Section 10 of The Natural History of Selbourne by Gilbert White This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to find out how to volunteer, please contact LibriVox.org. The Natural History of Selbourne by Gilbert White Letters 21 to 28 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Letters 21 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Selbourne, September the 28th, 1774 Dear Sir, as the swift or black Martin is the largest of the British heron deans, so is it 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 architecture, making no crust or shell for its nest, but form 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 carrying 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, while remembering that I have seen them squabbling 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 Andaluthia, and that he has shot them with such materials in their mouths. Swifts, like sand-Martins, carry on the business of nidification, 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 ninth of June. In general they haunt tall buildings, churches and steeples, and breed only in such, and 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 Odium in this county, where we have seen many pairs entering the crevices and skimming and squeaking round the precipices. As I have regarded these abusive birds with no small attention, 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 advance is that Swifts tread or copulate on the wing, and I would wish any nice observer that is startled at this supposition to use his own eyes, and I think he will soon be convinced. In another class of animals, that is 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 piercing shriek. This I take to be the juncture when the business of generation is carrying on. As the Swift eats, drinks, collects material 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 invariably 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 daybirds. 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 greater lacquery and calls forth all its powers. In hot mornings, several getting together in little parties, and dash round the steeples and churches, squeaking as they go in a very clamorous manner. These, by nice observers, are supposed to be males, serenading 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 returns to her duty of incubation. Swift's, 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 labour 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 are 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 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 Phryganae, ephemery, and libellially caduflies, mayflies, and dragonflies, 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 perches, nor that I could ever 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 thirtieth of last June I untiled the eaves of an house where many pairs build, and found in each nest only two squab-naked poli. On the eighth of July I repeated the same inquiry, and found 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 martens that have numerous families are continually feeding them every two or three minutes, while swifts that have but too young to maintain are much at their leisure and must attend on their nests for hours together. Sometimes they pursue and strike at hawks that come in their way, but not with that vehemence and fury that swallows 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 feathers of these birds must be well-preened to resist so much wet, windy 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 colour of swifts which seems not to be unworthy our attention. When they arrive in the spring they are all over of a glossy dark soot colour, except their chins which are white. But by being all day long in the sun and air they become quite weather-beaten and bleached from the heart, and yet they return glossy again in the spring. Now, if they pursue the sun into lower latitudes, as some suppose, in order to enjoy a perpetual summer, why do they not return bleached? Do they not rather perhaps retire to rest for a season, and at that juncture molt and to change their feathers, since all other birds are known to molt 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 herondines 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 brood. We may hear remark that as swifts breed but once in a summer, and only two at a time, and the other herondines 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 10th of August, and sometimes a few days sooner, and every straggler 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 till the beginning of November. This early retreat is mysterious and wonderful, 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 Andaluthia, where they can be no ways influenced by any defect of heat, or as one might suppose defect of food. Are they regulated in their motions with us, by a failure of food, by the intensity to malting, 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 herondines 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 hippoboschi herondines, 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 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 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 British herondines, and indeed from all other known birds. The herondo melba, great white-bellied swift of Gibraltar, accepted. For it is so disposed as to carry omnes quattro 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 undemandable, have induced a discerning naturalist. Note, John Anthony Scopoli of Carniola, M.D., end note, 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 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 Swalla, from the perpetual rings or circles that it takes round the scene of its nidification. Swifts feed on colioptera, 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, since they never settle on the ground. Young ones, overrun with hippoboski, are sometimes found under their nests fallen to the ground, the number of vermin rendering 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 