The Natural History of Selborne

The parish of Selborne lies in the extreme eastern corner of the county of Hampshire, bordering on the county of Sussex, and not far from the county of Surrey; is about fifty mi...

In the court of Norton-farmhouse, a manor farm to the north-west of the village, on the white maims, stood within these twenty years a broad-leaved elm, or wych hazel, ulmus fol...

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 curio...

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; t...

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 lan...

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...

Though large herds of deer do much harm to the neighbourhood, yet the injury to the morals of the people is of more moment than the loss of their crops. The temptation is irresi...

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...

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 reco...

It has been my misfortune never to have had any neighbours whose studies have led them towards the pursuit of natural knowledge; so that, for want of a companion to quicken my i...

It will not be without impatience, that I shall wait for your thoughts with regard to the falco; as to its weight, breadth, etc., I wish I had set them down at the time; but, to...

It gave me no small satisfaction to hear that the 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 th...

As in one of your former letters you expressed the more satisfaction from my correspondence on account of my living in the most southerly county; so now I may return the complim...

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, beside the nostrils...

Some intelligent country people have a notion that we have, in these parts, a species of the genus mustelinum, besides the weasel, stoat, ferret, and polecat; a little reddish b...

The history of the stone curlew, charadrius oedicnemus is as follows. It lays its eggs, usually two, never more than three, on the bare ground, without any nest, in the field; s...

On Wednesday last arrived your agreeable letter of June the 10th. It gives me great satisfaction to find that you pursue these studies still with such vigour, and are in such fo...

I received your obliging and communicative letter of June the 28th, while I was on a visit at a gentleman’s house, where I had neither books to turn to, nor leisure to sit down,...

I have now, past dispute, made out three distinct species of the willow-wrens (motacillae trochili) which constantly and invariably use distinct notes. But, at the same time, I...

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 t...

With regard to the oedicnemus, or stone curlew, I intend to write very soon to my friend near Chichester, in whose neighbourhood these birds seem most to abound; and shall urge...

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 st...

It is not improbable that the Guernsey lizard and our green lizard may be specifically the same; all that I know is, that, when some years ago many Guernsey lizards were turned...

The scarabaeus 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 b...

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 s...

I was much gratified by your communicative letter on your return from Scotland, where you spent, I find, some considerable time, and gave yourself good room to examine the natur...

Hedge-hogs abound in my gardens and fields. The manner in which they eat their roots of the plantain in my grass-walks is very curious: with their upper mandible, which is much...

On Michaelmas-day 1768 I managed to get a sight of the female moose belonging to the Duke of Richmond, at Goodwood; but was greatly disappointed, when I arrived at the spot, to...

Last month we had such a series of cold turbulent weather, such a constant succession of frost, and snow, and hail, and tempest, that the regular migration or appearance of the...

The French, I think, in general, are strangely prolix in their natural history. What Linnaeus says with respect to insects holds good in every other branch: ‘Verbositas praesent...

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...

After an ineffectual search in Linnaeus, Brisson, etc., I begin to suspect that I discern my brother’s hirundo hyberna in Scopoli’s new discovered hirundo rupestris, p. 167. His...

I was much pleased to see, among the collection of birds from Gibraltar, some of those short-winged English summer birds of passage, concerning whose departure we have made so m...

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...

Happening to make a visit to my neighbour’s peacocks, I could not help observing that the trains of those magnificent birds appear by no means to be their tails; those long feat...

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...

On the twelfth of July I had a fair opportunity of contemplating the motions of the caprimulgus, or fern-owl, as it was playing round a large oak that swarmed with scarabaei sol...

By my journal for last autumn it appears that the house-martins bred very late, and staid very late in these parts; for, on the first of October, I saw young martins in their ne...

As you desire me to send you such observations 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...

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 appeared; so that th...

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...

Some future faunist, a man of fortune, will, I hope, extend his visits to the kingdom of Ireland; a new field, and a country little known to the naturalist. He will not, it is t...

