NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 5 



Downs round Dorking, and Ryegate in Surrey, to the north-east, 

 which altogether, with the country beyond Alton and Farnham, 

 form a noble and extensive outline. 



At the foot of this hill, one stage or step from the uplands, lies 

 the village, which consists of one single straggling street, three- 

 quarters of a mile in length, in a sheltered vale, and running 

 parallel with The Hanger. The houses are divided from the hill 

 by a vein of stiff clay (good wheat-land), yet stand on a rock of 

 white stone, little in appearance removed from chalk ; but seems 

 so far from being calcareous, that it endures extreme heat. Yet 

 that the freestone still preserves somewhat that is analogous to 

 chalk, is plain from the beeches which descend as low as those 

 rocks extend, and no farther, and thrive as well on them, where 

 the ground is steep, as on the chalks. 



The cart-way of the village divides, in a remarkable manner, 

 two very incongruous soils. To the south-west is a rank clay, 

 that requires the labour of years to render it mellow ; while the 

 gardens to the north-east, and small enclosures behind, consist of 

 a warm, forward, crumbling mould, called black malm, which 

 seems highly saturated with vegetable and animal manure ; and 

 these may perhaps have been the original site of the town ; while 

 the woods and coverts might extend down to the opposite bank. 2 



At each end of the village, which runs from south-east to north- 

 west, arises a small rivulet : that at the north-west end frequently 

 fails ; but the other is a fine perennial spring, little influenced by 

 drought or wet seasons, called Well-head.* This breaks out of 

 some high grounds joining to Nore Hill, a noble chalk promontory, 

 remarkable for sending forth two streams into two different seas. 

 The one to the south becomes a branch of the Arun, running to 

 Arundel, and so sailing into the British Channel : the other to the 

 north. The Selborne stream makes one branch of the Wey ; and, 

 meeting the Black-down stream at Hedleigh, and the Alton and 



* This spring produced, September loth, 1871, after a severe hot summer, and 

 a preceding dry spring and winter, nine gallons of water in a minute, which is 

 540 in an hour, and 12,960, or 216 hogsheads, in twenty-four hours, or one 

 natural day. At this time many of the wells failed, and all the ponds in the 

 vale were dry. 