same birds return to the same spots, as they must stoop very low to get up under these humble eaves. It is a good proof, that the same birds return to the same spot, and sometimes catch them on the wing. On the 5th of July, 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 stalker for her brood, which she supposed 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. They were in the nest, where they tumbled about, and were as helpless as a newborn child. While we contemplated their naked bodies, their unwieldily disproportionate abdominal, 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 emigrations vast continents and oceans as distant as the equator. So soon does nature advance small birds to their illicure or state of perfection, while the progressive growth of men and large quadrupeds is slow and tedious. I am, etc. Letter 22 to the Honourable Danes Barrington, Selbourne, September the 13th, 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 species of Heron-deans arrived this spring in three very distant counties of this kingdom. With us the swallow was seen first on April the 4th, the swift on April the 24th, the bank martin on April the 12th, and the house martin not till April the 30th. At South Zeal, Devonshire swallows did not arrive till April the 25th, swifts in plenty on May the 1st, and house martins not till the middle of May. At Blackburn in Lancashire swifts were seen April the 28th, swallows April the 29th, house martins May the 1st. Do these different dates in such distant districts prove anything for or against migration? A farmer near Wayhill follows his land with two teams of asses, one of which works till noon and the other in the afternoon. 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 paschicun to inducias cumaevibus quamdiu cuculus cuculat read as note they truce with the birds as long as the cuckoo calls end, read as note. But it appears to me that during that period many little birds were taken and destroyed by birds of prey, as may be seen by their feathers left in lanes and under hedges. The missile 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 i lwin, the head or master 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 In general he is very successful in the defense of his family, but once I observed in my garden that several magpies came determined to storm the nest of a missile thrush. The dams defended their mansion with great vigor and fought resolutely pro aris at focus, but numbers at last prevailed. They tore the nest to pieces and swallowed the young alive. In the season of notification, the wildest birds are comparatively tame, thus the ring-dove breeds in my fields, though they are continually frequented, and the missile 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 injured the more necessary fruits of the earth, and discoloured and blighted our wheat. The crop of hops promises to be very large. Frequent returns of deafness incomode 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. Letter 23 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Selborne, June 8th, 1775 Dear Sir, on September the 21st, 1741, being then on a visit, and intent on fields and 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 hoodwinked not proceed, but were obliged to lie down and scrape the encumbrances from their faces with their forefeet 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 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 which 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 towards the sun How far this wonderful shower extended would be difficult to say but we know that it reached Bradley, Selbourn, and Al-Risford three places which lie in a sort of 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 intelligence turn we have the greatest veneration who observed it to 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 constant succession and twinkling in the sun so as to draw the attention of the most incurious Neither before nor after was any such fool 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 appearances called Gossamer as strange and superstitious as the notions about them were formally 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 rapturous insects should that day take such a wonderful aerial excursion and why their webs should at once become so gross and material 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 region 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 end note then when they will become heavier than the air they must fall each day in fine weather in autumn chiefly do I see those spiders shooting out their webs and mounting a loft 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 wondered 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 letter 24 to the Honourable Danes Parrington Selborne, August the 15th 1775 Dear sir there is a wonderful spirit of sociality in the brute creation independent of sexual attachment the congregating 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 neighbour'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 endeavouring to break the rack and the manger with his forefeet 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 themselves but will neglect the finest pasture that is not recommended by society it would be needless to instance in sheep which constantly flocked 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 favourite securely leading her pursuers overhead or gate or style 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 individuals the fowl would approach the quadruped with notes of complacency rubbing herself gently against his legs while the horse would look down with satisfaction and move with the greatest caution and circumspection he should trample on his diminutive companion thus by mutual good offices each seemed to console the vacant hours of the other so that Milton, 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 25 to the Honourable Daines Barrington Selbourn October the 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 