A pair of honey-buzzards, buteo opivorus, sive vespivorus Raii, built them a large shallow nest, composed of twigs and lined with dead beechen leaves, upon a tall slender beech...

As to the wild wood-pigeon, the oenas, 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 hav...

When I was in town last month I partly engaged that I would sometime do myself the honour to write to you on the subject of natural history: and I am the more ready to fulfil my...

When I did myself the honour 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...

It was no small matter of satisfaction to me to find that you were not displeased with my little methodus of birds. If there was any merit in the sketch, it must be owing to its...

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 co...

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...

The severity and turbulence of last month so interrupted the regular progress of summer migration, that some of the birds do but just begin to show themselves, and others are ap...

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

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...

You are, I know, no great friend to migration; and the well attested accounts from various parts of the kingdom seem to justify you in your suspicions, that at least many of the...

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 n...

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...

As a gentleman and myself were walking on the fourth of last November round the sea-banks at Newhaven, near the mouth of the Lewes river, in pursuit of natural knowledge, we wer...

While I was in Sussex last autumn my residence was at the village near Lewes, from whence I had formerly the pleasure of writing to you. On the first of November I remarked that...

The more I reflect on the στοργὴ 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. Th...

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 y...

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 happ...

I received your last favour just as I was setting out for this place; and am pleased to find that my monography met with your approbation. My remarks are the result of many year...

The house-swallow, or chimney-swallow, is undoubtedly the first comer of all the British hirundines; and appears in general on or about the thirteenth of April, as I have remark...

I received your favour of the eighth, and am pleased to find that you read my little history of the swallow with your usual candour: nor was I less pleased to find that you made...

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...

As the swift or black-martin is the largest of the British hirundines, so is it undoubtedly the latest comer. For I remember but one instance of its appearing before the last we...

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 conte...

On September the 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-grou...

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...

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 itse...

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...

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, h...

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...

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...

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 i...

On August the 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...

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, thig...

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...

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 rec...

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...

You cannot but remember that the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh of last March were very hot days; so sultry that everybody complained and were restless under those sensations t...

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 on...

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 pac...

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 th...

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...

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-w...

Omnibus animalibus reliquis certus et uniusmodi, et in suo cuique genere incessus est: aves solae vario meatu feruntur, et in terra, et in äere.—PLIN. Hist. Nat. lib. x. cap. 38.

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 lik...

Gentlemen who have outlets might contrive to make ornament subservient to utility; a pleasing eye-trap might also contribute to promote science: an obelisk in a garden or park m...

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, allu...

There is a steep abrupt pasture field interspersed with furze close to the back of this village, well known by the name of the Short Lithe, consisting of a rocky dry soil, and i...

While many other insects must be sought after in fields and woods, and waters, the gryllus domesticus, or house-cricket, resides altogether within our dwellings, intruding itsel...

How diversified are the modes of life not only of incongruous but even of congenerous animals; and yet their specific distinctions are not more various than their propensities....

It is now more than forty years that I have paid some attention to the ornithology of this district, without being able to exhaust the subject: new occurrences still arise as lo...

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...

I have now read your miscellanies through with much care and satisfaction: and am to return you my best thanks for the honourable mention made in them of me as a naturalist, whi...

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 specie...

As I have sometimes known you make inquiries about several kinds of insects, I shall here send you an account of one sort which I little expected to have found in this kingdom....

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...

I think I have observed before that much the most considerable part of the house-martins withdraw from hence about the first week in October; but that some, the latter broods I...

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...

A rare, and I think a new little bird frequents my garden, which I have great reason to think is the pettichaps: it is common in some parts of the kingdom, and I have received f...

My near neighbour, 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 the c...

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...

In reading Dr. Huxham’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 172...

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 c...

The most certain way to be exact will be to copy the passages from my journal, which were taken from time to time as things occurred. But it may be proper previously to remark t...

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 seve...

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...

The summer of the year 1783 was an amazing and portentous one, and full of horrible phaenomena; for besides the alarming meteors and tremendous thunder-storms that affrighted an...

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 bef...