A SUMMER DAY AT SELBORNE. 33 



its south side is the sweet resting-place of Gilbert White. All that tells 

 such is the case is a simple stone about eighteen inches high, fifteen inches 

 broad, rounded at the top, and the initials G. W., 26th. June, 1793. 

 Above all compare is such a resting-place; the green daisy-covered sod 

 exposed to the seasons preaching the silent lesson 



"That plants and flowers 

 Anew do deck the plain; 

 The woods do hear the voice of Spring, 

 And flourish green again." 



And lower down beneath that sod the lesson is also forced upon us 



"That man, when laid in lonesome grave, 

 Shall sleep in death's dark gloom, 

 Until the eternal warning wake 

 The slumbers of the tomb." 



Retracing our steps back through the Plestor, immediately to the right 

 we come to the residence of White, his birth-place, his life-long abode, 

 and where he died; indeed, with a few exceptions, his whole life may be 

 said to have been spent in the district, almost in the parish of Selborne, 

 and a place better adapted to a naturalist of White's stamp could scarcely 

 be found. The house remains very much in the same state as White left 

 it, excepting a wing added at the west end by the present proprietor, 

 Professor Bell. The grounds are much finer than when White had them, 

 although in making them so nothing characteristic of its former occupant 

 has been sacrificed. His brick-laid walk is there, his sun-dial is there, his 

 large Oak and Cedar still flourish; you may sit down and bring to your 

 mind what his appearance was, and you have the picture of a former time 

 complete. 



Again . passing along the village, now much as it was in 1780, "a, long 

 straggling street," some houses thatched, and with their moss-covered 

 ornaments present a pleasing appearance, some as the church, with square 

 tiles, but all having a tidy and cosy aspect. At the east end of the 

 village a path leads up to the Zigzag, (so named from its construction,) 

 and as you ascend this, a most glorious landscape reveals itself to your 

 gaze, such a sight as the soul delights to drink in through the eyes. This 

 hill rises above the village about three hundred feet, and is divided into 

 a sheep-down, a high wood, and a low wood called the "Hanger." This 

 wood consists entirely of Beech, and growing as it here does on chalk, 

 attains a beauty not elsewhere attained. The Beech tree, when it puts 

 forth its young downy leaves in the early spring, is a cheering and lovely 

 sight. In the autumn, when it assumes its rosy and brown tints, it lends 

 a warmth to the landscape that no other tree does. No wonder then it 

 was such a favourite with White. And this same "Hanger" is that wood 



VOL. VIII. F 