gibberish can be understood they seem to say that the name of their clan is Curlyople now the termination of this word is apparently Grecian and as Mezzarei and the gravest historians 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 name a little corrupted be the very name they brought with them from the Levant it would be a 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 cowhouses these sturdy savages seemed to pride themselves in braving the severities of winter and in living sub-deo 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 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 and 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 these people on the confines of Tartary who were endeavouring 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 26 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Selbwell, November the 1st 1775 Dear Sir Hic Tede Pingues Hic Plurimus Ignis Semper Et assidua pustes fuligni nigri Readers note Here are pitch torches Here the fire blazes always high with doorposts blackened by everlasting soot Virgil and Readers note 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 districts beside 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 jonchus effusus 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 to autumn it would be needless to add that the largest and longest are best Decade labourers women and children make it their business to procure and prepare them As soon as they are cut they must be flung into water 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 dispatch and seldom failing to strip them with the nicest regularity When these yonki 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 labourer obtains all her fat for nothing for she saves the scumings of her bacon pot for this use and if the greaser bounds with salt she causes the salt to precipitate to the bottom by setting the scumings in a warm oven where hogs are not much in use and especially by the seaside the coarser animal oils will come for a cheap a pound of common grease may be procured for four pence 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 just three shillings if men that keep bees will mix a little wax with the grease it will give it a consistency 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 still of 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 wicks of those have two ribs of the rind or peel to support the pith while the wick of the dipped rush has but one the two ribs are intended to impede the progress of the flame and make the candle last in a pound of dry rushes avois du pois which are caused to be weighed and numbered we found upwards of one thousand 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 one thirty third of a farthing and one eleventh afterwards thus a poor family will enjoy five and a half hours of comfortable light for a farthing an experienced old housekeeper assures me that one pound and a half of rushes completely supplies his family the year round since working people burn no candle in the long days because they rise and go to bed by daylight little farmers use rushes much in the short days both morning and evening in the dairy and kitchen but the very poor who are always the worst economists and therefore must continue very poor buy and half penny 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 improper to mention a pretty implement of housewifery that we have seen nowhere else that is little neat bezoms which our foresters make from the stalk of the polytrichum commune or great golden maiden here which they call silkwood and find plenty in the bogs when this moss is well combed and dressed and divested of its outer skin it becomes of a beautiful bright chestnut colour and being soft and pliant is very proper for the dusting of beds, curtains, carpets, hangings etc. if these bezoms were known to the brushmakers in town it is probable they might come much in use for the purpose above mentioned note a bezom of this sort is to be seen at the Ashton Leavers Museum end note I am etc. Letter 27 to the Honourable Daines Barrington Selbourn December the 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 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 corner but in the summer he was all alert and in quest of his game in the fields and on sunny banks honey-bees, humble-bees and wasps were his prey wherever he found them no apprehensions from their stings but would seize them, nudist manibus and at once disarm them of their weapons and suck their bodies for the sake of their honey-bags sometimes 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 Merobs 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 wrap with his fingers 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 Methagline was making he would linger round the tubs and vessels begging a draft of what he called bee-wine as he ran about he used to to make a humming-noise with his lips resembling the buzzing of bees this lad was lean and sallow and of a cadaverous complexion and except in his favourite 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, John shouldst wildmen be when at all youth he was removed from hence to a distant village where he died as I understand before he arrived at manhood I am, etc. Let's a twenty-eight to the honourable Danes Barrington Selbon, January the 8th, 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 ourselves 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 enabled to make any efforts adequate to the occasion such a preamble seems to be necessary before we enter on the superstitions of this district we should be suspected of exaggeration in a recital of practices too gross for this enlightened age but the people of Tring in Hartfordshire would do well to remember that no longer ago than the year 1751 and within twenty miles of the capital they seized on two superannuated wretches crazed with age and overwhelmed with infirmities on a suspicion of witchcraft and by trying experiments to surround them in a horse pond in a farmyard 