : the engrosser of the lease not understanding this
name, has made a strange barbarous word of it. Conduit wood
was and is a steep, rough cow-pasture, lying above the Priory,
at about a quarter of a mile to the south-west. In the side of
this field there is a spring of water that never fails ; at the
head of which a cistern was built which communicated with
leaden pipes that conveyed water to the monastery. When
this reservoir was first constructed does not appear ; we only
know that it underwent a repair in the episcopate of Bishop
Wainfleet about the year 1462.^ Whether these pipes only
conveyed the water to the Priory for common and culinary
purposes, or contributed to any matters of ornament and ele-

3l8 WHITE

gance, we shall not pretend to say ; nor when artists and me-
chanics first understood anything of hydraulics, and that water •
confined in tubes would rise to its original level. There is a
person now living who had been employed formerly in digging
for these pipes, and once discovered several yards, which they
sold for old lead.

There was also a plot of ground called Tan-house garden :
and "Tannaria sua," a tanyard of their own, has been men-
tioned in Letter XVI. This circumstance I just take notice
of, as an instance that monasteries had trades and occupations
carried on within themselves.^

Registr. B., p. 112. Here we find a lease of the parsonage
of Selborne to Thomas Sylvester and Miles Arnold, husband-
men — of the tythes of all manner of corne pertaining to the
parsonage — with the offerings at the chapel of Whaddon
belonging to the said parsonage. Dat. June i. 2f^. Hen. 8'^
[viz. 1536.]

As the chapel of Whaddon has never been mentioned till
now, and as it is not noticed by Bishop Tanner in his " Notitia
Monastica," some more particular account of it will be proper
in this place. Whaddon was a chapel of ease to the mother
church of Selborne, and was situated in the tithing of Oak-
hanger, at about two miles' distance from the village. The
farm and field whereon it stood are still called Chapel Farm and
Field :" but there are no remains or traces of the building itself,
the very foundations having been destroyed before the memory
of man. In the farmyard at Oakhanger we remember a large
hollow stone, of a close substance, which had been used as a
hog-trough, but was then broken. This stone, tradition said,
had been the baptismal font of Whaddon chapel. The chapel
had been in a very ruinous state in old days ; but was new
built at the instance of Bishop Wainfleet, about the year 1463,
during the first priorship of Berne, in consequence of a seques-
tration issued forth by that visitor against the Priory on
account of notorious and shameful dilapidations.*

The Selborne rivulet becomes of some breadth at Oak-
hanger, and, in very wet seasons, swells to a large flood.
There is a bridge over the stream at this hamlet of consider-
able antiquity and peculiar shape, known by the name of Tun-

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 319

bridge : it consists of one single blunt Gothic arch, so high
and sharp as to render the passage not very convenient or
safe. Here was also, we find, a bridge in very early times ;
for Jacobus de Hochangre, the first benefactor to the Priory
of Selborne, held his estate at Hochangre by the service of
providing the king one foot-soldier for forty days, and by build-
ing this bridge. " Jacobus de Hochangre tenet Hochangre in
com. Southampton, per Serjantiam,^inveniendi unum valectum
in exercitu Domini regis [scil. Henrici HI'".] per 40 dies; et
ad faciendum pontem de Hochangre : et valet per ann. C. s."
— Blount's "Ancient Tenures," p. 84.

A dove-house was a constant appendant to a manorial dwell-
ing : of this convenience more will be said hereafter.

A corn-mill was also esteemed a necessary appendage of
every manor ; and therefore was to be expected of course at
the Priory of Selborne.

The prior had secta molendini, or ad molcndimim}^ a power
of compelling his vassals to bring their corn to be ground at
his mill according to an old custom. He had also, according
to Bishop Tanner, secta molendini de strete ; but the purport
of strete, we must confess, we do not understand. Strete, in
old English, signifies a road or highway, as Watling Strete, etc.,
therefore the prior might have some mill on a high-road. The
Priory had only one mill originally at Selborne ; but, by grants
of lands, it came possessed of one at Durton, and one at Oak-
hanger, and probably some on its other several manors.^^ The
mill of the Priory was in use within the memory of man, and
the ruins of the mill-house were standing within these thirty
years : the pond and dam and miller's dwelling still remain.
As the stream was apt to fail in very dry summers, the tenants
found their situation very distressing, for want of water, and
so were forced to abandon the spot. This inconvenience was
probably never felt in old times, when the whole district was
nothing but wood-lands : and yet several centuries ago there
seem to have been two or three mills between Well Head and
the Priory. For the reason of this assertion, see Letter XXIX.
to Mr. Barrington.

Occasional mention has been made of the many privileges
and immunities enjoyed by the convent and its priors; but a

320 WHITE

more particular state seems to be necessary. The author,
therefore, thinks this the proper place, before he concludes
these Antiquities, to introduce all that has been collected by
the judicious Bishop Tanner, respecting the Priory and its
advantages, in his " Notitia Monastica," a book now seldom
seen, on account of the extravagance of its price, and being
but in few hands cannot be easily consulted.^ He also adds
a few of its many privileges from other authorities — the
account is as follows. — Tanner, p. i66.

Selburne

A priory of black canons, founded by the often-mentioned
Peter de Rupibus, bishop of Winchester, a.d. 1233, and dedi-
cated to the blessed Virgin Mary ; but was suppressed, and
granted to William Wainfleet, bishop of Winchester, who
made it part of the endowment of St. Mary Magdalene Col-
lege in Oxford. The bishops of Winchester were patrons of
it. [Pat. 17, Edward II.] Vide. Mon. Ang., torn II., p. 343.
" Cartam fundationis ex ipso autographo in archivis Coll.
Magd. Ox5n. ubi etiam conservata sunt registra, cartas, rentali
et alia munimenta ad hunc prioratum spectantia.

"Extracta quaedam e registro MSS. in bibl. Bodl. — Dod-
worth, vol. 89, f. 140.

"Cart, antiq. N. N. n. 33. P. P. n. 48. et. 71. Q. Q. n. 40.
plac. coram justit. itin. [Southampton] 20. Hen. rot. 25. De
eccl. de Basing & Basingstoke. Plac. de juratis apud Win-
ton. 40 Hen. III. rot. — Protecta molendini de Strete. Cart. 54.
Hen. III. m. 3. [De mercatu, & feria apud Seleborne, a mis-
take.] Pat. 9. Edw. I. m. — Pat. 30. Edw. I. m. — Pat. 33.
Edw. I. p. i. m. — Pat. 35. Edw. I. m. — Pat. i. Edw. II. p. i.
m. 9. — Pat. 5. Edw. II. p. i. m. 21. De terris in Achanger.
Pat. 6. Edw. II. p. i. m. 7. de. eisdem. Brev. in Scacc. 6. Edw.

II. Pasch. rot. 8. — Pat. 17. Edw. II. p. i. m. — Cart. 10. Edw.

III. n. 24. Quod terrae suas in Seleburn, Achangre, Norton,
Basings, Basingstoke, & Nately, sint de afforestatae, and pro
aliis libertatibus. Pat. 12. Edw. III. p. 3. m. 3. — Pat. 10.
Edw. III. p. i. m. — Cart. 18. Edw. III. n. 24."

" N. N. 33. Rex concessit quod prior, et canonici de Sele-
burn habeant per terras suas de Seleburne, Achangre, Nor-

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 32 1

ton, Brompden, Basinges, Basingstoke, & Nately, diversas
libertates.

" P. P. 48. Quod prior de Seleburne, habeat terras suas
quietas de vasto, et regardo." — Extracts from Ayloffes Cal-
endars of Ancient Charters.

" Placita de juratis & assis coram Sal5m de Roff, & sociis
suis justic. itiner. apud Wynton in comitatu Sutht. — anno
regni R. Edwardi filii reg. Henr. octavo. — Et Por de Sele-
born ht in Selebr. fure, thurset. pillory, emendasse panis, &
suis." [cerevisae.] — Chapter-Jiouse, Westminster.

"Placita Foreste apud Wynt5n in com. Sutham. — Anno
reg. Edwardi octavo coram Rog. de Clifford, &c. Justic. ad
eadem placita audienda et tminand. assigtis.

" Carta Pror de Seleburn, H. Dei gra. rex. angl. &c. Con-
cessim, prior, see. Marie de Seleburn. et canonicis ibidem Deo

servient. q ipi et oes holes sui in pdcis terris suis et

tenementis manentes sint in ppetum quieti de sectis Swane-
motor. et omnium alior. placitor. for. et de espeltamentis
canum. et de omnibus submonitoibz. placitis querelis et
exaccoibus et occoibz. ad for. et for. et viridar. et eor. min-
istros ptinentibz." — Chapter-Jionse, Westminister.

" Plita Forestarum in com. Sutht. apud Suthamton

anno regni regis Edwardi tcii post consequentum quarto coram
Johz Mantvers. &c., justic. itinand., &c.

" De hiis qui clamant libtates infra Forestas in com. Sutht.

" Prior de Selebourne clamat esse quietus erga dnm regem
de omnibus finibus et amerciamentis p tnsgr. et omnibus, ex-
accoibe ad Dom. regem vel hered. suos ptinent. pret. plita
corone reg,

" Item clamat q*^ si aliquis hominum suorum de terris et ten
p. deliciato suo vitam aut membrum debcat amittere vclfugiat,
& judico stare noluerit vel aliud delictum fecit pro quo debcat
catella sua amittere, ubicuncq ; justitia fieri debeat omnia
catella ilia sint ptci Prioris et successor, suor. Et liceat eidem
priori et balHs suis ponere se in seisinam in hujusmodi catall.
in casibus pdcis sine disturbacone ballivor. dni. reg. quorum-
cunque.

" Item clam, quod licet aliqua libtatum p dnm regem con-
cessar, pcessu temporis quocunq; casu contingente usi non
22

322 WHITE

fuerint, nlominus postea eadm libtate uti possit. Et pdcus
prior quesitus p justic. quo waranto clamat omn. terr. et ten.
sua in Seleburne, Norton, Basynges, Basyngestoke, & Nattele.
que prior domus pdte huit & tenuit X""". die April anno regni
dni Hen. reg. nue XVIII. imppm effe quieta de vasto et re-
gardo, et visu forestarior. et viridarior. regardator. et omnium
ministrorum foreste." etc., etc. — Chapter-hotise^ Westminster.

Notes

^ The bishops of Winchester were patrons of the Priory. — G. W.

^ It may not be amiss to mention here that various names of tithings,
farms, fields, woods, etc., which appear in the ancient deeds, and evidences
of several centuries standing, are still preserved in common use with little
or no variation : as Norton, Southington, Durton, Achangre, Blackmore,
Bradshot, Rood, Plestor, etc., etc. At the same time it should be acknowl-
edged that other places have entirely lost their original titles, as le Buri and
Trucstede in this village ; and la Liege, or la Lyge, which was the name of
the original site of the Priory, etc. — G. W.

2 Men at first heaped sods, or fern, or heath, on their roofs to keep off
the inclemencies of weather ; and then by degrees laid straw or haum. The
first refinements on roofing were shingles, which are very ancient. Tiles
are a late and imperfect covering, and were not much in use till the beginning
of the sixteenth century. The first tiled house at Nottingham was in 1503.
— G. W.

^ There is also a Butt-close just at the back of the village. — G. W.

5 N. 381. "Clausure terre abbatie ecclesie parochiali de Seleburne, ixi'.
\\\\d. Reparacionibus domorum predicti prioratus iiii. lib. xij. Aque conduct,
ibidem, xxiiirf." — G. W.

^ There is still a wood near the Priory, called Tanner's Wood. — G. W.

^ This is a manor-farm, at present the property of Lord Stawell ; and
belonged probably in ancient times to Jo. de Venur, or Venuz, one of the
first benefactors to the Priory. — G. W.

' See Letter XIX. of these Antiquities. — " Summa total, solut. de novis
edificationibus, et raparacionibus per idem tempus, ut patet per comput."

"Videlicet de nova edificat. Capelle Marie de Wadden. xiiii. lib. vs.
viii. d. — Reparacionibus ecclesie Prioratus, cancellor. et capellar. ecclesia-
rum et capellarum de Selborne, et Estworhlam," etc., etc. — G. W.

^ Sargentia, a sort of tenure of doing something for the king. — G. W.

1° " Servitium, quo feudatorii grana sua ad Domini molendinum, ibi
molenda perferre, ex consuetudine, astringuntur." — G. W.

11 Thomas Knowles, president, etc., ann. Hen. 8vi. xxiii°. [1532] demised
to J. Whitelie their mills, etc., for twenty years. Rent xxiiij. mxd. — Ac-
cepted Frewen, president, etc., ann. Caroli xv. [viz., 1640] demised to Jo.
Hook and Elizabeth his wife, the said mills. Rent as above. — G. W.

^■^ A few days after this was written a new edition of this valuable work
was announced, in the month of April of the year 1787, as published by
Mr. Nasmith. — G. W.

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 323

LETTER XXVI

Though the evidences and documents of the Priory and
parish of Selborne are now at an end, yet as the author has
still several things to say respecting the present state of that
convent and its Grange, and other matters, he does not see
how he can acquit himself of the subject without trespassing
again on the patience of the reader by adding one supplement-
ary letter.

No sooner did the Priory (perhaps much out of repair at the
time) become an appendage to the college, but it must at once
have tended to swift decay. Magdalen College wanted now
only two chambers for the chantry priest and his assistant ;
and therefore had no occasion for the hall, dormitory, and
other spacious apartments belonging to so large a foundation.

The roofs, neglected, would soon become the possession of
daws and owls ; and, being rotted and decayed by the weather,
would fall in upon the floors, so that all parts must have
hastened to speedy dilapidation and a scene of broken ruins.
Three full centuries have now passed since the dissolution —
a series of years that would craze the stoutest edifices. But,
besides the slow hand of time, many circumstances have con-
tributed to level this venerable structure with the ground, of
which nothing now remains but one piece of wall about ten
feet long and as many feet high, which probably was a part
of an out-house. As early as the latter end of the reign of
Henry VII., we find that a farmhouse and two barns were
built to the south of the Priory, and undoubtedly out of its
materials. Avarice again has much contributed to the over-
throw of this stately pile, as long as the tenants could make
money of its stones or timbers. Wantonness, no doubt, has
had a share in the demolition ; for boys love to destroy what
men venerate and admire. A remarkable instance of this pro-
pensity the writer can give from his own knowledge. When
a schoolboy, more than fifty years ago, he was eye-witness,
perhaps a party concerned, in the undermining a portion of
that fine old ruin at the north end of Basingstoke town, well
known by the name of Holy Ghost Chapel. Very providen-

324 WHITE

tially the vast fragment which these thoughtless little engi-
neers endeavored to sap did not give way so soon as might
have been expected ; but it fell the night following, and with
such violence that it shook the very ground, and, awakening
the inhabitants of the neighboring cottages, made them start
up in their beds as if they had felt an earthquake. The mo-
tive for this dangerous attempt does not so readily appear ;
perhaps the more danger the more honor thought the boys,
and the notion of doing some mischief gave a zest to the
enterprise. As Dryden says upon another occasion —

" It looked so like a sin it pleased the more."

