The Natural History of Selborne 309 



This wild and fanciful assertion will hardly be admitted by 

 the philosophers of these days, especially as they all now seem 

 agreed that insects are not furnished with any organs of 

 hearing at all. 1 But if it should be urged, that though they 

 cannot hear yet perhaps they may feel the repercussions of 

 sounds, I grant it is possible they may. Yet that these 

 impressions are distasteful or hurtful, I deny, because bees, 

 in good summers, thrive well in my outlet, where the echoes 

 are very strong; for this village is another Anathoth, a place 

 of responses and echoes. Besides, it does not appear from 

 experiment that bees are in any way capable of being affected 

 by sounds; for I have often tried my own with a large 

 speaking-trumpet held close to their hives, and with such an 

 exertion of voice as would have hailed a ship at the distance 

 of a mile, and still these insects pursued their various employ- 

 ments undisturbed, and without showing the least sensibility 

 or resentment. 



Some time since its discovery this echo is become totally 

 silent, though the object, or hop-kiln, remains ; nor is there 

 any mystery in this defect ; for the field between is planted 

 as an hop-garden, and the voice of the speaker is totally 

 absorbed and lost among the poles and entangled foliage of 

 the hops. And when the poles are removed in autumn the 

 disappointment is the same ; because a tall, quick-set hedge, 

 nurtured up for the purpose of shelter to the hop ground, 

 entirely interrupts the impulse and repercussion of the voice; 

 so that till these obstructions are removed no more of its 

 garrulity can be expected. 



Should any gentleman of fortune think an echo in his park 

 or outlet a pleasing incident, he might build one at little or 

 no expense. For whenever he had occasion for a new barn, 

 stable, dog-kennel, or the like structure, it would be only 

 needful to erect this building on the gentle declivity of an 

 hill, with a like rising opposite to it, at a few hundred yards 



] Insects have since been proved to be sensible to sound. Many insects 

 emit musical notes as calls or cries to attract their mates. ED. 