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 the poor babes would be cured of their infirmity as soon as the operation was over the tree and the suffering part was plastered with loam and carefully swathed up if the parts coalesced and soldered together as usually fell out where the feet 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 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 superstitious ceremony derived down perhaps from our Saxon ancestors who practised it before their conversion to Christianity at the south corner of the plestor or area near the church tested 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 baneful and deleterious a nature that wherever it creeps over a beast 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 continually 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 dined alive and plugged in no doubt with several quainting cantations 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 manner or hundred as to that on the pleister the late vicar stubbed it and burnt it when he was way warden regardless of the remonstrances of the bystanders who interceded in vain for its preservation urging its power and efficacy and alleging that it had been religione patrim multiservata peranos reader's note saved for many years by our ancestors' reverence and reader's note I am etc the end of section 10 of the natural history of cell-borne by Gilbert White section 11 of the natural history of cell-borne by Gilbert White this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to find out how to volunteer please contact LibriVox.org the natural history of cell-borne by Gilbert White Letters 29 to 38 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Letters 29 to the Honourable Danes Barrington cell-borne February the 7th 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 distill in a night's time by condensing the vapour which trickles down the twigs and boughs so as to make the ground below quite in a float In Newton Lane in October 1775 a mighty day a particular oak in leaf dropped so fast that the cartway stood in puddles and the ruts ran with water so the ground in general was dusty In some of our smaller islands in the West Indies if I mistake not there are no springs or rivers but the people are supplied with that necessary element water merely by the dripping of some large tall trees which standing in the bosom of a mountain heads constantly enveloped with fogs and clouds from which they dispense their kindly, never-ceasing moisture and so render those districts habitable by condensation alone trees in leaf have such a vast proportion more of surface than those that are naked that in theory their condensations should greatly exceed those that are stripped of their leaves but as the former in Bybe also a great quantity of moisture it is difficult to say which drip most but this I know that deciduous trees that are entwined with much ivy seem to distill the greatest quantity ivy leaves are smooth and thick and cold and therefore condense very fast and besides evergreens in Bybe very little these facts may furnish the intelligent with hints concerning what trees they should plant round small ponds that they should wish to be perennial and show them how advantageous their appearance to others trees perspire profusely condense largely and check evaporation 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 woodlands forests and chases with us are bound 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 of 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 beaches 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 the wettest seasons as they would do if supplied by springs by my journal of May seventeen seventy-five it appears that the small and even considerable ponds in the veils are now dried up while the small ponds on the very tops 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 moisture 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 vapours and even with copious use 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 towns even in the hottest parts of summer and how much the surfaces of things are drenched by those swimming vapours though to the senses all the while little moisture seems to fall I am etc Letter 30 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Selbourne, April the 3rd 1776 Dear Sir, Monsieur Erison 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 crore of a cuckoo does not light before the sternum at the bottom of the neck as in the Galanee, Columbia etc but immediately behind it on and over the bowels so as to make a large protuberance in the belly induced by this assertion we procured a cuckoo and cutting 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 a nice examination of insects such as small scarabs spiders and dragonflies the last of which we have seen cuckoos catching on the wing as they were just emerging out of the Aurelia State among this ferrago 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 bird seemed to us to be remarkably short between which and the anus lay the crop or crore and immediately 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 information 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 internal construction nor were our suspicions ill-grounded for upon the dissection the crop or crore also lay behind the sternum immediately on the viscera and the stem and the skin of the belly it was bulky and stuffed hard with large filaney 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 practice incubation is formed in a similar manner with cuckoos Monsieur Erisant's conjecture that cuckoos are incapable of incubation from the disposition of their intestines seems to fall to the ground and we are still at a loss of peculiarity in the instance of the cuckoos canorus we found the case to be the same with the ring-tailed 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 31 to the Honourable Daines Barrington Selbourne April 29th 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 eschewed into the world with the true viper spirit about