Had the Priory been only levelled to the surface of the
ground, the discerning eye of an antiquary might have ascer-
tained its ichnography, and some judicious hand might have
developed its dimensions. But besides other ravages, the very
foundations have been torn up for the repair of the highways ;
so that the site of this convent is now become a rough, rugged
pasture-field, full of hillocks and pits, choked with nettles and
dwarf elder, and trampled by the feet of the ox and the heifer.

As the tenant at the Priory was lately digging among the
foundations for material to mend the highways, his laborers
discovered two large stones, with which the farmer was so
pleased that he ordered them to be taken out whole. One of
these proved to be a large Doric capital, worked in good taste ;
and the other a base of a pillar, both formed out of the soft
freestone of this district. These ornaments, from their dimen-
sions, seemed to have belonged to massive columns, and show
that the church of this convent was a large and costly edifice.
They were found in the space which has always been supposed
to have contained the south transept of the priory church.
Some fragments of large pilasters were also found at the
same time. The diameter of the capital was two feet three
inches and a half, and of the column, where it had stood on
the base, eighteen inches and three-quarters.

Two years ago, some laborers, digging again among the
ruins, sounded a sort of rude thick vase or urn of soft stone,
containing about two gallons in measure, on the verge of the
brook, in the very spot which tradition has always pointed

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 325

out as having been the site of the convent kitchen. This
clumsy utensil,! whether intended for holy water or whatever
purpose, we were going to procure, but found that the laborers
had just broken it in pieces and carried it out on the high-
ways.

The Priory of Selborne had possessed in this village a
grange, an usual appendage to manorial estates, where the
fruits of their lands were stowed and laid up for use, at a time
when men took the natural produce of their estates in kind.
The mansion of this spot is still called the Grange, and is the
manor-house of the convent possessions in this place. The
author has conversed with very ancient people who remem-
bered the old, original Grange, but it has long given place to
a modern farmhouse. Magdalen College holds a court-leet
and court-baron ^ in the great wheat-barn of the said Grange,
annually, where the president usually superintends, attended
by the bursar and steward of the college.^

The following uncommon presentment at the court is not
unworthy of notice. There is on the south side of the King's
Field (a large common field, so called) a considerable tumulus,
or hillock, now covered with thorns and bushes, and known by
the name of Kite's Hill, which is presented, year by year, in
court as not ploughed. Why this injunction is still kept up
respecting this spot, which is surrounded on all sides by arable
land, may be a question not easily solved, since the usage has
long survived the knowledge of the intention thereof. We
can only suppose that as the prior, besides thurset and pillory,
had also furcas, a power of life and death, he might have
reserved this little eminence as the place of execution for de-
linquents. And there is the more reason to suppose so, since
a spot just by is called Gaily (Gallows) Hill.

The lower part of the village, next the Grange, in which is
a pond and a stream, is well known by the name of Gracious
Street, an appellation not at all understood. There is a lake
in Surrey, near Cobham, called also Gracious Pond; and
another, if we mistake not, near Hedleigh, in the county of
Hants. This strange denomination we do not at all compre-
hend, and conclude that it may be a corruption from some
Saxon word, itself perhaps forgotten.

326 WHITE

It has been observed already that Bishop Tanner was mis-
taken when he refers to an evidence of Dodsworth, " De mer-
cante feria de Seleburne." Selborne never had a chartered
fair; the present fair was set up since the year 1681, by a set
of jovial fellows who had found in an old almanac that there
had been a fair here in former days on the ist August and
were desirous to revive so joyous a festival. Against this
innovation the vicar set his face, and persisted in crying it
down, as the probable occasion of much intemperance. How-
ever, the fair prevailed, but was altered to the 29th May,
because the former day often interfered with wheat-harvest.
On that day it still continues to be held, and is become a
useful mart for cows and calves. Most of the lower house-
keepers brew beer against this holiday, which is dutied by
the exciseman, and their becoming victuallers for the day
without a license is overlooked.

Monasteries enjoyed all sorts of conveniences within them-
selves. Thus, at the Priory, a low and moist situation, there
were ponds and stews for their fish ; at the same place also,
and at the Grange in Culver * Croft, there were dove-houses ;
and on the hill opposite to the Grange the prior had a warren,
as the names of the Coneycrofts and Coneycroft Hanger
plainly testify.^

Nothing has been said, as yet, respecting the tenure or hold-
ing of the Selborne estates. Temple and Norton are manor
farms and freeholds ; as is the manor of Chapel, near Oak-
hanger, and also the estate at Oakhanger House and Black-
moor. The Priory and Grange are leasehold under Magdalen
College, for twenty-one years, renewable every seven ; all the
smaller estates in and round the village are copyhold of inheri-
tance under the college, except the little remains of the Gur-
don Manor, which had been of old leased out upon lives, but
have been freed of late by their present lord, as fast as those
lives have dropped.

Selborne seems to have derived much of its prosperity from
the near neighborhood of the Priory. For monasteries were
of considerable'advantage to places where they had their sites
and estates, by causing great resort, by procuring markets and
fairs, by freeing them from the cruel oppression of forest laws,

ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 327

and by letting their lands at easy rates. But, as soon as the
convent was suppressed, the town which it had occasioned
began to decline, and the market was less frequented ; the
rough and sequestered situation gave a check to resort, and
the neglected roads rendered it less and less accessible.

That it had been a considerable place for size, formerly,
appears from the largeness of the church, which much exceeds
those of the neighboring villages; by the ancient extent of the
burying-ground, which, from human bones occasionally dug
up, is found to have been much encroached upon ; by giving a
name to the hundred; by the old foundations and ornamented
stones and tracery of windows that have been discovered on the
north-east side of the village ; and by the many vestiges of dis-
used fish-ponds still to be seen around it. For ponds and stews
were multiplied in the times of popery, that the affluent might
enjoy some variety at their tables on fast-days ; therefore, the
more they abounded the better probably was the condition of
the inhabitants.

More Particulars respecting the Old Family Tortoise,

OMITTED in the NATURAL HiSTORY

Because we call this creature an abject reptile, we are too
apt to undervalue his abilities and depreciate his powers of
instinct. Yet he is, as Mr. Pope says of his lord,

. . . '• Much too wise to walk into a well : "

and has so much discernment as not to fall down a ha-ha, but
to stop and withdraw from the brink with the readiest precau-
tion.

Though he loves warm weather he avoids the hot sun ; be-
cause his thick shell, when once heated, would, as the poet says
of solid armor, " scald with safety." He therefore spends the
more sultry hours under the umbrella of a large cabbage-leaf,
or amidst the waving forest of an asparagus bed.

But, as he avoids heat in the summer, so, in the decline of
the year, he improves the faint autumnal beams by getting
within the reflection of a fruit wall ; and, though he never has
read that planes inclining to the horizon receive a greater share

328 WHITE

of warmth,^ he inclines his shell, by tilting it against the wall,
to collect and admit every feeble ray.

Pitiable seems the condition of this poor embarrassed rep-
tile ; to be cased in a suit of ponderous armor, which he can-
not lay aside ; to be imprisoned, as it were, within his own
shell, must preclude, we should suppose, all activity and dis-
position for enterprise. Yet there is a season of the year
(usually the beginning of June) when his exertions are remark-
able. He then walks on tiptoe, and is stirring by five in the
morning ; and, traversing the garden, examines every wicket
and interstice in the fences, through which he will escape if
possible ; and often has eluded the care of the gardener, and
wandered to some distant field. The motives that impel him
to undertake these rambles seem to be of the amorous kind ;
his fancy then becomes intent on sexual attachments, which
transport him beyond his usual gravity and induce him to for-
get for a time his ordinary solemn deportment.

Notes

^ A judicious antiquary who saw this vase observed that it possibly might
have been a standard measure between the monastery and its tenants. The
Priory we have mentioned claimed the assize of bread and beer in Selborne
manor, and probably the adjustment of dry measures for grain, etc. — G. W.

2 The time when this court is held is the mid-week between Easter and
Whitsuntide. — G. W.

8 Owen Oglethorpe, president, etc., an. Edw. Sexti, primo [viz., 1547]
demised to Robert Arden Selborne Grange for twenty years. Rent vi".
Index of Leases. — G. W .

^ Culver, as has been observed before, is Saxon for a pigeon. — G. W.

^ A warren was an usual appendage to a manor. — G. W.

^ Several years ago a book was written entitled " Fruit Walls Improved
by Inclining them to the Horizon : " in which the author has shown, by
calculation, that a much greater number of the rays of the sun will fall on
such walls than on those which are perpendicular. — G. W.

OBSERVATIONS

ON

VARIOUS PARTS OF NATURE

FROM MR. WHITE'S MSS.
WITH REMARKS BY MR. MARKWICK

ADVERTISEMENT

TO THE 8V0 EDITION, PUBLISHED IN l802, EDITED BY JOHN
WHITE, THE BROTHER OF THE AUTHOR

" The favorable reception with which the works on natural
history of my late respected relation, the Rev. Gilbert White
of Selborne, have been honored by the persons best qualified
to judge of their merit, has induced me to present them to
the public in a collected and commodious form, free from the
encumbrance of any extraneous matter. His largest work,
entitled 'The Natural History of Selborne,' has probably
been supposed by many to be formed upon a more local and
confined plan than it really is. In fact, the greater part
of the observations are applicable to all that portion of the
island in which he resided, and were indeed made in various
places. Almost the only matter absolutely local is the account
of the antiquities of the village of Selborne ; and this seemed
to stand so much apart, that, however well calculated to gratify
the lovers of topographical studies, it was thought that its
entire omission would be considered no loss to the work, con-
sidered as a publication on natural history. Its place is oc-
cupied by the 'Naturalists' Calendar and Miscellaneous
Observations,' which appeared in a separate volume since the
author's decease, extracted from his papers by Dr. Aitkin.
That gentleman has also made some farther selections from
the papers, which are now all in my possession ; and has
undertaken the revision and arrangement of the whole. A
very valuable addition to the calendar and observations has
been obtained from the kindness of William Markwick, Esq.,
F.L.S.,well known as an accurate observer of nature, whose
parallel calendar, kept in the county of Sussex, is given upon
the opposite columns.

"The Editor flatters himself that the publication in its

present form will prove an acceptable addition to the library

of the naturalist ; and will in particular be useful in inspiring

young persons, and those who pass their time in retirement,

with a taste for the very pleasing branch of knowledge on

which it treats. J. W.

"Fleet Street, 1802."

330

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS

Birds in General. — In severe weather fieldfares, red-
wings, skylarks, and titlarks resort to watered meadows for
food ; the latter wades up to its belly in pursuit of the pupae
of insects, and runs along upon the floating grass and weeds.
Many gnats are on the snow near the water; these support the
birds in part.

Birds are much influenced in their choice of food by color,
for though white currants are a much sweeter fruit than red,
yet they seldom touch the former till they have devoured every
bunch of the latter.

Redstarts, fly-catchers, and blackcaps arrive early in April.
If these little delicate beings are birds of passage (as we have
reason to suppose they are, because they are never seen in
winter), how could they, feeble as they seem, bear up against
such storms of snow and rain, and make their way through
such meteorous turbulences, as one should suppose would
embarrass and retard the most hardy and resolute of the
winged nation ? Yet they keep their appointed times and
seasons ; and in spite of frosts and winds return to their sta-
tions periodically as if they had met with nothing to obstruct
them. The withdrawing and appearance of the short-winged
summer birds is a very puzzling circumstance in natural history.

When the boys bring me wasps' nests, my bantam fowls fare
deliciously, and when the combs are pulled to pieces, devour
the young wasps in their maggot state with the highest glee
and delight. Any insect-eating bird would do the same ; and
therefore I have often wondered that the accurate Mr. Ray
should call one species of buzzard dutco apivorus sive vespivo-
ms, or the ho7iej> buzzard, because some combs of wasps hap-

3Zi

332 WHITE

pened to be found in one of their nests. The combs were
conveyed thither doubtless for the sake of the maggots or
nymphs, and not for their honey, since none is to be found in
the combs of wasps. Birds of prey occasionally feed on in-
sects ; thus have I seen a tame kite picking up the female
ants full of eggs, with much satisfaction. — White.

That redstarts, fly-catchers, blackcaps, and other slender-
billed insectivorous small birds, particularly the swallow tribe,
make their first appearance very early in the spring, is a well-
known fact ; though the fly-catcher is the latest of them all in
its visit (as this accurate naturalist observes in another place),
for it is never seen before the month of May. If these deli-
cate creatures come to us from a distant country, they will
probably be exposed in their passage, as Mr. White justly
remarks, to much greater difficulties from storms and tem-
pests than their feeble powers appear to be able to surmount :
on the other hand, if we suppose them to pass the winter in a
dormant state in this country, concealed in caverns or other
hiding-places sufficiently guarded from the extreme cold of
our winter to preserve their life, and that at the approach of
spring they revive from their torpid state and reassume their
usual powers of action, it will entirely remove the first difB-
culty arising from the storms and tempests they are liable to
meet with in their passage ; but how are we to get over the
still greater difficulty of their revivification from their torpid
state .'' What degree of warmth in the temperature of the air
is necessary to produce that effect, and how it operates on the
functions of animal life, are questions not easily answered.

How could Mr. White suppose that Ray named this species
the honey buzzard, because it fed on honey, when he not only
named it in Latin biiteo apivoriis et vespivorus, but expressly
says that " it feeds on insects, and brings up its young with
the maggots or nymphs of wasps 1 "

That birds of prey, when in want of their proper food, flesh,
sometimes feed on insects I have little doubt, and I think I
have observed the common hnzzdivd, falco btiteo, to settle on
the ground and pick up insects of some kind or other. —
Markwick.

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 333

Rooks. — Rooks are continually fighting and pulling each
other's nests to pieces : these proceedings are inconsistent with
living in such close community. And yet if a pair offer to
build on a single tree, the nest is plundered and demolished
at once. Some rooks roost on their nest trees. The twigs
which the rooks drop in building supply the poor with brush-
wood to light their fires. Some unhappy pairs are not per-
mitted to finish any nest till the rest have completed their
building. As soon as they get a few sticks together, a party
comes and demolishes the whole. As soon as rooks have fin-
ished their nests and before they lay, the cocks begin to feed
the hens, who receive their bounty with a fondling tremulous
voice and fluttering wings, and all the little blandishments that
are expressed by the young while in a helpless state. This
gallant deportment of the males is continued through the
whole season of incubation. These birds do not copulate on
trees, nor in their nests, but on the ground in the open fields.
— White.

