VI.] OF SELBORNE. 



this money, lent on private security, was in danger of being 

 lost, and the bequest remained in an unsettled state for near 

 twenty years, till 1700 ; so that little or no advantage was 

 derived from it. About the year 1759 it was again in the 

 utmost danger by the failure of a borrower ; but by prudent 

 management, has since been raised to one hundred pounds 

 stock in the three per cents, reduced. The trustees are the 

 vicar and the renters or owners of Temple, Priory, Grange, 

 Blackrnore, and Oakhanger House, for the time being. This 

 gentleman seemed inclined to have put the vicarial premises 

 in a comfortable state; and began by building a solid stone 

 wall round the front court, and another in the lower yard, 

 between that and the neighbouring garden; but was inter- 

 rupted by death from fulfilling his laudable intentions. 

 April 1680, Barnabas Long became vicar. 

 June 1681. This living was now in such low estimation in 

 Magdalen College, that it descended to a junior fellow, Gilbert 

 White, M.A., who was instituted to it in the thirty-first year 

 of his age. At his first coming he ceiled the chancel, and also 

 floored and wainscoted the parlour and hall, which before were 

 paved with stone, and had naked walls ; he enlarged the kitchen 

 and brewhouse, and dug a cellar and well : he also built a large 

 new barn in the lower yard, removed the hovels in the front 

 court, which he laid out in walks and borders ; and entirely 

 planned the back garden, before a rude field with a stone-pit 

 in the midst of it. By his will he gave and bequeathed " the 

 sum of forty pounds to be laid out in the most necessary repairs 

 of the church; that is, in strengthening and securing such 

 parts as seem decaying and dangerous." With this sum two 

 large buttresses were erected to support the east end of the 

 south wall of the church ; and the gable end wall of the west 

 end of the south aisle was new built from the ground. 



By his will also he gave " One hundred pounds to be laid 

 out on lands ; the yearly rents whereof shall be employed in 

 teaching the poor children of Selboura parish to read and write, 

 and say their prayers and catechism, and to sew and knit : 

 and be under the direction of his executrix as long as she lives ; 

 and after her, under the direction of such of his children and 



