xxvi MEMOIR. 



letters to whom, and four from Linnaeus to him, will be 

 found in the second volume. It is remarkable that Mr. 

 Bennett, in the preface to his edition, should have fallen 

 into the mistake (perpetuated, of course, by his copyists) 

 that the Rev. John White was vicar of Blackburn before 

 he went to Gibraltar. It will be seen that, of the six 

 letters to Linnseus just mentioned, the only one from 

 Gibraltar is of the date June 30, 1771, and the first from 

 England is dated London, Jan. 1, 1773 ; the others are 

 all from Blackburn, of various dates, from November 

 1773 to October 1774. Gilbert White, writing to his 

 brother at Blackburn, August 2, 1773, says, " I find 

 you still, as when you resided on the other side of the 

 Pyrenean mountains, my most steady and communica- 

 tive correspondent/' It was, then, after his return from 

 Gibraltar that he was instituted to the living of Black- 

 burn, where for many years he continued his corre- 

 spondence with his brother, whose letters to him will be 

 read with great pleasure, as many of them evince the 

 same qualities of style arid matter as those which charac- 

 terize his book. Gilbert took great interest in the pro- 

 gress of his brother's work, and there are repeated allu- 

 sions to the subject in his letters to him. Even so early 

 as in that which I have mentioned above, there appears 

 an entreaty that he will " revise his journal without loss 

 of time ; " but in a letter of later date, to Daines Bar- 

 rington, he refers to it as the work of the late Rev. J. 

 White, "not yet published." The introduction to this 

 work is now in my possession. 



A letter from John White to his brother Gilbert, 

 written some time after the former had gone to Gibral- 

 tar, indicates that some circumstances connected with 

 his marriage had given uneasiness to his brothers in 