After the first brood of rooks is sufficiently fledged, they all
leave their nest trees in the day-time, and resort to some dis-
tant place in search of food, but return regularly every even-
ing, in vast flights, to their nest trees, where, after flying round
several times with much noise and clamor till they are all as-
sembled together, they take up their abode for the night. —
Markwick,

Thrushes. — Thrushes during long droughts are of great
service in hunting out shell snails, which they pull to pieces
for their young, and are thereby very serviceable in gardens.
Missel-thrushes do not destroy the fruit in gardens like the
other species of turdi, but feed on the berries of mistletoe, and
in the spring on ivy berries, which then begin to ripen. In the
summer, when their young become fledged, they leave neigh-
borhoods and retire to sheep-walks and wild commons.

The magpies, when they have young, destroy the broods of
missel-thrushes, though the dams are fierce birds and fight
boldly in defence of their nests. It is probably to avoid such
insults that this species of thrush, though wild at other times,

334 WHITE

delights to build near houses and in frequented walks and
gardens. — White.

Of the truth of this I have been an eye-witness, having seen
the common thrush feeding on the shell snail.

In the very early part of this spring (1797) a bird of this
species used to sit every morning on the top of some high
elms close by my windows, and delight me with its charming
song, attracted thither, probably, by some ripe ivy berries that
grew near the place.

I have remarked something like the latter fact, for I re-
member, many years ago, seeing a pair of these birds fly up
repeatedly and attack some larger bird, which I suppose dis-
turbed their nest in my orchard, uttering at the same time
violent shrieks. Since writing the above, I have seen more
than once a pair of these birds attack some magpies that had
disturbed their nest with great violence and loud shrieks. —
Markwick.

Poultry. — Many creatures are endowed with a ready dis-
cernment to see what will turn to their own advantage and
emolument : and often discover more sagacity than could be
expected. Thus my neighbor's poultry watch for wagons
loaded with wheat, and running after them, pick up a num-
ber of grains which are shaken from the sheaves by the agita-
tion of the carriages. Thus, when my brother used to take
down his gun to shoot sparrows, his cats would run out before
him to be ready to catch up the birds as they fell.

The earnest and early propensity of gaUinse to roost on high
is very observable, and discovers a strong dread impressed on
their spirits respecting vermin that may annoy them on the
ground during the hours of darkness. Hence poultry, if left
to themselves and not housed, will perch the winter through
on yew-trees and fir-trees ; turkeys and guinea fowls, heavy as
they are, get up into apple-trees ; pheasants also in woods
sleep on trees to avoid foxes ; ^ while peafowls climb to the
tops of the highest trees round their owner's house for secu-
rity, let the weather be ever so cold or blowing. Partridges,
it is true, roost on the ground, not having the faculty of perch-

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 335

ing; but then the same fear prevails in their minds; for,
through apprehension from polecats and stoats, they never
trust themselves to coverts, but nestle together in the midst
of large fields, far removed from hedges and coppices, which
they love to haunt in the day, and where at that season they
can skulk more secure from the ravages of rapacious birds.

As to ducks and geese, their awkward splay web-feet forbid
them to settle on trees : they therefore, in the hours of dark-
ness and danger, betake themselves to their own element, the
water, where amidst large lakes and pools, like ships riding
at anchor, they float the whole night long in peace and security.
— White.

Guinea fowls not only roost on high, but in hard weather
resort, even in the day-time, to the very tops of the highest
trees. Last winter, when the ground was covered with snow,
I discovered all my guinea fowls, in the middle of the day,
sitting on the highest boughs of some very tall elms, chatter-
ing and making a great clamor : I ordered them to be driven
down lest they should be frozen to death in so elevated a
situation, but this was not effected without much difficulty ;
they being very unwilling to quit their lofty abode, notwith-
standing one of them had its feet so much frozen that we were
obliged to kill it. I know not how to account for this, unless
it was occasioned by their aversion to the snow on the ground,
they being birds that come originally from a hot climate.

Notwithstanding the awkward splay web-feet (as Mr. White
calls them) of the duck genus, some of the foreign species
have the power of settling on the boughs of trees apparently
with great ease ; an instance of which I have seen in the Earl
of Ashburnham's menagerie, where the summer duck, anas
sponsa, flew up and settled on the branch of an oak-tree in
my presence : but whether any of them roost on trees in the
night, we are not informed by any author that I am acquainted
with. I suppose not, but that, like the rest of the genus, they
sleep on the water, where the birds of this genus are not
always perfectly secure, as will appear from the following cir-
cumstance which happened in this neighborhood a few years
since, as I was credibly informed. A female fox was found

336 WHITE

in the morning drowned in the same pond in which were sev-
eral geese, and it was supposed that in the night the fox swam
into the pond to devour the geese, but was attacked by the
gander, which, being most powerful in its own element, buf-
feted the fox with its wings about the head till it was drowned.
— Markwick.

Hen Partridge. — A hen partridge came out of a ditch
and ran along shivering with her wings and crying out as if
wounded and unable to get from us. While the dam acted
this distress, the boy who attended me saw her brood, that
was small and unable to fly, run for shelter into an old fox-
earth under the bank. So wonderful a power is instinct. —
White.

It is not uncommon to see an old partridge feign itself
wounded and run along on the ground fluttering and crying
before either dog or man, to draw them away from its help-
less unfledged young ones. I have seen it often, and once in
particular I saw a remarkable instance of the old bird's solici-
tude to save its brood. As I was hunting a young pointer,
the dog ran on a brood of very small partridges : the old bird
cried, fluttered, and ran tumbling along just before the dog's
nose till she had drawn him to a considerable distance, when
she took wing and flew still farther off, but not out of the
field : on this the dog returned to me, near which place the
young ones lay concealed in the grass, which the old bird no
sooner perceived than she flew back again to us, settled just
before the dog's nose again, and by rolling and tumbling
about, drew off his attention from her young, and thus pre-
served her brood a second time. I have also seen, when a
kite has been hovering over a covey of young partridges, the
old birds fly up at the bird of prey, screaming and fighting
with all their might to preserve their brood. — Markwick.

A Hybrid Pheasant. — Lord Stawell sent me from the
great lodge in the Holt a curious bird for my inspection. It was
found by the spaniels of one of his keepers in a coppice, and
shot on the wing. The shape, air, and habit of the bird, and
the scarlet ring round the eyes, agreed well with the appear-

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 337

ance of a cock pheasant ; but then the head, and neck, and
breast, and belly were of a glossy black : and though it
weighed three pounds three ounces and a half,^ the weight
of a full-grown cock pheasant, yet there were no signs of
any spurs on the legs, as is usual with all grown cock pheas-
ants who have long ones. The legs and feet were naked
of feathers, and therefore it could be nothing of the grouse
kind. In the tail were no bending feathers, such as cock
pheasants usually have and are characteristic of the sex.
The tail was much shorter than the tail of a hen pheasant,
and blunt and square at the end. The back, wing, feathers,
and tail were all of a pale russet curiously streaked some-
what like the upper parts of a hen partridge. I returned it
with my verdict that it was probably a spurious or hybrid
hen bird, bred between a cock pheasant and some domestic
fowl. When I came to talk with the keeper who brought it,
he told me that some peahens had been known last summer
to haunt the coppices and coverts where this mule was found.

Mr. Elmer, of Farnhara, the famous game painter, was
employed to take an exact copy of this curiolis bird.

N.B. — It ought to be mentioned that some good judges
have imagined this bird to have been a stray grouse or black-
cock ; it is however to be obser\^ed, that Mr. W. remarks
that its legs and feet were naked, whereas those of the grouse
are feathered to the toes. — White.

Mr. Latham observes that " peahens, after they have done
laying, sometimes assume the plumage of the male bird,"
and has given a figure of the male-feathered peahen now to
be seen in the Leverian Museum ; and M. Salerne remarks,
that "the hen pheasant, when she has done laying and sit-
ting, will get the plumage of the male." May not this hybrid
pheasant (as Mr. White calls it) be a bird of this kind ? that
is, an old hen pheasant which had just begun to assume the
plumage of the cock. — Markwick.

Landrail — A man brought me a landrail, or daker-hen,
a bird so rare in this district that we seldom see more than
one or two in a season, and those only in autumn.^ This is
23

338 WHITE

deemed a bird of passage by all the writers ; yet from its
formation seems to be poorly qualified for migration ; for
its wings are short, and placed so forward and out of the
centre of gravity, that it flies in a very heavy and embarrassed
manner, with its legs hanging down ; and can hardly be
sprung a second time, as it runs very fast and seems to
depend more on the swiftness of its feet than on its flying.

When we came to draw it, we found the entrails so soft
and tender in appearance, they might have been dressed like
the ropes of a woodcock. The craw or crop was small and
lank, containing a mucus ; the gizzard thick and strong, and
filled with small shell snails, some whole, and many ground
to pieces through the attrition which is occasioned by the
muscular force and motion of that intestine. We saw no
gravels among the food : perhaps the shell snails might per-
form the functions of gravels or pebbles, and might grind
one another. Landrails used to abound formerly, I remem-
ber, in the low wet bean-fields of Christian Malford in North
Wilts, and in the meadows near Paradise Gardens at Oxford,
where I have often heard them cry crex, crex. The bird
mentioned above weighed seven and a half ounces, was fat
and tender, and in flavor like the flesh of a woodcock. The
liver was very large and delicate. — White.

Landrails are more plentiful with us than in the neighbor-
hood of Selborne. I have found four brace in an afternoon,
and a friend of mine lately shot nine in two adjoining fields ;
but I never saw them in any other season than the autumn.

That it is a bird of passage there can be little doubt, though
Mr. White thinks it poorly qualified for migration, on account
of the wings being short and not placed in the exact centre of
gravity ; how that may be I cannot say, but I know that its
heavy sluggish flight is not owing to its inability of flying faster,
for I have seen it fly very swiftly, although in general its actions
are sluggish. Its unwillingness to rise proceeds, I imagine,
from its sluggish disposition and its great timidity, for it will
sometimes squat so close to the ground as to suffer itself to be
taken up by the hand, rather than rise ; and yet it will at times
run very fast.

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 339

What Mr. White remarks respecting the small shell snails
found in its gizzard confirms my opinion that it frequents corn-
fields, seed clover, and brakes or fern, more for the sake of
snails, slugs, and other insects which abound in such places,
than for the grain or seeds ; and that it is entirely an insectivo-
rous bird. — Markwick.

Food of the Ring-dove. — One of my neighbors shot a
ring-dove on an evening as it was returning from feed and
going to roost. When his wife had picked and drawn it, she
found its craw stuffed with the most nice and tender tops of
turnips. These she washed and boiled, and so sat down to a
choice and delicate plate of greens, culled and provided in this
extraordinary manner.

Hence we may see that graminivorous birds, when grain fails,
can subsist on the leaves of vegetables. There is reason to
suppose that they would not long be healthy without ; for tur-
keys, though corn fed, delight in a variety of plants, such as
cabbage, lettuce, endive, etc., and poultry pick much grass;
while geese live for months together on commons by grazing

alone.

" Naught is useless made ; . . .
. . . On the barren heath
The shepherd tends his flock that daily crop
Their verdant dinner from the mossy turf
Sufficient : after them the cackling goose,
Close-grazer, finds wherewith to ease her want."

Philips's Cyder.
— White.

That many graminivorous birds feed also on the herbage or
leaves of plants, there can be no doubt : partridges and larks
frequently feed on the green leaves of turnips, which give a
peculiar flavor to their flesh, that is, to me, very palatable : the
flavor also of wild-ducks and geese greatly depends on the
nature of their food ; and their flesh frequently contracts a
rank unpleasant taste, from their having lately fed on strong,
marshy, aquatic plants, as I suppose.

That the leaves of vegetables are wholesome and conducive
to the health of birds seems probable, for many people fat
their ducks and turkeys with the leaves of lettuce chopped
small. — Markwick.

340 WHITE

Hen Harrier. — A neighboring gentleman sprung a pheas-
ant in a wheat stubble, and shot at it ; when, notwithstanding
the report of the gun, it was immediately pursued by the blue
hawk, known by the name of the hen harrier, but escaped into
some covert. He then sprung a second, and a third, in the
same field, that got away in the same manner ; the hawk hov-
ering round him all the while that he was beating the field,
conscious no doubt of the game that lurked in the stubble.
Hence we may conclude that this bird of prey was rendered
very daring and bold by hunger, and that hawks cannot always
seize their game when they please. We may farther observe,
that they cannot pounce their quarry on the ground where it
might be able to make a stout resistance, since so large a fowl
as a pheasant could not but be visible to the piercing eye of a
hawk, when hovering over the field. Hence that propensity
of cowering and squatting till they are almost trod on, which
no doubt was intended as a mode of security ; though long
rendered destructive to the whole race of gallinae by the in-
vention of nets and guns. — White.

Of the great boldness and rapacity of birds of prey when
urged on by hunger, I have seen several instances ; particu-
larly v/hen shooting in the winter in company with two friends
a woodcock flew across us, closely pursued by a small hawk ;
we all three fired at the woodcock instead of the hawk, which,
notwithstanding the report of three guns close by it, continued
its pursuit of the woodcock, struck it down, and carried it off,
as we afterwards discovered.

At another time, when partridge-shooting with a friend, we
saw a ring-tail hawk rise out of a pit with some large bird in
its claws ; though at a great distance we both fired and obliged
it to drop its prey, which proved to be one of the partridges
which we were in pursuit of ; and lastly, in an evening, I shot
at and plainly saw that I had wounded a partridge, but it being
late, was obliged to go home without finding it again. The
next morning I walked round my land without any gun, but a
favorite old spaniel followed my heels. When I came near
the field where I wounded the bird the evening before, I heard
the partridges call, and seeming to be much disturbed. On

t/1

u

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 34 1

my approaching the bar-way, they all rose, some on my right
and some on my left hand ; and just before and over my head
I perceived (though indistinctly from the extreme velocity of
their motion) two birds fly directly against each other, when
instantly, to my great astonishment, down dropped a partridge
at my feet ; the dog immediately seized it, and on examination
I found the blood flow very fast from a flesh wound in the
head, but there was some dry clotted blood on its wings and
side ; whence I concluded that a hawk had singled out my
wounded bird as the object of his prey, and had struck it
down the instant that my approach had obliged the birds to
rise on the wing ; but the space between the hedges was so
small, and the motion of the birds so instantaneous and
quick, that I could not distinctly observe the operation, —
Mark WICK.