them showing great alertness as soon as disengaged from the belly of the dam they twisted and wriggled about and set themselves up and gaped very wide when touched with a stick showing manifested tokens of menacing 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 the notion of the situation of their natural weapons and of using them properly in their own defence even before those weapons are subsist or are formed thus a young cock will spark his adversary before his spurs are grown the dam 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 formidable 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 danger was approaching possibly we should have found them somewhere in the neck and not in the abdomen letter 32 to the honourable Danes Barrington castration has a strange effect it emasculates both man beast and bird and brings them to a new resemblance of the other sex thus eunuchs have smooth unmascular arms, thighs and legs and broad hips and beardless chins and squeaking voices gelt, stags and bucks have hornless heads like hines and does thus weathers have small horns like use and oxen large bent horns and horse voices when they low like cows, for bulls have short straight horns and though they mutter and grumble in a deep tremulous 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 without 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. Lyle 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 bore so fierce and venerious 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 could restrain him letter 33 to the honourable Danes Barrington the natural term of an hog's life is little known and the reason is plain because it is neither profitable nor convenient to keep that turbulent animal to the full extent of its time however my neighbour 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 to her 17th year at which period she showed some tokens of age by the decay of her teeth and the decline of her fertility 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 fatting pen she proved when fat, good bacon juicy and tender the rind or sword was remarkably thin at a moderate computation she was allowed to have been the fruitful parent of three hundred pigs a prodigious instance of fecundity in so large a quadruped she was killed in spring 1775 I am et cetera Letter 34 to the Honourable Danes Barrington, Selbourne May 9th 1776 Dear Sir Admorent Ubera Tigres Readers note The tigers have bought near their teats for suckling. End Readers note 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 a strange affondness 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 dispatched and buried the hare was soon lost and supposed to be gone the way of most foundlings to be killed by some dog or cat however 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 inward notes of complacency such as they used towards their kittens and something gambling after which proved to be the leveret that the cat had supported with her milk and continued to support with great affection thus was a graminivorous animal nurtured by a carnivorous and predatious one Why so cruel and sanguinary a beast as a cat of the ferocious genus of Phyllis the murium leo as Linnaeus calls it should be affected with any tenderness towards an animal which is its natural prey which is not so easy to determine this strange affection probably was occasioned by that disiderium 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 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 marvellous that Romulus and Remus in their infant state should be nursed by she-wolf than that a poor little sucking leveret should be fostered and cherished by a bloody Grimalkin Viridi foetum marvortis in anthro cubiusei lupam gaminosiuic uberus curcum luderi pendentes pueros et lamberi metrim impavidos ilam tereti kervikei reflexam mulcheri alternus et corpora fingere lingua readers note he had pictured the newly delivered she-wolf stretched out in the green cave of Mars with the twin boys playing hanging from her breasts and licking their dam without fear while she, bending her shapely neck caress them and moulded their bodies with her tongue and read as note letter 35 to the honourable Danes Barrington cell-born May the 20th, 1777 Dear sir, lands that are subject to frequent inundations are always poor and probably the reason may be because 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 minuteness 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 nothing of half the birds and some quadrupeds which are almost entirely supported by them worms seem to be the great promoters of vegetation which would proceed but lamely without them by boring, perforating and loosening the soil and rendering it pervious to rains and the fibres of plants by drawing straws and stalks of leaves and twigs into it giving up such infinite numbers of lumps of earth called worm casts which, being their excrement is a fine manure 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 gardeners 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 favour of worms it should be hinted that green corn, plants and flowers are not so much injured by them as by many species of colioptera scarabs and tipuli long legs in their larvae or grub state and by unnoticed myriads of small shellless snails called slugs which silently and imperceptibly make amazing havoc in the field and garden note, Pharma Young of Norton Farm says that this spring, 1777 about four acres of his wheat in one field was entirely destroyed by slugs which swarmed on the blades of corn and devoured it as fast as it sprang and note 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 entertainment 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 convinced by the pains to examine his grass plots with a candle, a hermaphrodites and much addicted to venery and consequently very prolific I am, etc. Letter 36 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Selborne, November the 22nd 1777 Dear sir you cannot but remember that the 26th and 27th of last March were very hot days