OF SELBOKNE. 15 



spring and summer the women weed the corn ; and enjoy a 

 second harvest in September by hop-picking. Formerly, in 

 the dead months they availed themselves greatly by spin- 

 ning wool, for making of barragons, a genteel corded stuff, 

 much in vogue at that time for summer wear ; and chiefly 

 manufactured at Alton, a neighbouring town, by some of the 

 people called Quakers : but from circumstances this trade 

 is at an end. 1 The inhabitants enjoy a good share of health 

 and longevity ; and the parish swarms with children*. 



LETTER VI. 



TO THE SAME. 



SHOULD I omit to describe with some exactness the forest of 

 Wolmer, of which three fifths perhaps lie in this parish, my 



1 Since the passage above was written, I am happy in being able to say 

 that the spinning employment is a little revived, to the no small comfort 

 of the industrious housewife. 



* [Between September 1854, and July 1855, there died in Selborne three 

 persons, two men and a woman, at the age of 90, they having been born 

 within one year. The latter was mistress of a very respectable dame's 

 school, where she continued to teach until a short time before her death. 

 She had a perfect recollection of Gilbert White, and had, I believe, been 

 formerly a servant at the Vicarage. A still more remarkable instance 

 occurred in a woman of the name of Oilman, who died at Selborne about 

 the year 1860, being then in her 100th year. When she was 98, we 

 missed her one Sunday afternoon from church, where she was so regular 

 an attendant that we concluded that no other cause than illness would 

 occasion her absence. We therefore called at her cottage, and found her in 

 perfect health, with her daughter, who was then about 70; and we were 

 told that she had been to church at Newton Valence, more than a mile 

 distant, having had to climb Selborne Hill, 300 feet high, had gone half 

 a mile further to dine with her brother j and her daughter added, " I 

 assure you she outran me across the common as we came home." There 

 were recently living in the parish eight persons whose average age was 

 80^ ; and the average number of deaths in a population of 1100 has not 

 been more than 12 annually. T. B.] 