Great Speckled Diver or Loon. — As one of my
neighbors was traversing Wolmer Forest from Bramshot
across the moors, he found a large uncommon bird fluttering
in the heath, but not wounded, which he brought home alive.
On examination it proved to be colymbus glacialis, Linn., the
great speckled diver, or loon, which is most excellently de-
scribed in Willughby's " Ornithology."

Every part and proportion of this bird is so incomparably
adapted to its mode of life, that in no instance do we see the
wisdom of God in the creation to more advantage. The head
is sharp and smaller than the part of the neck adjoining, in
order that it may pierce the water ; the wings are placed for-
ward, and out of the centre of gravity, for a purpose which
shall be noticed hereafter ; the thighs quite at the podex, in
order to facilitate diving ; and the legs are quite flat, and as
sharp backwards almost as the edge of a knife, that in strik-
ing they may easily cut the water ; while the feet are pal-
mated, and broad for swimming, yet so folded up when
advanced forward to take a fresh stroke, as to be full as
narrow as the shank. The two exterior toes of the feet are
longest ; the nails flat and broad, resembling the human,
which give strength and increase the power of swimming.
The foot, when expanded, is not at right angles to the leg or

342 WHITE

fiody of the bird : but the exterior part inclining towards the
head forms an acute angle with the body, the intention
being not to give motion in the line of the legs themselves,
but by the combined impulse of both in an intermediate line,
the line of the body.

Most people know, that have observed at all, that the swim-
ming of birds is nothing more than a walking in the water,
where one foot succeeds the other as on the land ; yet no one,
as far as I am aware, has remarked that diving fowls, while
under water, impel and row themselves forward by a motion
of their wings, as well as by the impulse of their feet : but
such is really the case, as any person may easily be con-
vinced who will observe ducks, when hunted by dogs, in a
clear pond. Nor do I know that any one has given a reason
why the wings of diving fowls are placed so forward : doubt-
less, not for the purpose of promoting their speed in flying,
since that position certainly impedes it, but probably for the
increase of their motion under water, by the use of four oars
instead of two ; yet were the wings and feet nearer together,
as in land birds, they would, when in action, rather hinder
than assist one another.

This colymbus was of considerable bulk, weighing only
three drams short of three pounds avoirdupois. It meas-
ured in length from the bill to the tail (which was very short)
two feet, and to the extremities of the toes four inches more ;
and the breadth of the wings expanded was forty-two inches.
A person attempted to eat the body, but found it very strong
and rancid, as is the flesh of all birds living on fish. Divers,
or loons, though bred in the most northerly parts of Europe,
yet are seen with us in very severe winters ; and on the Thames
they are called sprat loons, because they prey much on that
sort of fish.

The legs of the colymbi and mergi are placed so very back-
ward, and so out of all centre of gravity, that these birds can-
not walk at all. They are called by Linnaeus compedes, because
they move on the ground as if shackled or fettered. — White.

These accurate and ingenious observations, tending to set
forth in a proper light the wonderful works of God in the crea-

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 343

tion, and to point out His wisdom in adapting the singular
form and position of the limbs of this bird to the particular
mode in which it is destined to pass the greatest part of its life
in an element much denser than the air, do Mr. White credit,
not only as a naturalist, but as a man, and as a philosopher,
in the truest sense of the word, in my opinion ; for were we
enabled to trace the works of nature minutely and accurately,
we should find, not only that every bird, but every creature,
was equally well adapted to the purpose for which it was in-
tended; though this fitness and propriety of form is more
striking in such animals as are destined to any uncommon

mode of life.

I have had in my possession two birds, which, though of a
different genus, bear a great resemblance to Mr. White's colym-
bus, in their manner of life, which is spent chiefly in the water,
where they swim and dive with astonishing rapidity, for which
purpose their fin-toed feet, placed far behind, and very short
wings, are particularly well adapted, and show the wisdom of
God in the creation as conspicuously as the bird before-men-
tioned. These birds were the greater and lesser crested grebe,
podiceps cristatus et auritus. What surprised me most was
that the first of these birds was found alive on dry ground,
about seven miles from the sea, to which place there was no
communication by water. How did it get so far from the sea ?
its wings and legs being so ill adapted either to flymg or walk-
ing The lesser crested grebe was also found in a fresh-water
pond which had no communication with other water, at some
miles' distance from the sea. — Markwick.

Stone-curlew. -On the 27th February, 1788, stone-cur-
lews were heard to pipe : and on March ist, after it was dark,
some were passing over the village, as might be perceived by
their quick short note, which they use in their nocturnal e.xcur-
sions by way of watchword, that they may not stray and lose

their companions. ,

Thus we see that, retire whithersoever they may m the wm-

ter, they return again early in the ^P""^' ^" Vp^hfosThl
appears, the first summer birds that come back. Perhaps the
mildness of the season may have quickened the emigration of
the curlews this year.

344 WHITE

They spend the day in high elevated fields and sheep-walks,
but seem to descend in the night to streams and meadows,
perhaps for water, which their upland haunts do not afford
them. — White.

On the 31st January, 1792, 1 received a bird of this species
which had been recently killed by a neighboring farmer, who
said he had frequently seen it in his fields during the former
part of the winter : this perhaps was an occasional straggler,
which by some accident was prevented from accompanying its
companions in their migration. — Markwick.

The Smallest Uncrested Willow-wren. — The small-
est uncrested willow-wren, or chiff-chaff, is the next early sum-
mer bird which we have remarked ; it utters two sharp piercing
notes, so loud in hollow woods as to occasion an echo, and is
usually first heard about the 20th March. — White.

This bird, which Mr. White calls the smallest willow-wren or
chiff-chaff, makes its appearance very early in the spring, and
is very common with us ; but I cannot make out the three differ-
ent species of willow-wrens which he assures us he has discov-
ered. Ever since the publication of his " History of Selborne "
I have used my utmost endeavors to discover his three birds,
but hitherto without success. I have frequently shot the bird
which " haunts only the tops of trees, and makes a sibilous
noise," even in the very act of uttering that sibilous note, but
it always proved to be the common willow-wren or his chiff-
chaff. In short, I never could discover more than one species,
unless my greater petty-chaps, sylvia hortensis of Latham, is
his greatest willow-wren. — Markwick.

Fern-owl, or Goat-sucker. — The country-people have a
notion that the fern-owl, or churn-owl or eve-jarr, which they
also call a puckeridge, is very injurious to weanling calves, by
inflicting as it strikes at them the fatal distemper known to
cow-leeches by the name of puckeridge.* Thus does this harm-
less ill-fated bird fall under a double imputation which it by no
means deserves — in Italy, of sucking the teats of goats, whence
it is C2i\\e.dcaprimulgus ; and with us, of communicating a deadly
disorder to cattle. But the truth of the matter is, the malady

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 345

above-mentioned is occasioned by the cBstrus bovis, a dipterous
insect, which lays its eggs along the chines of kinc, where the
maggots, when hatched, eat their way through the hide of the
beast into the flesh, and grow to a very large size. I have
just talked with a man who says he has more than once
stripped calves who have died of the puckeridge ; that the ail
or complaint lay along the chine, where the flesh was much
swelled and filled with purulent matter. Once I myself saw
a large rough maggot of this sort squeezed out of the back of
a cow.

These maggots in Essex are called wornils.

The least observation and attention would convince men
that these birds neither injure the goatherd nor the grazier,
but are perfectly harmless, and subsist alone, being night
birds, on night insects, such as scai-abcEi and pJialcBJice ; and
through the month of July mostly on the scarabcBus solstitialis,
which in many districts abounds at that season. Those that
we have opened have always had their craws stuffed with
large night moths and their eggs, and pieces of chaffers : nor
does it anywise appear how they can, weak and unarmed as
they seem, inflict any harm upon kine, unless they possess the
powers of animal magnetism and can affect them by fluttering
over them.

A fern-owl this evening (August 27th) showed off in a
very unusual and entertaining manner, by hawking round and
round the circumference of my great spreading oak for twenty
times following, keeping mostly close to the grass, but occa-
sionally glancing up amidst the boughs of the tree. This
amusing bird was then in pursuit of a brood of some particular
phalaena belonging to the oak, of which there are several
sorts ; and exhibited on the occasion a command of wing
superior, I think, to that of the swallow itself.

When a person approaches the haunt of fern-owls in an
evening, they continue flying round the head of the obtruder ;
and by striking their wings together above their backs, in the
manner that the pigeons called smiters are known to do, make
a smart snap ; perhaps at that time they are jealous for their
young, and their noise and gesture are intended by way of
menace.

34^ WHITE

Fern-owls have attachment to oaks, no doubt on account of
food ; for the next evening we saw one again several times
among the boughs of the same tree ; but it did not skim round
its stem over the grass, as on the evening before. In May
these birds find the scarabceiis melolontha on the oak, and the
scarabceiis solstitialis at midsummer. These peculiar birds can
only be watched and observed for two hours in the twenty-
four ; and then in dubious twilight an hour after sunset and
an hour before sunrise.

On this day (July 14th, 1789), a woman brought me two
eggs of a fern-owl, or evening jarr, which she found on the
verge of the Hanger, to the left of the hermitage under a
beechen shrub. This person, who lives just at the foot of the
Hanger, seems well acquainted with these nocturnal swallows,
and says she has often found their eggs near that place, and
that they lay only two at a time on the bare ground. The
eggs were oblong, dusky, and streaked somewhat in the man-
ner of the plumage of the parent bird, and were equal in size
at each end. The dam was sitting on the eggs when found,
which contained the rudiments of young, and would have been
hatched perhaps in a week. From hence we may see the time
of their breeding, which corresponds pretty well with that of
the swift, as does also the period of their arrival. Each species
is usually seen about the beginning of May. Each breeds
but once in a summer; each lays only two eggs.

July 4th, 1790. The woman who brought me two fern-owl's
eggs last year on July 14th, on this day produced me two more,
one of which had been laid this morning, as appears plainly,
because there was only one in the nest the evening before.
They were found, as last July, on the verge of the down above
the hermitage under a beechen shrub, on the naked ground.
Last year those eggs were full of young, just ready to be
hatched.

These circumstances point out the exact time when these
curious, nocturnal migratory birds lay their eggs and hatch
their young. Fern-owls, like snipes, stone-curlews, and some
other birds, make no nest. Birds that build on the ground do
not make much of nests. — White.

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 347

No author that I am acquainted with has given so accurate
and pleasing an account of the manners and habits of the goat-
sucker as Mr. White, taken entirely from his own observations.
Its being a nocturnal bird, has prevented my having many
opportunities of observing it. I suspect that it passes the day
in concealment amidst the dark and shady gloom of deep-
wooded dells, or as they are called here gills ; having more
than once seen it roused from such solitary places by my dogs,
when shooting in the day-time. I have also sometimes seen it
in an evening, but not long enough to take notice of its habits
and manners. I have never seen it but in summer, between
the months of May and September. — Markwick.

Sand-Martins. — March 23rd, 1788. A gentleman who
was this week on a visit at Waverley took the opportunity of
examining some of the holes in the sandbanks with which
that district abounds. As these are undoubtedly bored by bank-
martins, and are the places where they avowedly breed, he was
in hopes that they might have slept there also, and that he
might have surprised them just as they were awaking from
their winter slumbers. When he had dug for some time, he
found the holes were horizontal and serpentine, as I had ob-
served before ; and that the nests were deposited at the inner
end, and had been occupied by broods in former summers, but
no torpid birds were to be found. He opened and examined
about a dozen holes. Another gentleman made the same
search many years ago, with as little success.

These holes were in depth about two feet.

March 21st, 1790. A single bank or sand martin was seen
hovering and playing round the sandpit at Short Heath, where
in the summer they abound.

April 9th, 1793. A sober hind assures us that this day, on
Wishhanger Common between Hedleigh and Frinsham, he saw
several bank-martins playing in and out, and hanging before
some nest-holes in a sandhill, where these birds usually
nestle.

The incident confirms my suspicions, that this species of
hirundo is to be seen first of any ; and gives great reason to
suppose that they do not leave their wild haunts at all, but

348 WHITE

are secreted amidst the clefts and caverns of those abrupt
cHffs, where they usually spend their summers.

The late severe weather considered, it is not very probable
that these birds should have migrated so early from a tropical
region, through all these cutting winds and pinching frosts ;
but it is easy to suppose that they may, like bats and flies, have
been awakened by the influence of the sun, amidst their secret
latebrae, where they have spent the uncomfortable, foodless
months in a torpid state and the profoundest of slumbers.

There is a large pond at Wishhanger, which induces these
sand-martins to frequent that district. For I have ever re-
marked that they haunt near great waters, either rivers or
lakes. — White.

Here, and in many other passages of his writings, this very
ingenious naturalist savors the opinion that part, at least, of
the swallow tribe pass their winter in a torpid state in the same
manner as bats and flies, and revive again on the approach of
spring.

I have frequently taken notice of all these circumstances,
which induced Mr. White to suppose that some of these hirun-
dines lie torpid during winter. I have seen so late as Novem-
ber, on a finer day than usual at that season of the year, two
or three swallows flying backwards and forwards under a warm
hedge, or on the sunny side of some old building ; nay, I once
saw on the 8th December two martins flying about very briskly,
the weather being mild. I had not seen any considerable num-
ber either of swallows or martins for a considerable time be-
fore ; from whence, then, could these few birds come, if not
from some hole or cavern where they had laid themselves up
for the winter ? Surely it will not be asserted that these birds
migrate back again from some distant tropical region, merely
on the appearance of a fine day or two, at this late season
of the year. Again, very early in the spring, and sometimes
immediately after very cold severe weather, on its growing a
little warmer, a few of these birds suddenly make their appear-
ance, long before the generality of them are seen. These
appearances certainly favor the opinion of their passing the
winter in a torpid state, but do not absolutely prove the fact ;

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 349

for who ever saw them reviving of their own accord from their
torpid state, without being first brought to the fire, and, as it
were, forced into Hfe again ; soon after which revivification
they constantly die. — Markwick.

Swallows, Congregating and Disappearance of. —
During the severe winds that often prevail late in the spring,
it is not easy to say how the hirundines subsist ; for they with-
draw themselves, and are hardly ever seen, nor do any insects
appear for their support. That they can retire to rest, and
sleep away these uncomfortable periods, as bats do, is a mat-
ter rather to be suspected than proved ; or do they not rather
spend their time in deep and sheltered vales near waters,
where insects are more likely to be found .'' Certain it is, that
hardly any individuals of this genus have at such times been
seen for several days together.

September 13th, 1791. The congregating flocks of hirun-
dines on the church and tower are very beautiful and amusing !
When they fly off together from the roof, on any alarm, they
quite swarm in the air. But they soon settle in heaps, and
preening their feathers, and lifting up their wings to admit the
sun, seem highly to enjoy the warm situation. Thus they spend
the heat of the day, preparing for their emigration, and, as it
were, consulting when and where they are to go. The flight
about the church seems to consist chiefly of house-martins,
about 400 in number; but there are other places of rendez-
vous about the village frequented at the same time.

