28 NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 
share forty stacks of wood. Forty-five of these people his lordship 
has served with actions. These trees, which were very sound and in 
high perfection, were winter-cut, viz., in February and March, before 
the bark would run. In old times the Holt was estimated to be 
eighteen miles, computed measure from water-carriage, viz., from 
the town of Chertsey, on the Thames ; but now it is not half that 
distance, since the Wey is made navigable up to the town of 
Godalming in the county of Surrey. 
LET Pi es 
TO THE SAME, 
August 4th, 1767. 
Ir has been my misfortune never to have had.any neighbours 
whose studies have led them towards the pursuit of natural know- 
ledge; so that, for want of a companion to quicken my industry 
and sharpen my attention, I have made but slender progress in a 
kind of information to which I have been attached from my child- 
hood. 
As to swallows (Azrundines rustice) being found in a torpid state 
* This letter is extremely interesting in many points, it is the earliest in date, and as 
such tends to confirm what we suggested in the note to p. 1, that the first letter of this 
series was written at a later date as introductory. Its early date also accounts for the 
apologetical expression in the first paragraph, and in it we find mentioned the two subjects 
for which White always entertained the greatest interest: these were migration and 
hybernation. 
White at the commencement of his meditations on this subject was inclined to the 
belief of a partial hybernation taking place among birds, which Mr. Barrington, with 
whom he was also corresponding, tended to confirm. Neither could he get rid of the 
various accounts in circulation, in regard to swallows being found torpid, and of their 
retiring under water at stated periods. His candid mind would not allow him to credit 
these, but at the same time he could not divest them of all foundation. Birds migrate, 
and the instinct thus implanted may be looked upon generally as the provision to supply 
the wants of a peculiar season. All those summer visitants that have been found after 
the usual period of their departure, have been detained by other causes than a will to 
remain, and as the season advanced and the supplies of food and warmth failed, they 
sought retreats which by-and-by they were probably unable to leave. Some found in 
such places have been dead at the time or have died almost immediately after being 
discovered, and a few have revived just according to the time they were concealed, or 
were able to withstand the cold or want of sustenance. Our winter visitants are in the 
same way occasionally detained ; a short time since we took a woodcock which had the 
tip of the wing slightly injured, it could perhaps fly about thirty yards. This bird could 
not have migrated, but it had not the scarcity of food to contend with that a summer 
visitant would incur, and there is no doubt it would have lived through the season, as it 
was perfectly healthy and in good condition. 
