228 GILBERT WHITE OF SELBORNE 1791 



best on stoney, or chalkey cliffs, where there seems to be 

 little or no soil. Thus about a mile and an half from me to 

 the S.E. in an abrupt field, stand four noble beech-trees on 

 the edge of a steep, rocky-ravin, or water-gulley, the biggest 

 of which measures 9 feet 5 inches at four feet from the 

 ground. Their noble branching heads, and smooth rind 

 show that they are in the highest vigour and preservation. 

 Again the vast bloated, pollard, hollow beeches, mentioned 

 before, stood on the bare naked end of a chalky promontory 

 many of which measured from 20 to 30 feet in circum- 

 ference ! they were the admiration of all strangers. How 

 has prevailed the notion that all old London was built with 

 chestnut ? It is with us now vile timber, porous, shakey, 

 and fragile, and only fit for the meanest coopery purposes. 

 Yet have I known it smuggled into Portsmouth dock as 

 good ship-building oak ! 



The more I observe and take notice of the best oaks now 

 remaining in this neighbourhood, the more I am astonished 

 at the oak which you planted yourself. For there is a 

 most noble tree of that kind near Hartely house, which 

 I caused to be measured last week; when behold, at four 

 feet above the ground the girth proved to be only 14 feet, 

 when yours measured 12 ft. 6 in. ! Why this fine shafted 

 tree, with it's majestic head escaped the axe thirty years ago, 

 when Sir Simeon Stuart felled all its contemporaries, I 

 cannot pretend to say. If you ever happen to see the 

 Hamadryad of your favourite Oak, pray give my respects 

 to her. She must be a fine venerable old lady. For a 

 diverting story respecting an Hamadryad, see the * Spectator,' 

 vol. viii., p. 128. 



Behind my house I have got an outlet of seven acres 

 laid out in walks by my father. As the soil is strong, the 

 hedges, which are cut-up, are prodigious. The maples about 

 35 feet in height, and the hasles, and whitethorns 20, which, 

 when feathered to the ground, were beautiful : but they now, 