It is remarkable that though most of them sit on the battle-
ments and roof, yet many hang or cling for some time by their
claws against the surface of the walls, in a manner not prac-
tised by them at any other time of their remaining with us.

The swallows seem to delight more in holding their assem-
blies on trees.

November 3rd, 1789. Two swallows were seen this morn-
ing at Newton vicarage-house, hovering and settling on the
roofs and out-buildings. None have been observed at Sel-
borne since October nth. It is very remarkable, that after
the hirundines have disappeared for some weeks, a few are
occasionally seen again; sometimes, in the first week in

3SO WHITE

November, and that only for one day. Do they not with-
draw and slumber in some hiding-place in the interval ? For
we cannot suppose they had emigrated to warmer climes and
so returned again for one day. Is it not more probable that
they are awakened from sleep, and like the bats are come forth
to collect a little food .'' Bats appear at all seasons through
the autumn and spring months, when the thermometer is at
50°, because then phalsense and moths are stirring.
These swallows looked like young ones. — White.

Of their migration the proofs are such as will scarcely admit
of a doubt. Sir Charles Wager and Captain Wright saw vast
flocks of them at sea, when on their passage from one country
to another. Our author, Mr. White, saw what he deemed the
actual migration of these birds, and which he has described at
p. 184 of his " History of Selborne ; " and of their congregat-
ing together on the roofs of churches and other buildings, and
on trees, previous to their departure, many instances occur ;
particularly I once observed a large stock of house-martins on
the roof of the church here at Catsfield, which acted exactly
in the manner here described by Mr. White, sometimes preen-
ing their feathers and spreading their wings to the sun, and
then flying off all together, but soon returning to their former
situation. The greatest part of these birds seem to be young
ones. — Markwick.

Wagtails. — While the cows are feeding in the moist low
pastures, broods of wagtails, white and gray, run round them,
close up to their noses, and under their very bellies, availing
themselves of the flies that settle on their legs, and probably
finding worms and larvae that are roused by the trampling of
their feet. Nature is such an economist, that the most incon-
gruous animals can avail themselves of each other !

Interest makes strange friendships. — White.

Birds continually avail themselves of particular and unusual
circumstances to procure their food ; thus wagtails keep play-
ing about the noses and legs of cattle as they feed, in quest
of flies and other insects which abound near those animals ;
and great numbers of them will follow close to the plough to

OBSERVATIONS ON BIRDS 35 1

devour the worms, etc., that are turned up by that instrument.
The redbreast attends the gardener when digging his borders ;
and will, with great familiarity and tameness, pick out the
worms, almost close to his spade, as I have frequently seen.
Starlings and magpies very often sit on the backs of sheep and
deer to pick out their ticks. — Markwick.

Wryneck. — These birds appear on the grass plots and
walks ; they walk a little as well as hop, and thrust their bills
into the turf, in quest, I conclude, of ants, which are their
food. While they hold their bills in the grass, they draw out
their prey with their tongues, which are so long as to be coiled
round their heads. — White.

Grossbeak. — Mr. B. shot a cock grossbeak which he had
observed to haunt his garden for more than a fortnight. I
began to accuse this bird of making sad havoc among the buds
of the cherries, gooseberries, and wall fruit of all the neighbor-
ing orchards. Upon opening its crop or craw no buds were
to be seen, but a mass of kernels of the stones of fruits. Mr.
B. observed that this bird frequented the spot where plum-
trees grow, and that he had seen it with somewhat hard in its
mouth, which it broke with difficulty ; these w^ere the stones
of damsons. The Latin ornithologists call this bird cocco-
thraiistes, i.e. berry-breaker, because with its large horny beak
it cracks and breaks the shells of stone fruits for the sake of
the seed or kernel. Birds of this sort are rarely seen in Eng-
land, and only in winter. — White.

I have never seen this rare bird but during the severest cold
of the hardest winters; at which season of the year I have had
in my possession two or three that were killed in this neighbor-
hood in different years. — Markwick.

Notes

1 The pheasants run into equal danger when they roost in the trees ; for,
although they are secure from ground vermin, yet do they often fail victims
to the poacher, who can see them plainly against the sky. — G. C. D.

2 Hen pheasants usually weigh only two pounds ten ounces. — G. W.

3 The landrail is common in Shropshire, and I have found three or four
nests in a single hayfield. One of these birds was once brought in, in a

352 WHITE

load of hay, and when discovered feigned to be dead. It was laid aside,
and recovered so quickly, that it made good its eScape with remarkable
speed. — G. C. D.

* The goat-sucker, like other birds, finds insects in attendance on cattle ;
hence its apparent "striking at them." Magpies and starlings will coolly
perch on the backs of animals and leisurely make their meal. — G. C. D.

OBSERVATIONS ON QUADRUPEDS

Sheep. — The sheep on the downs this winter (1769) are
very ragged, and their coats much torn ; the shepherds say
they tear their fleeces with their own mouths and horns, and
they are always in that way in mild wet winters, being teased
and tickled with a kind of lice.

After ewes and lambs are shorn, there is great confusion
and bleating, neither the dams nor the young being able to
distinguish one another as before. This embarrassment seems
not so much to arise from the loss of the fleece, which may
occasion an alteration in their appearance, as from the defect
of that notus odor, discriminating each individual personally ;
which also is confounded by the strong scent of pitch and tar
wherewith they are newly marked ; for the brute creation recog-
nize each other more from the smell than the sight ; and in
matters of identity and diversity appeal much more to their
noses than their eyes. After sheep have been washed there
is the same confusion, from the reason given above. — White,

Rabbits. — Rabbits make incomparably the finest turf, for
they not only bite closer than larger quadrupeds, but they
allow no bents to rise ; hence warrens produce much the most
delicate turf for gardens. Sheep never touch the stalks of
grasses. — White.

Cat and Squirrels. — A boy has taken three young squir-
rels in their nest or drey as it is called in these parts. These
small creatures he put under the care of a cat who had lately
lost her kittens, and finds that she nurses and suckles them
with the same assiduity and affection as if they were her own

OBSERVATIONS ON QUADRUPEDS 353

offspring. This circumstance corroborates my suspicion, that
the mention of exposed and deserted children being nurtured
by female beasts of prey who had lost their young, may not
be so improbable an incident as many have supposed ; and
therefore may be a justification of those authors who have
gravely mentioned what some have deemed to be a wild and
improbable story.

So many people went to see the little squirrels suckled by
a cat, that the foster mother became jealous of her charge, and
in pain for their safety ; and therefore hid them over the ceil-
ing, where one died. This circumstance shows her affection
for these fondlings, and that she supposes the squirrels to be
her own young. Thus hens, when they have hatched duck-
lings, are equally attached to them as if they were their own
chickens. — White.

Horse. — An old hunting mare, which ran on the common,
being taken very ill, ran down into the village, as it were to
implore the help of men, and died the night following in the
street. — White.

Hounds. — The king's staghounds came down to Alton,
attended by a huntsman and six yeoman prickers with horns,
to try for the stag that has haunted Harteley Wood for so long
a time. Many hundreds of people, horse and foot, attended
the dogs to see the deer unharbored; but though the hunts-
men drew Harteley Wood, and Long Coppice, and Shrub Wood,
and Temple Hangers, and on their way back Harteley and
Ward le Ham Hangers, yet no stag could be found.

The royal pack, accustomed to have the deer turned out
before them, never drew the coverts with any address and
spirit, as many people that were present observed ; and this
remark the event has proved to be a true one. For as a per-
son was lately pursuing a pheasant that was wing-broken in
Harteley Wood, he stumbled upon the stag by accident, and
ran in upon him as he lay concealed amidst a thick brake of
brambles and Bushes. — White.

24

354 WHITE

OBSERVATIONS ON INSECTS AND

VERMES

Insects in General. — The day and night insects occupy
the annuals alternately ; the papilios, muscae, and apes are
succeeded at the close of day by phalaenae, ear-wigs, wood-lice,
etc. In the dusk of the evening, when beetles begin to buzz,
partridges begin to call ; these two circumstances are exactly
coincident.

Ivy is the last flower that supports the hymenopterous and
dipterous insects. On sunny days quite on to November they
swarm on trees covered with this plant ; and when they dis-
appear, probably retire under the shelter of its leaves, con-
cealing themselves between its fibres and the trees which it
entwines.^ — White.

This I have often observed, having seen bees and other
winged insects swarming about the flowers of the ivy, very
late in the autumn. — Markwick.

Spiders, wood-lice, lepismae in cupboards and among sugar,
some empedes, gnats, flies of several species, some phalaenae
in hedges, earthworms, etc., are stirring at all times when
winters are mild ; and are of great service to those soft-billed
birds that never leave us.

On every sunny day the winter through, clouds of insects
usually called gnats (I suppose tipulae and empedes) appear
sporting and dancing over the tops of the evergreen trees in
the shrubbery, and striking about as if the business of gen-
eration was still going on. Hence it appears that these dip-
tera (which by their sizes appear to be of different species)
are not subject to a torpid state in the winter, as most winged
insects are. At night, and in frosty weather, and when it
rains and blows, they seem to retire into those trees. They
often are out in a fog. — White.

This I have also seen, and have frequently observed swarms
of little winged insects playing up and down in the air in the
middle of winter, even when the ground has been covered
with snow. — Markwick.

OBSERVATIONS ON INSECTS AND VERMES 355

Humming in the Air. — There is a natural occurrence to
be met with upon the highest part of our down in hot summer
days, which always amuses me much, without giving me any
satisfaction with respect to the cause of it ; and that is, a loud
audible humming of bees in the air, though not one insect is
to be seen. The sound is to be heard distinctly the whole
common through, from the Money Dells to Mr. White's avenue
gate. Any person would suppose that a large swarm of bees
was in motion, and playing about over his head. This noise
was heard last week, on June 28th.

" Resounds the living surface of the ground,
Nor undehghtful is the ceaseless hum
To him who muses ... at noon.

" Thick in yon stream of light a thousand ways.
Upward and downward, thwarting and convolved.
The quivering nations sport." Thomson's Seasons.

— White.

Chaffers. — Cock-chaffers seldom abound oftener than once
in three or four years ; when they swarm, they deface the
trees and hedges. Whole woods of oaks are stripped bare by
them.

Chaffers are eaten by the turkey, the rook, and the house-
sparrow.

The scarabcBus sohtitialis first appears about June 26th :
they are very punctual in their coming out every year. They
are a small species, about half the size of the May-chaffer,
and are known in some parts by the name of the fern-chaffer.
— White.

A singular circumstance relative to the cock-chaffer, or, as
it is called here, the May-bug, scarabcEus vielolojitha, hap-
pened this year (1800). My gardener, in digging some
ground, found, about six inches under the surface, two of
these insects alive and perfectly formed, so early as the 24th
March. When he brought them to me, they appeared to be
as perfect, and as much alive, as in the midst of summer,
crawling about as briskly as ever ; yet I saw no more of this
insect till the 22nd May, when it began to make its appear-
ance. How comes it, that though it was perfectly formed so

356 WHITE

early as the 24th March, it did not show itself above ground
till nearly two months afterwards ? — Markwick.

Ptinus Pectinicornis. — Those maggots that make worm-
holes in tables, chairs, bedposts, etc., and destroy wooden fur-
niture, especially where there is any sap, are the larvae of the
ptinus pectinicornis. This insect, it is probable, deposits its
eggs on the surface, and the worms eat their way in.

In their holes they turn into their pupae state, and so come
forth winged in July ; eating their way through the valances
or curtains of a bed, or any other furniture that happens to
obstruct their passage.

They seem to be most inclined to breed in beech : hence
beech will not make lasting utensils or furniture. If their
eggs are deposited on the surface, frequent rubbing will pre-
serve wooden furniture. — White.

Blatta Orientalis ; Cockroach. — A neighbor com-
plained that her house was overrun with a kind of black
beetle, or, as she expressed herself, with a kind of black bob,
which swarmed in her kitchen when they got up in a morn^
ing before daybreak.

Soon after this account, I observed an unusual insect in
one of my dark chimney-closets, and find since, that in the
night, they swarm also in my kitchen. On examination I
soon ascertained the species to be the blatta orientalis of
Linnaeus, and the blatta molejidinaria of Mouffet. The male
is winged ; the female is not, but shows somewhat like the
rudiments of wings, as if in the pupa state.

These insects belonged originally to the warmer parts of
America, and were conveyed from thence by shipping to the
East Indies ; and by means of commerce begin to prevail in
the more northern parts of Europe, as Russia, Sweden, etc.
How long they have abounded in England I cannot say ; but
have never observed them in my house till lately.

They love warmth, and haunt chimney-closets and the backs
of ovens. Poda says that these and house-crickets will not
associate together; but he is mistaken in that assertion, as
Linnaeus suspected he was. They are altogether night insects,
liicifngcB, never coming forth till the rooms are dark and still,

OBSERVATIONS ON INSECTS AND VERMES 357

and escaping away nimbly at the approach of a candle. Their
antennae are remarkably long, slender, and flexile.

October 1790. After the servants are gone to bed, the
kitchen hearth swarms with young crickets, and young blattce
moleiidinaricE of all sizes, from the most minute growth to
their full proportions. They seem to live in a friendly man-
ner together, and not to prey the one on the other.

August 1792. After the destruction of many thousands of
blattcB molcndinaricE, we find that at intervals a fresh detach-
ment of old ones arrives, and particularly during this hot
season ; for the windows being left open in the evenings, the
males come flying in at the casements from the neighboring
houses, which swarm with them. How the females, that
seem to have no perfect wings that they can use, can contrive
to get from house to house, does not so readily appear.
These, like many insects, when they find their present abodes
overstocked, have powers of migrating to fresh quarters.
Since the blattcB have been so much kept under, the crickets
have greatly increased in number. — White.

Gryllus Domesticus ; House-cricket. — November.
After the servants are gone to bed, the kitchen hearth swarms
with minute crickets not so large as fleas, which must have
been lately hatched. So that these domestic insects, cherished
by the influence of a constant large fire, regard not the season
of the year, but produce their young at a tim.e when their
congeners are either dead, or laid up for the winter, to pass
away the uncomfortable months in the profoundest slumbers
and a state of torpidity.

When house-crickets are out and running about in a room
in the night, if surprised by a candle they give two or three
shrill notes, as it were for a signal to their fellows, that they
may escape to their crannies and lurking holes to avoid
danger. — White.