so sultry that everybody complained and were restless under those sensations to which they had not been reconciled by gradual approaches this sudden summer-like heat was attended by many summer 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 neighbourhood the old tortoise near Lewis the insects 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 preceded by harsh severe weather with frequent frosts and ice and cutting winds the insects withdrew into the ground and the swallows were seen no more until the 10th of April when the rigor of the spring are baiting 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 conclude that they had taken their last farewell but then it may be seen in my diaries also that considerable flocks have discovered 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 fourth of November more than twenty house martins in appearance had all departed about the 7th of October was seen again for that one morning only sporting between my fields and the hangar and feasting on insects which swarmed in that sheltered district the preceding day was wet and blustering but the fourth was dark and mild and soft the wind at south-west and the thermometer at fifty-eight and a half a pitch not common at that season of the year moreover it may not be a miss to add in this place that whenever the thermometer is above fifty the bat comes flitting out in every autumnal and winter month from all these circumstances laid together it is obvious that torpin insects, reptiles and quadrupeds are awakened from their profoundest slumbers by a little untimely warmth and therefore that nothing so much promotes this death-like stupa as a defect of heat and further it is reasonable to suppose that two whole species or at least many individuals of those two species of British herondines do never leave this island at all but partake of the same benarmed state for we cannot suppose that after a month's absence house martins can return from southern regions to appear for one morning in November or that house swallows should leave the districts of Africa to enjoy in March the transient summer of a couple of days I am, etc. Letter 37 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Selbourn, January the 8th, 1778 Dear sir, there was in this village several years ago a miserable pauper who from his birth was addicted with a leprosy 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 his 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 or feet were able to perform 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 loved 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, neither of which were lepers his father in particular lived to be far advanced in years in all ages the leprosy has made a dreadful havoc among mankind the Israelites seem to have been greatly afflicted with it from the most remote times as appears from the peculiar and repeated injunctions given them in the Levitical law nor was the ranker of this foul disorder much abated in the last period of their commonwealth as may be seen in many passages of the New Testament 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 Dices 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 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 an humane and thinking person a matter of equal wonder and satisfaction when he contemplates how nearly this pest is eradicated and observes that a leper now is a real scion he will moreover when engaged in such a train of thought naturally inquire for the reason perhaps may have originated and been continued from the much smaller quantity of salted meat and fish now eaten in these kingdoms from the use of linen next to 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 Mickelmuss to shift as they could through the dead months so that no fresh meat could be had in winter or spring hence the marvellous account of the vast stores of salted flesh found in the larder of the eldest Spencer in the days of Edward II even so late in the spring as the 3rd of May that is 600 bacons 80 cocks of beef and 600 muttons 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 has now arrived at such a picture 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 quantity of wretched fresh and salt fish consumed by the commonality at all seasons as well as in Lent which our poor now would hardly be persuaded to touch the use of linen changes, shirts or shifts in the room of sordid and filthy woollen long worn next to skin is a matter of neatness comparatively modern but must prove a great means of preventing cutaneous ales at this very time woollen instead of linen prevails among the poorer welch who are subject to foul eruptions there plenty of good wheat and bread that now is found among 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 contribute not a little to the sweetening their blood and correcting their juices for the inhabitants of mountainous districts to this day are still liable to the itch and other cutaneous disorders the 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 labourer 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 to their sordid parsimony and looked upon as regardless of the welfare of their dependence potatoes have prevailed in this little district 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 rain 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 within the walls of their abbeys and priories note 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 proficient in mechanics, gardening and architecture Seedal Rimpel's Annals of Scotland end note 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 Eyler and Mr. Waller of Beaconsfield were some of the first people of rank that promoted the elegant science of ornamenting without despising the superintendents 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 but we find him observing so late as his days that the Italians use several herbs for salads which are not yet or have not been but lately used in England that is celery which is nothing else but the sweet smallage the young shoots