Cimex Linearis. — August 12th, 1775. Cimices Imeares
are now in high copulation on ponds and pools. The females,
who vastly exceed the males in bulk, dart and shoot along on
the surface of the water with the males on their backs.
When a female chooses to be disengaged, she rears, and

358 . WHITE

jumps, and plunges, like an unruly colt ; the lover thus dis-
mounted, soon finds a new mate. The females, as fast as
their curiosities are satisfied, retire to another part of the lake,
perhaps to deposit their foetus in quiet ; hence the sexes are
found separate, except where generation is going on. From
the multitude of minute young of all gradations of sizes, these
insects seem without doubt to be viviparous. — White,

PhalvEna Quercus. — Most of our oaks are naked of
leaves, and even the Holt in general, having been ravaged by
the caterpillars of a small phalasna which is of a pale yellow
color. These insects, though a feeble race, yet, from their
infinite numbers, are of wonderful effect, being able to destroy
the foHage of whole forests and districts. At this season they
leave their aurelia, and issue forth in their fly state, swarming
and covering the trees and hedges.

In a field at Greatham, I saw a flight of swifts busied in
catching their prey near the ground ; and found they were
hawking after these phalaense. The aureliae of this moth is
shining and as black as jet ; and lies wrapped up in a leaf of
the tree, which is rolled round it, and secured at the ends by
a web, to prevent the maggot from falling out. — White.

I suspect that the insect here meant is not the pJialmia
qiierciis, but the phalcsna viridata, concerning which I find
the following note in my "Naturalist's Calendar" for the
year 1785.

About this time, and for a few days last past, I observed
the leaves of almost all the oak-trees in Denn copse to be
eaten and destroyed, and, on examining more narrowly, saw
an infinite number of small, beautiful, pale green moths flying
about the trees; the leaves of which that were not quite
destroyed were curled up, and withinside were the exuviae or
remains of the chrysahs, from whence I suppose the moths
had issued, and whose caterpillar had eaten the leaves. —
Markwick.

Ephemera Cauda Biseta; May-fly. — June loth, 1771.
Myriads of May-flies appear for the first time on the Aires-
ford stream. The air was crowded with them, and the surface

OBSERVATIONS ON INSECTS AND VERMES 359

of the water covered. Large trouts sucked them in as they
lay struggling on the surface of the stream, unable to rise till
their wings were dried.

This appearance reconciled me in some measure to the
wonderful account that Scopoli gives of the quantities emerg-
ing from the rivers of Carniola. Their motions are very
peculiar, up and down for many yards almost in a perpendic-
ular line. — White.

I once saw a swarm of these insects playing up and down
over the surface of a pond in Denn Park, exactly in the man-
ner described by this accurate naturalist. It was late in the
evening of a warm summer's day when I observed them. —
Markwick.

Sphinx Ocellata. — A vast insect appears after it is dusk,
flying with a humming noise, and inserting its tongue into the
bloom of the honey-suckle ; it scarcely settles upon the plants,
but feeds on the wing in the manner of humming-birds. —
White.

I have frequently seen the large bee moth, sphinx stellata-
rum, inserting its long tongue or proboscis into the centre of
flowers, and feeding on their nectar, without settling on them,
but keeping constantly on the wing. — Markwick.

Wild Bee. — There is a sort of wild bee frequenting the
garden-campion for the sake of its tomentum, which prob-
ably it turns to some purpose in the business of nidification.
It is very pleasant to see with what address it strips off the
pubes, running from the top to the bottom of a branch, and
shaving it bare with all the dexterity of a hoop-shaver. When
it has got a vast bundle, almost as large as itself, it flies away,
holding it secure between its chin and its fore-legs.

There is a remarkable hill on the downs near Lewes in
Sussex, known by the name of Mount Carburn, which over-
looks that town and affords a most engaging prospect of all
the country round, besides several views of the sea. On the
very summit of this exalted promontory, and amidst the
trenches of its Danish camp, there haunts a species of wild
bee, making its nest in the chalky soil. When people ap-

36o WHITE

proach the place, these insects begin to be alarmed, and, with
a sharp and hostile sound, dash and strike round the heads
and faces of intruders. I have often been interrupted myself
while contemplating the grandeur of the scenery around me,
and have thought myself in danger of being stung. — White.

Wasps. — Wasps abound in woody wild districts far from
neighborhoods ; they feed on flowers, and catch flies and cater-
pillars to carry to their young. Wasps make their nests with
the raspings of sound timber ; hornets, with what they gnaw
from decayed : these particles of wood are kneaded up with
a mixture of saliva from their bodies and moulded into combs.

When there is no fruit in the gardens, wasps eat flies, and
suck the honey from flowers, from ivy blossoms and um-
bellated plants ; they carry off also flesh from butchers*
shambles. — White.

In the year 1775, wasps abounded so prodigiously in this
neighborhood that, in the month of August, no less than
seven or eight of their nests were ploughed up in one field :
of which there were several instances, as I was informed.

In the spring, about the beginning of April, a single wasp
is sometimes seen, which is of a larger size than usual ; this
I imagine is the queen, or female wasp, the mother of the
future swarm. — Markwick.

CEsTRUs CuRVicAUDA. — This insect lays its nits or eggs on
horses' legs, flanks, etc., each on a single hair. The maggots,
when hatched, do not enter the horses' skins, but fall to the
ground. It seems to abound most in moist moorish places,
though sometimes seen in the uplands. — White.

Nose-fly. — About the beginning of July a species of fly
{imiscd) obtains, which proves very tormenting to horses, try-
ing still to enter their nostrils and ears, and actually laying
their eggs in the latter of those organs, or perhaps in both.
When these abound, horses in wood-land districts become very
impatient at their work, continually tossing their heads, and
rubbing their noses on each other, regardless of the driver, so
that accidents often ensue. In the heat of the day, men are
often obliged to desist from ploughing. Saddle-horses are

OBSERVATIONS ON INSECTS AND VERMES 361

also very troublesome at such seasons. Country-people call
this insect the nose-fly. — White.

Is not this insect the cestrus nasalis of Linnaeus, so well
described by Mr. Clark in the third volume of the " Linnaean
Transactions," under the name of cestriis veterimis ? — Mark-
wick.

Ichneumon Fly. — I saw lately a small ichneumon fly
attack a spider much larger than itself on a grass-walk.
When the spider made any resistance, the ichneumon applied
her tail to him and stung him with great vehemence, so that
he soon became dead and motionless. The ichneumon then
running backward drew her prey very nimbly over the walk
into the standing grass. This spider would be deposited in
some hole where the ichneumon would lay some eggs ; and
as soon as the eggs were hatched, the carcass would afford
ready food for the maggots.

Perhaps some eggs might be injected into the body of the
spider, in the act of stinging. Some ichneumons deposit their
eerss in the aurelia of moths and butterflies. — White.

'&&"

In my "Naturalist's Calendar" for 1795, July 21st, I find
the following note : —

It is not uncommon for some of the species of ichneumon
flies to deposit their eggs in the chrysalis of a butterfly ; some
time ago I put two of the chrysalises of a butterfly into a bo.x,
and covered it with gauze, to discover what species of butter-
fly they would produce; but instead of a butterfly, one of them
produced a number of small ichneumon flies.

There are many instances of the great service these little
insects are to mankind in reducing the number of noxious
insects, by depositing their eggs in the soft bodies of their
larvae ; but none more remarkable than that of the ichneumon
tipjil(2, which pierces the tender bodies and deposits its eggs
in the larva of the tipiila ti'itici, an insect which, when it
abounds greatly, is very prejudicial to the grains of wheat.
This operation I have frequently seen it perform with wonder
and dehght. — Markwick.

362 WHITE

BoMBYLius Medius. — The bombylius medius is much about
in March and the beginning of April, and soon seems to retire.
It is a hairy insect, Hke a bumble-bee, but with only two wings,
and a long straight beak, with which it sucks the early flowers.
The female seems to lay its eggs as it poises on its wings, by
striking its tail on the ground, and against the grass that
stands in its way, in a quick manner, for several times
together. — White.

I have often seen this insect fly with great velocity, stop on
a sudden, hang in the air in a stationary position for some
time, and then fly off again ; but do not recollect having ever
seen it strike its tail against the ground, or any other sub-
stance. — Markwick.

MusCjE ; Flies. — In the decline of the year, when the
mornings and evenings become chilly, many species of flies
{itmsccB) retire into houses, and swarm in the windows.

At first they are very brisk and alert ; but as they grow
more torpid, one cannot help observing that they move with
difficulty, and are scarce able to lift their legs, which seem
as if glued to the glass ; and by degrees many do actually
stick on till they die in the place.

It has been observed that divers flies, besides their sharp
hooked nails, have also skinny palms, or flaps to their feet,
whereby they are enabled to stick on the glass and other
smooth bodies, and to walk on ceilings with their backs down-
ward, by means of the pressure of the atmosphere on those
flaps ; the weight of which they easily overcome in warm
weather, when they are brisk and alert. But in the decline
of the year, this resistance becomes too mighty for their
diminished strength ; and we see flies laboring along, and
lugging their feet in windows as if they stuck to the glass,
and it is with the utmost difficulty they can draw one foot
after another, and disengage their hollow caps from the slip-
pery surface.

Upon the same principle that flies stick and support them-
selves, do boys, by way of play, carry heavy weights by only
a piece of wet leather at the end of a string clapped close on
the surface of a stone. — White.

OBSERVATIONS ON INSECTS AND VERMES 363

TiPUL^, OR Empedes. — May. Millions of empedes or
tipidcB come forth at the close of day, and swarm to such a
degree as to fill the air. At this juncture they sport and cop-
ulate ; as it grows more dark they retire. All day they hide
in the hedges. As they rise in a cloud they appear like
smoke.

I do not remember to have seen such swarms, except in the
fens of the Isle of Ely. They appear most over grass grounds.
— White.

Aphides. — On the ist August, about half an hour after three
in the afternoon, the people of Selborne were surprised by a
shower of aphides which fell in these parts. They who were
walking in the streets at that time found themselves covered
with these insects, which settled also on the trees and gardens,
and blackened all the vegetables where they alighted. These
armies, no doubt, were then in a state of emigration, and shift-
ing their quarters ; and might perhaps come from the great
hop-plantations of Kent or Sussex, the wind being that day at
north. They were observed at the same time at Farnham, and
all along the vale to Alton. — White.

Ants. — August 23rd. Every ant-hill about this time is a
strange hurry and confusion; and all the winged ants, agitated
by some violent impulse, are leaving their homes, and, bent
on emigration, swarm by myriads in the air, to the great emolu-
ment of the hirundines, which fare luxuriously. Those that
escape the swallows return no more to their nests, but looking
out for fresh settlements, lay a foundation for future colonies.
All the females at this time are pregnant; the males that escape
being eaten, wander away and die.

October 2nd. Flying-ants, male and female, usually swarm
and migrate on hot sunny days in August and September: but
this day a vast emigration took place in my garden, and myriads
came forth, in appearance from the drain which goes under
the fruit wall, filling the air and the adjoining trees and shrubs
with their numbers. The females were full of eggs. This
late swarming is probably owing to the backward wet season.
The day following, not one flying-ant was to be seen.

Horse-ants travel home to their nests laden with flies which

364 WHITE

they have caught, and the aureliae of smaller ants, which they
seize by violence. — White.

In my "Naturalist's Calendar" for the year 1777, on Sep-
tember 6th, I find the following note to the article Flying Ants.

I saw a prodigious swarm of these ants flying about the top
of some tall elm-trees (close by my house) ; some were continu-
ally dropping to the ground, as if from the trees, and others
rising up from the ground ; many of them were joined together
in copulation ; and I imagine their life is but short, for as soon
as produced from the egg by the heat of the sun, they propa-
gate their species, and soon after perish. They were black,
somewhat like the small black ant, and had four wings. I saw
also, at another place, a large sort, which were yellowish. On
the 8th September, 1785, I again observed the same circum-
stance of a vast number of these insects flying near the tops
of the elms and dropping to the ground.

On the 2nd March, 1777, I saw great numbers of ants come
out of the ground. — Markwick.

Glowworms. — By observing two glowworms which were
brought from the field to the bank in the garden, it appeared
to us that these little creatures put our their lamps between
eleven and twelve, and shine no more for the rest of the
night.

Little glowworms, attracted by the light of the candles,
come into the parlor. — White.

Earthworms. — Earthworms make their casts most in
mild weather, about March and April ; they do not lie torpid
in winter, but come forth when there is no frost ; they travel
about in rainy nights, as appears from their sinuous tracks on
the soft muddy soil, perhaps in search of food.

When earthworms lie out a-nights on the turf, though they
extend their bodies a great way, they do not leave their holes,
but keep the ends of their tails fixed therein, so that on the
least alarm they can retire with precipitation under the earth.
Whatever food falls within their reach when thus extended,
they seem to be content with, such as blades of grass, straws,
fallen leaves, the ends of which they often draw into their

OBSERVATIONS ON INSECTS AND VERMES 365

holes ; even in copulation their hinder parts never quit their
holes ; so that no two, except they lie within reach of each
other's bodies, can have any commerce of that kind ; but as
every individual is an hermaphrodite, there is no difficulty in
meeting with a mate, as would be the case were they of dif-
ferent sexes. — White.

Snails and Slugs. — The shell-less snails called slugs are
in motion all the winter in mild weather, and commit great
depredations on garden plants, and much injure the green
wheat, the loss of which is imputed to earthworms ; while the
shelled snail, the (^epeot/co?, does not come forth at all till about
April loth, and not only lays itself up pretty early in autumn,
in places secure from frost, but also throws out round the
mouth of its shell a thick operculum formed from its own
saliva ; so that it is perfectly secured and corked up, as it
were, from all inclemencies. The cause why the slugs are
able to endure the cold so much better than shell-snails is,
that their bodies are covered with slime, as whales are with
blubber.

Snails copulate about midsummer ; and soon after deposit
their eggs in the mould by running their heads and bodies
under ground. Hence the way to be rid of them is to kill as
many as possible before they begin to breed.

Large, gray, shell-less cellar-snails lay themselves up about
the same time with those that live abroad ; hence it is plain
that a defect of warmth is not the only cause that influences
their retreat. — White.

Snake's Slough. —

. . . " There the snake throws her enamelled skin."

— Shakespeare's Mids. NighVs Dream.

About the middle of this month (September) we found in a
field near a hedge the slough of a large snake, which seemed
to have been newly cast. From circumstances it appeared as
if turned wrong side outward, and as drawn off backward, like
a stocking or woman's glove. Not only the whole skin, but
scales from the very eyes are peeled off, and appear in the
head of the slough like a pair of spectacles. The reptile, at

366 WHITE

the time of changing his coat, had entangled himself intricately
in the grass and weeds, so that the friction of the stalks and
blades might promote this curious shifting of his exuviae.

. " Lubrica serpens
Exuit in spinis vestem." — Lucret.

It would be a most entertaining sight could a person be an
eye-witness to such a feat, and see the snake in the act of
changing his garment. As the convexity of the scales of the
eyes in the slough is now inward, that circumstance alone is
a proof that the skin has been turned; not to mention that
now the present inside is much darker than the outer. If you
look through the scales of the snake's eyes from the concave
side, viz., as the reptile used them, they lessen objects much.
Thus it appears from what has been said, that snakes crawl
out of the mouth of their own sloughs, and quit the tail part
last, just as eels are skinned by a cook maid. While the scales
of the eyes are growing loose, and a new skin is forming, the
creature in appearance must be blind, and feel itself in an
awkward, uneasy situation. — White.

I have seen many sloughs or skins of snakes entire, after
they have cast them off ; and once in particular I remember
to have found one of these sloughs so intricately interwoven
amongst some brakes that it was with difficulty removed with-
out being broken ; this undoubtedly was done by the creature
to assist in getting rid of its encumbrance.

I have great reason to suppose that the eft, or common lizard,
also casts its skin or slough, but not entire like the snake ; for
on the 30th March, 1777, I saw one with something ragged
hanging to it, which appeared to be part of its old skin. —
Markwick,

Note

1 The ivy is haunted at night by swarms of moths and other insects. I
have seen an ivy bush, on a warm summer night, literally moving with the
number of moths which were feeding on it. The eyes of the larger ones
glowed like sparks of fire. — G. C. D.

OBSERVATIONS ON VEGETABLES 367

OBSERVATIONS ON VEGETABLES

Trees, Order of losing their Leaves. — One of the
first trees that becomes naked is the walnut ; the mulberry,
the ash, especially if it bears many keys, and the horse-
chestnut come next. All lopped trees, while their heads are
young, carry their leaves a long while. Apple-trees and
peaches remain green very late, often till the end of Novem-
ber: young beeches never cast their leaves till spring, till
the new leaves sprout and push them off ; in the autumn the
beechen leaves turn of a deep chestnut color. Tall beeches
cast their leaves about the end of October. — White.

Size and Growth. — Mr. Marsham of Stratton, near Nor-
wich, informs me by letter thus : " I became a planter early ;
so that an oak which I planted in 1720 is become now, at one
foot from the earth, twelve feet six inches in circumference,
and at fourteen feet (the half of the timber length) is eight
feet two inches. So if the bark was to be measured as timber,
the tree gives 1 16| feet, buyer's measure. Perhaps you never
heard of a larger oak while the planter was living. I flatter
myself that I increased the growth by washing the stem, and
digging a circle as far as I supposed the roots to extend, and
by spreading sawdust, etc., as related in the " Phil. Trans." I
wish I had begun with beeches (my favorite trees as well as
yours); I might then have seen very large trees of my own
raising. But I did not begin with beech till 1741, and then by
seed ; so that my largest is now, at five feet from the ground,
six feet three inches in girth, and with its head spreads a cir-
cle of twenty yards' diameter. This tree was also dug round,
washed, etc." — Stratton, July 24th, 1790.

The circumference of trees planted by myself, at one foot
from the ground ( 1 790) : —

Oak in 1 730 4 ft. 5 in.

Ash 1730 4 6^

Great fir 175 1 5 o

Greatest beech 1751 4 o

Elm 1750 5 3

Lime 1756 5 5

368 WHITE

The great oak in the Holt, which is deemed by Mr. Marsham
to be the biggest in this island, at seven feet from the ground,
measures in circumference thirty-four feet. It has in old
times lost several of its boughs, and is tending to decay.
Mr. Marsham computes, that at fourteen feet length this oak
contains looo feet of timber.

It has been the received opinion that trees grow in height
only by their annual upper shoot. But my neighbor over the
way, whose occupation confines him to one spot, assures me
that trees are expanded and raised in the lower parts also.
The reason that he gives is this : the point of one of my firs
began for the first time to peep over an opposite roof at the
beginning of summer; but before the growing season was
over, the whole shoot of the year, and three or four joints of
the body beside, became visible to him as he sits on his form
in his shop. According to this supposition, a tree may ad-
vance in height considerably, though the summer shoot should
be destroyed every year. — White.

Flowing of Sap. — If the bough of a vine is cut late in
the spring, just before the shoots push out, it will bleed con-
siderably ; but after the leaf is cut, any part may be taken off
without the least inconvenience. So oaks may be barked
while the leaf is budding ; but as soon as they are expanded,
the bark will no longer part from the wood, because the sap
that lubricates the bark and makes it part, is evaporated off
through the leaves. — White.

Renovation of Leaves. — When oaks are quite stripped
of their leaves by chaffers, they are clothed again soon after
midsummer with a beautiful foliage ; but beeches, horse-
chestnuts, and maples, once defaced by those insects, never
recover their beauty again for the whole season. — White.

Ash-Trees. — Many ash-trees bear loads of keys every
year, others never seem to bear any at all. The prolific ones
are naked of leaves and unsightly; those that are sterile
abound in foliage, and carry their verdure a long while, and
are pleasing objects. — White.

Beech. — Beeches love to grow in crowded situations, and
will insinuate themselves through the thickest covert, so as to

OBSERVATIONS ON VEGETABLES 369

surmount it all : are therefore proper to mend thin places in
tall hedges. — White.

Sycamore. — May 12th. The sycamore or great maple
is in bloom, and at this season makes a beautiful appearance,
and affords much pabulum for bees, smelling strongly like
honey. The foliage of this tree is very fine and very orna-
mental to outlets. All the maples have saccharine juices. —
White.

Galls of Lombardy Poplar. — The stalks and ribs of
the leaves of the Lombardy poplar are embossed with large
tumors of an oblong shape, which by incurious observers
have been taken for the fruit of the tree. These galls are
full of small insects, some of which are winged, and some
not. The parent insect is of the genus of cynips. Some
poplars in the garden are quite loaded with these excres-
cences. — White.

Chestnut Timber. — John Carpenter brings home some old
chestnut-trees which are very long ; in several places the wood-
peckers had begun to bore them. The timber and bark of
these trees are so very like oak, as might easily deceive an
indifferent observer, but the wood is very shaky, and towards
the heart aip-shaky (that is to say, apt to separate in round
pieces like cups), so that the inward parts are of no use.
They are bought for the purpose of cooperage, but must make
but ordinary barrels, buckets, etc. Chestnut sells for half the
price of oak ; but has sometimes been sent into the king's
docks and passed off instead of oak. — White.

Lime Blossoms. — Dr. Chandler tells that in the south of
France an infusion of the blossoms of the lime-tree, tilia, is
in much esteem as a remedy for coughs, hoarsenesses, fevers,
etc., and that at Nismes he saw an avenue of limes that was
quite ravaged and torn to pieces by people greedily gathering
the bloom, which they dried and kept for these purposes.

Upon the strength of this information we made some tea of
lime blossoms, and found it a very soft, well-flavored, pleas-
ant, saccharine julep, in taste much resembling the juice of
licorice, — White.

25

370 WHITE

Blackthorn. — This tree usually blossoms while cold north-
east winds blow ; so that the harsh rugged weather obtaining
at this season is called by the country-people blackthorn
winter. — White.

Ivy Berries. — Ivy berries form a noble and providential
supply for birds in winter and spring ; for the first severe frost
freezes and spoils all the haws, sometimes by the middle of
November ; ivy berries do not seem to freeze. — White.

Hops. — The culture of Virgil's vines corresponds very
exactly with the modern management of hops. I might in-
stance in the perpetual diggings and hoeings, in the tying to
the stakes and poles, in pruning the superfluous shoots, etc.,
but lately I have observed a new circumstance, which was
a neighboring farmer's harrowing between the rows of hops
with a small triangular harrow, drawn by one horse, and
guided by two handles. This occurrence brought to my
mind the following passage : —

. . . "ipsa
Flectere luctantes inter vineta juvencos." — Georg.

Hops are dioecious plants ; hence perhaps it might be proper,
though not practised, to leave purposely some male plants in
every garden, that their farina might impregnate the blossoms.
The female plants without their male attendants are not in
their natural state : hence we may suppose the frequent fail-
ure of crop so incident to hop grounds ; no other growth, cul-
tivated by man, has such frequent and general failures as hops.

Two hop gardens much injured by a hail-storm, June 5th,
show now (September 2nd) a prodigious crop, and larger and
fairer hops than any in the parish. The owners seem now to
be convinced that the hail, by beating off the tops of the binds,
has increased the side-shoots, and improved the crop. Query.
— Therefore should not the tops of hops be pinched off when
the binds are very gross and strong } — White.

Seed lying Dormant. — The naked part of the Hanger
is now covered with thistles of various kinds. The seeds of
these thistles may have lain probably under the thick shade
of the beeches for many years, but could not vegetate till the

OBSERVATIONS ON VEGETABLES 37'

sun and air were admitted. When old beech-trees are cleared
away, the naked ground in a year or two becomes covered
with strawberry plants, the seeds of which must have lain in
the ground for an age at least. One of the slidders or trenches
down the middle of the Hanger, close covered over with lofty
beeches near a century old, is still called "strawberry slidder,"
though no strawberries have grown there in the memory of
man. That sort of fruit did once, no doubt, abound there,
and will again when the obstruction is removed. — White.

Beans sown by Birds. — Many horse-beans sprang up in
my field-walks in the autumn, and are now grown to a consid-
erable height. As the Ewel was in beans last summer, it is
most likely that these seeds came from thence ; but then the
distance is too considerable for them to have been conveyed
by mice. It is most probable, therefore, that they were brought
by birds, and in particular by jays and pies, who seem to have
hid them among the grass and moss, and then to have forgotten
where they had stowed them. Some peas are growing also
in the same situation, and probably under the same circum-
stances. — White.

Cucumbers set by Bees. — If bees, who are much the best
setters of cucumbers, do not happen to take kindly to the
frames, the best way is to tempt them by a little honey put
on the male and female bloom. When they are once induced
to haunt the frames, they set all the fruit, and will hover with
impatience round the lights in a morning till the glasses are
opened. Probatinn est. — White.

Wheat. — A notion has always obtained that in England
hot summers are productive of fine crops of wheat ; yet in the
years 1780 and 1781, though the heat was intense, the wheat
was much mildewed and the crop light. Does not severe
heat, while the straw is milky, occasion its juices to exude,
which, being extravasated, occasion spots, discolor the stems
and blades, and injure the health of the plants ? — White.

Truffles. — August. A truffle-hunter called on us, hav-
ing in his pocket several large truffles found in this neighbor-
hood. He says these roots are not to be found in deep woods,

372 WHITE

but in narrow hedgerows and the skirts of coppices. Some
truffles, he informed us, lie two feet within the earth, and some,
quite on the surface ; the latter, he added, have little or no
smell, and are not so easily discovered by the dogs as those
that lie deeper. Half a crown a pound was the price which
he asked for this commodity. Truffles never abound in wet
winters and springs. They are in season, in different situ-
ations, at least nine months in the year. — White.

Tremella Nostoc. — Though the weather may have been
ever so dry and burning, yet after two or three wet days this
jelly-like substance abounds on the walks. — White.

Fairy Rings. — The cause, occasion, call it what you will,
of fairy rings, subsists in the turf, and is conveyable with it : ^
for the turf of my garden-walks, brought from the down above,
abounds with those appearances, which vary their shape and
shift situation continually, discovering themselves now in circles,
now in segments, and sometimes in irregular patches and spots.
Wherever they obtain, puffballs abound, the seeds of which
were doubtless brought in the turf. — White.

Note

^ Fairy rings are caused by certain fiingi which throw their seeds out-
wards, so that a gradually increasing circle is formed of greener and brighter
vegetation. — G. C. D.

METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS

Barometer. — November 22nd, 1768. A remarkable fall
of the barometer all over the kingdom. At Selborne we had
no wind, and not much rain ; only vast, swagging, rock-like
clouds appeared at a distance. — White.

Partial Frost. — The country-people, who are abroad in
winter mornings long before sunrise, talk much of hard frosts
in some spots, and none in others. The reason of these par-
tial frosts is obvious, for there are at such times partial fogs
about ; where the fog obtains, little or no frost appears ; but

METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS 373

where the air is clear, there it freezes hard. So the frost
takes place either on hill or in dale, wherever the air happens
to be clearest and freest from vapor. — White.

Thaw. — Thaws are sometimes surprisingly quick, consid-
ering the small quantity of rain. Does not the warmth at
such times come from below .-' The cold in still severe sea-
sons seems to come down from above ; for the coming over
of a cloud in severe nights raises the thermometer abroad at
once full ten degrees. The first notices of thaws often seem
to appear in vaults, cellars, etc.

If a frost happens, even when the ground is considerably
dry, as soon as a thaw takes place, the paths and fields are
all in a batter. Country-people say that the frost draws moist-
ure. But the true philosophy is, that the steam and vapors
continually ascending from the earth are bound in by the
frost, and not suffered to escape till released by the thaw.
No wonder then that the surface is all in a float ; since the
quantity of moisture by evaporation that arises daily from
every acre of ground is astonishing. — White.

Frozen Sleet. — January 20th. Mr. H.'s man says that
he caught this day in a lane near Hackwood Park many rooks,
which, attempting to fly, fell from the trees with their wings
frozen together by the sleet, that froze as it fell. There were,
he affirms, many dozen so disabled. — White.

Mist, called London Smoke. — This is a blue mist which
has somewhat the smell of coal smoke, and as it always comes
to us with a north-east wind, is supposed to come from London.
It has a strong smell, and is supposed to occasion blights.
When such mists appear they are usually followed by dry
weather. — White.

Reflection of Fog. — When people walk in a deep white
fog by night with a lantern, if they will turn their backs to
the light, they will see their shades impressed on the fog in rude
gigantic proportions. This phenomenon seems not to have
been attended to, but implies the great density of the meteor
at that juncture. — White.

Honey-dew. — June 4th, 1783. Fast honey-dews this

374 WHITE

week. The reason of these seems to be that in hot days the
effluvia of flowers are drawn up by a brisk evaporation, and
then in the night fall down with the dews with which they
are entangled.

This clammy substance is very grateful to bees, who gather
it with great assiduity, but it is injurious to the trees on which
it happens to fall, by stopping the pores of the leaves. The
greatest quantity falls in still close weather ; because winds
disperse it, and copious dews dilute it, and prevent its ill effects.
It falls mostly in hazy warm weather. — White.

Morning Clouds. — After a bright night and vast dew,
the sky usually becomes cloudy by eleven or twelve o'clock
in the forenoon, and clear again towards the decline of the
day. The reason seems to be that the dew, drawn up by
evaporation, occasions the clouds ; which, towards evening,
being no longer rendered buoyant by the warmth of the sun,
melt away, and fall down again in dews. If clouds are watched
in a still warm evening, they will be seen to melt away and
disappear. — White.