were off with a little of the head of the root cut off they eat raw with oil and pepper and further he adds curled endi of blanched is much used beyond seas and for a raw salad seemed to excel letters itself now this journey was undertaken no longer ago than in the year 1663 I am etc Letter 38 to the Honourable Danes Barrington Forte Puer, Cometum seductus abagmine fido tixerat equest adest et adest respondrat echo Hic stupet utque achiem partes divisit in omnes voque veni clamat magna vocat ila vocantem Readers note a boy separated from his band of friends had called out is anyone here? to which had come the echo in reply amazed looking all round the boy called out loudly come his call is answered by the call of the echo End Readers note Selbourn February the 12th 1778 Dear sir, in a district so diversified as this so full of hollow veils and hanging woods it is no wonder that echoes should abound many we have discovered that returned 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 respondents to be a very adroit polyglot he then discerned the deception this echo in an evening before rural noises cease would repeat ten syllables most articulately and distinctly especially if quick dactyls were chosen the last syllables of titire tu patule 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 distance 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 repercussion and is not too near nor too far off buildings or naked rocks re-echo much more articulately than hanging wood or veils because in the latter the voices 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 experiments is the stone built tiled hop kiln in galley lane which measures in front 40 feet and from the ground to the eaves 12 feet the true centrum phonicum or just distance is one particular spot in the king's field in the path to nor hill on the very brink of the steep bulk above the hollow cartway 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 doctor plots rule for distinct articulation for the doctor in his history of oxford cheer allows 120 feet for the return of each syllable distinctly hence this echo which gives 10 distinct syllables ought to measure 400 yards or 120 feet to each syllable whereas our distance is only 258 yards or near 75 feet to each syllable thus our measure falls short of the doctors 5 to 8 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 needs the gravest man be ashamed to appear taken with such a phenomenon 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 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 hearing at all but if it should be urged that though they cannot hear yet perhaps they may feel the repercussion of sounds I grant it is possible they may yet that these impressions are distasteful or hurtful I deny because bees in good summers thrive well in my outlet where the echoes are very strong for this village is another anathoth a place of responses or echoes besides it does not appear from experiment that bees 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 sometimes 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 an 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 disappointment is the same because at all quick set hedge nurtured up for the purpose of shelter to the hop ground entirely interrupts the impulse and repercussion of the voice so that till those obstructions are removed no more of its carruity 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 needful to erect this building on the gentle declivity of an hill with a like rising opposite to it at a few hundred yards distance and perhaps success might be the easier ensured could some canal, lake or stream intervene from a seat at the centrum phonicum he and his friends might amuse themselves sometimes 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 quay neck reticare laquenti neck prio ripsa laquididicit recenabilis echo readers note responsive echo who learned neither to be silent when another speaks nor herself to be the first to speak end readers note 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 quay beni quom videas rationim radere posis tutte tibiat quialis copacto perloca sola saxa pareyes formas verborem ex ordine redant palenteyes comiteyes quom monteyes interopacos quermis et magna dispersos quokei quiemus sex etiem au septem loca vidi redere voces unem quom giaceris ita colis colibus ipsis verba repulsantes iterabant dictareferi hayek loca capripeides satiros nymphasque tenere finitimi fingunt et feunus esse loc vuontor quorum noctivago strepitu ludoque ducanti adfirmant folgo taciterno selentia rumpi codorumpi sonos fieri dulqueyesque querilas tibia quas fundet digitas pulsata canentum et genus agricolum latte sentischeri compan pinaia semiferi capitis velamina quassans un cosaipe labro calamos percurit ianteyes fistila silvestrem nekeset fondere musa Lucretius, Book 4, 1, 5, 7, 6 Readers note When you understand this well you might be able to give a reason to yourself and others how it happens that in lonely places the rocks give back the same formation of words in their order when we look for friends struggling among the shady mountains and call loudly after them scattered around I have known places give back as many as six or seven sounds when only one has been uttered Esoded Hills echo ones for words and repeatedly give back that which was spoken those living near imagine goat-footed satyrs and nymphs haunting these places they say there are fawns by whose din and play at night they commonly declare silence and stillness to be broken they say too how the sounds of strings are heard and plaintive laments which the pipe pours forth when played on by the fingers of the music-maker they tell how the farmers far and wide are aware when Pan, shaking the pine-read covering of his half-bestial head often runs over the open reeds with curving lips at the shepherd's pipe may never cease its flow of woodland song End Readers note The end of section 11 of Gilbert White's natural history of Selbourne


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