Dripping Weather after Drought. — No one that has
not attended to such matters, and taken down remarks, can
be aware how much ten days' dripping weather will influence
the growth of grass or corn after a severe dry season. This
present summer, 1776, yielded a remarkable instance : for till
the 30th May the fields were burnt up and naked, and the
barley not half out of the ground ; but now, June lOth, there
is an agreeable prospect of plenty. — White.

Aurora Borealis. — November ist, 1787. The north au-
rora made a particular appearance, forming itself into a broad,
red, fiery belt, which extended from east to west across the
welkin : but the moon rising at about ten o'clock in unclouded
majesty, in the east, put an end to this grand but awful
meteorous phenomenon. — White.

Black Spring, 1771. — Dr. Johnson says that "in 1771
the season was so severe in the island of Skye, that it is remem-
bered by the name of the 'black spring.' The snow, which
seldom lies at all, covered the ground for eight weeks, many

METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS 375

cattle died, and those that survived were so emaciated that
they did not require the male at the usual season." The case
was just the same with us here in the south; never were so
many barren cows known as in the spring following that dread-
ful period. Whole dairies missed being in calf together.

At the end of March the face of the earth was naked to a
surprising degree. Wheat hardly to be seen, and no signs of
any grass ; turnips all gone, and sheep in a starving way. All
provisions rising in price. Farmers cannot sow for want of
rain. — White.

ON THE DARK, STILL, DRY, WARM WEATHER

OCCASIONALLY HAPPENING IN THE WINTER MONTHS

Th' imprisoned winds slumber within their caves
Fast bound : the fickle vane, emblem of change,
Wavers no more, long-settling to a point.

All nature nodding seems composed : thick steams
From land, from flood up-drawn, dimming the day,
" Like a dark ceiling stand : " slow thro' the air
Gossamer floats, or stretched from blade to blade
The wavy net-work whitens all the field.

Pushed by the weightier atmosphere, up springs
The ponderous Mercury, from scale to scale
Mounting, amidst the Torricellian tube.^

While high in air, and poised upon his wings
Unseen, the soft, enamored wood-lark runs
Thro' all his maze of melody ; — the brake
Loud with the blackbird's bolder note resounds.

Soothed by the genial warmth, the cawing rook
Anticipates the spring, selects her mate.
Haunts her tall nest-trees, and with sedulous care
Repairs her wicker eyry, tempest torn.

The ploughman inly smiles to see upturn
His mellow glebe, best pledge of future crop :

3/6 WHITE

With glee the gardener eyes his smoking beds :
E'en pining sickness feels a short relief.

The happy school-boy brings transported forth
His long-forgotten scourge, and giddy gig :
O'er the white paths he whirls the rolling hoop,
Or triumphs in the dusty fields of taw.

Not so the museful sage : — abroad he walks
Contemplative, if haply he may find
What cause controls the tempest's rage, or whence
Amidst the savage season winter smiles.

For days, for weeks, prevails the placid calm.
At length some drops prelude a change : the sun
With ray refracted bursts the parting gloom ;
When all the chequered sky is one bright glare.

Mutters the wind at eve : th' horizon round
With angry aspect scowls : down rush the showers,
And float the deluged paths, and miry fields.

Note
^ The barometer. — G. W.

INDEX

Affection of birds for young, 7, 124.

Ants, 363.

Aphides, 213, 316.

Ash, 368. See also Pollard-ash and

Shrew-ash.
Auk, 83.
Aurora borealis, 374.

Barn-owl, See Owl.

Barometer, 372.

Bat, habit of feeding, 29, 65, 178 ; size,

79-
Bean, sown by birds, 371.

Bean's pond, 20.

Beaufort, Bishop, 290.

Bees, deafness of, 182 ; humming of,
355 ; wild, 359; set cucumbers, 371.

Birds, celibacy of, 70; migration of,
115. 136. 331 ; congregation of, 121 ;
flight of, 191 ; note of, 193 ; nests
of, 217 ; food of, 331 ; — of passage,
smaller, 41 ; summer, 95 ; winter,
97 ; singing — , night, 98 ; summer,
100 ; spring, 100 ; early breeding — ,
102 ; soft-billed — , 33, 36. 72, 88 ;
non-migratory — , 97 ; long-billed
— , 107 ; night-flying — , 223. See
also under names of species.

Black cap, migration of, 26 ; song of,

87.
Black spring, 374.
Blackthorn, 370.
Blowfly. See Fly.
Bombylius medius, 362.
Brimstone lodge, 19.
Bultinch, 38, 83.

Bunting, 35.
Bustard, 102.

Butcher bird, food of, 50 ; variety of,
82.

Canons of Selbome priory, 283, 285.

Carp, 86.

Cat, 352.

Chaffers, 355.

Chaffinches, 34, 113.

Chapel field, 267.

Chestnut timber, 369.

Chinese dog, 221.

Church, of Selborne, 245, 250 ; — yard,

251.
Cimex linearis, 357.
Clouds, morning, 374.
Cobweb, 155.
Coccus vitis viniferse, 211.
Cockroach, 356.
Cock's comb, 8.
Coins, 241.
Coot, 192.

Comua ammonis, 8.
Crane, flight of, 192 ; note of, 193-
Cricket, field — , 200 ; house — , 203,

356 ; mole — , 204.
Crossbill, 28.
Crow, in pairs, 82 ; note of, 193 ; flight

of, 191 ; gray — , see Royston.
Cuckoo, nest of, 104 ; eggs of, 105,

107, III ; note of, 118 ; anatomy of,

168.
Cuckoo-pint, 39.
Cucumbers, 371.
Curlew, 65. See also Stone-curlew.

377

378

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE

Daw, breeding place, 52 ; flight of,

191.
Dogs, 221. See also Chinese Dog.
Dove, ring — , food of, 339. See also

Pigeon.
Dripping weather after drought, 374.
Duck, note of, 193 ; wild — , note of,

193-

Eagle, 193.
Echo, 180, 224.
Elm, 6.
Empedes, 363.

Fair of Selbome, 326.

Fairy-rings, 392.

Falco, 28.

Falcon, peregrine, 219.

Fallow deer, 37.

Fernchafer, 86.

Fern-owl. See Goatsucker,

Fieldfare, breeding of, 63 ; roosting

place of, 66 ; migration of, 1 14 ;

nidification of, 114.
Field mouse. See Mouse.
Fish of Selbome, 29. See also under

under names of species.
Flycatcher, 26, 87.
Fly, 362 ; blow — , 76 ; ichneumon — ,

361 ; May — , 358 ; nose — , 360 ;

side — , 129 ; turnip — , 77.
Fog, effect of, 237 ; reflection of, 373.
Food, influence of, on color, 38, 83.
Fossils of Selbome, 8 ; — wood, 223.
Freestone, 9.

Frog, breeding of, 43 ; growth of, 44.
Frost, eff"ect of, 107, 226, 232 ; origin

of, 228 ; partial, 372.

Geography of Selbome, i.
Geology of Selborne, 4.
Glow-worm. See Worm.
Goatsucker, history of, 55 ; flight of,

192 ; food of, 79, 344 ; anatomy of,

169 ; note of, 193.

Goldfish, 213.

Goose, flight of, 192 ; note of, 193.
Grange, the, 325.
Grasshopper-lark, 84.
Grasshopper warbler, 26.
Grossbeak, 28 ; food of, 351.
Gurdon, Adam, 264, 268.

Hanger, i.

Harvest-bug, 76.

Hawk, note of, 193 ; sparrow — , habi-
tat of, 85 ; food of, 91 ; ringtail — ,
169 ; blue — , see Hen-barrier.

Heat, 235.

Hedge-hog, 66.

Heliotrope, 196.

Hellebore, 88^

Hen-harrier, 85, 34O.

Heron, 191.

Himantopus, 206.

Hippoboscae hirundinis, I2g.

Hirundo, characteristics of, 128 ; mi-
gration of, 153 ; hyberna, 73 ; mel-
ba, 75. See also Martin, Swallow,
and Swift.

Hog, 171.

Holt, the, 23.

Honey-buzzard, 91.

Honey-dew, 235, 373.

Hoopoe, 28.

Hops, 370.

Horse, 353.

House-martin. See Martin.

Ichneumon-fly. See Fly.
Insects, 354.
Ivy-berries, 370.

Jay, 191.

Kestrel, 191.
Kingfisher, 191.
Kite, 191.
Knights Templars, 273.

INDEX

379

Lakes in Wolmer forest, 21.
Land-rail, 337.
Lanes, geology of, 1 1.
Lapwing, 83.
Lime-blossoms, 369.
Linnet, 35.
Lizard, 51, 54.
Loach, 47.
Loon, 341.

Magpie, 191.

Martin, first brood, 25 ; house — , mi-
gration of, 29, 80, 209, 215 ; young
of, 73 ; history of, 129, 131 ; Sand
— , history of, 143 ; hybernation of,
347 ; black — , see Swift.

May-fly. See Fly.

Missel-bird, 82.

Missel-thrush, 154.

Mist, 373.

Moor-hen, 192.

Moose, 68, 71.

Mouse, field — , size of, 31 ; nest of,
31 ; weight of, 36 ; hybernaculum
of, 36, 126 : food of, 218.

Nautilus, 9.

Nidification, 154.

Nightingale, note of, 84 ; habitat of,

117.
Norton manor house, 326.
Nose-fly. See Fly.
Nut-hatch, note of, 42 ; food of, 218.

Oak, 6.

CEstrus curvicauda, 77, 360.

Osprey, 82.

Owl, note of, 118, 193 ; flight of, 191 ;
barn — , 29 ; brown — , food of, 29 ;
note of, 128 ; fern — , see Goat-
sucker; white — , 126.

Paradise mede, 317.
Parish of Selborne, 12.
Parrot, 193.

Partridge, 336.

Peacock, 78.

Peregrine-falcon. See Falcon.

Pettichaps, 219.

Phaloena quercus, 308,

Pheasant, hybrid, 336.

Pigeon, drinking of, 86 ; flight of, 191 ;
note of, 193 ; wood — , history of,
92, 1 18 ; house — , history of, 92 ;
origin of, 93.

Plants, 189.

Plover, stilt — , 206.

Pollard-ash, 164.

Poplar, 369.

Population of Selborne, 12.

Poultry, 334.

Priors of Selborne, method of choos-
ing, 280, 290 ; names of, 280, 290,
298, 300, 302, 304, 307, 308, 315,

Priory of Selborne, 259 ; grant of, 262 ;
grants to, 268, 272, 275, 278 ; and
Knights Templars, 274 ; visitation
of, 283, 295 ; canons of, 285 ; Pope
and, 293 ; deserted, 310 ; gift of,
to college, 310; release of, 315;
privileges of, 319, 325, 326 ; decay
of, 323-

Pulveratrices, ill.

Ptinus pectini cornis, 356.

Rabbits, 352.

Rag, blue — , 10.

Rainfall, 12, 224.

Raven, flight of, 191 ; note of, 193.

Redbreast, 85, 103.

Redstart, 87.

Ring-ousel, rare, 50; size of, 50; mi-
gration of, 54, 63, 72, 81, 112; late
breeding of, 58 ; boldness of, 81.

Rook, flight of, 191 ; note of, 193 ;
roosting of, 223 ; nest of, 333 ;
white — , 38.

Royston, 118.

Sand-martin. See Martin.
Sandpiper, 49.

38o

NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE

Sandstone, lo.

Scallops, 9.

Sedge-bird, 61 ; song of, 83, 103.

Seed, dormant, 370.

Sex-migration, 113.

Sheep, species of, 135 ; effect of shear-
ing, 352.

Shrew-ash, 164.

Side-fly. See Fly.

Silk-tail, 32.

Skylark, 192.

Sleet, 373.

Snail, 365.

Snake, 365.

Snipe, breeding ground, 26 ; note of,
42, 83 ; flight of, 191.

Snow-fleck, 64.

Sociability of animals, 172.

Song, incubation and, 103.

Sparrow, house — , 85 ; hedge — , 88 ;
reed — , 109 ; — hawk, see Hawk.

Sphinx ocellata, 359.

Squirrel, 218.

Squnck, 62.

Starling, 192.

Stock-dove. See Wood Pigeon.

Stone-curlew, history of, 39 ; breed-
ing place of, 75 ; note of, 223 ; mi-
gration of, 343.

Swallow, hybernation of, 25, 123 ; his-
tory of, 123, 137, 192 ; note of, 193 ;
roosting place of, 33 ; migration of,
57, 61, 65, 70, 80, 82, 108, 116, 138,
176, 349 ; sex of, 83.

Swan, 84.

Swift, hybernation of, 25 ; history of,
147, 192, 210 ; late appearance of,
29, 210 ; migration of, 65 ; drinks
on wing, 83 ; pairing of, 185.

Sycamore, 369.

Temple, manor house of, 267 ; holding

of, 326.
Thaw, origin of, 228, 373.
Thrush, 39, 333.
Thunderstorm, 238.

Titlark, song of, 82, 104 ; breeding of,

103.
Titmouse, song of, 86 ; history of, 89 ;

species, 89.
Toad, breeding of, 43 ; venom of, 43 ;

cancer cure, 47.
Tortoise, hybernation of, 113, 137, 208 ;

history of, 327.
Trees, distillation of water by, 166 ;

losing leaves, 367 ; size of, 367 ; sap

of, 368 ; renovation of leaves of,

368.
Tremella nostoc, 372.
Truffles, 371.
Tunbridge, 318.
Turkey, 193.
Turnip-fly. See Fly.

Vicarage of Selbome, 254 ; house of,

252 ; revenue of, 255.
Vicars of Selborne, 255.
Viper, antidote for, 45.

Wagtails, non-migratory, 35 ; food of,

350.
Waldon lodge, ig.
Wasps, 235, 360.
Water-newt, 44 ; absence of gills of,

48.
Water-rat, 26 ; hybemaculum of, 65.
Waynflete, Bishop, 295.
Weasel, 85.
Whaddon chapel, 318.
Wheat, 371.
Wheat-ear, 35, 83, 136.
Whinchat, 83.
Whitethroat, history of, 83 ; flight of,

193-

Willow-wren, species of, 40, 49 ; his-
tory of, 41, 344.

Wren, 86, 103.

Wolmer forest, description of, 14 ;
limits of, 20 ; lakes in, 21 ; grant
of, 23, 269 ; soil of, 23 ; — pond,
22.

Woodlark, 61, 192.

INDEX

381

Woodcock, transportation of young,

73 ; migration of, 74, 114, 117.
Woodpecker, flight of, 191 ; note of,

193-
Worm, blind — , 45 ; earth — , 174,
364 ; glow — , 60, 364.

Wryneck, 351.

Wykeham, Bishop, visit of, 282 ; gifts
of, 289.

Yew, Selborne — , 252; poisonous,
253.

THE END