28 NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



share forty stacks of wood. Forty-five of these people his lordship 

 .has served with actions. These trees, which were very sound and in 

 high perfection, were winter-cut, viz., in February and March, before 

 the bark would run. In old times the Holt was estimated to be 

 eighteen miles, computed measure from water-carriage, viz., from 

 the town of Chertsey, on the Thames ; but now it is not half that 

 distance, since the Wey is made navigable up to the town of 

 Godalming in the county of Surrey. 



LETTER X.* 



TO THE SAME. 



August \th, 1767. 



IT has been my misfortune never to have had any neighbours 

 whose studies have led them towards the pursuit of natural know- 

 ledge ; so that, for want of a companion to quicken my industry 

 and sharpen my attention, I have made but slender progress in a 

 kind of information to which I have been attached from my child- 

 hood. 



As to swallows (hirundines rusticce) being found in a torpid state 



* This letter is extremely interesting in many points, it is the earliest in date, and as 

 such tends to confirm what we suggested in the note to p. i, that the first letter of this 

 scries was written at a later date as introductory. Its early date also accounts for the 

 apologetical expression in the first paragraph, and in it we find mentioned the two subjects 

 for which White always entertained the greatest interest : these were migration and 

 hybernation. 



White at the commencement of his meditations on this subject was inclined to the 

 belief of a partial hybernation taking place among birds, which Mr. Harrington, with 

 whom he was also corresponding, tended to confirm. Neither could he get rid of the 

 various accounts in circulation, in regard to swallows being found torpid, and of their 

 retiring under water at stated periods. His candid mind would not allow him to credit 

 these, but at the same time he could not divest them of all foundation. Birds migrate, 

 and the instinct thus implanted may be looked upon generally as the provision to supply 

 the wants of a peculiar season. All those summer visitants that have been found after 

 the usual period of their departure, have been detained by other causes than a will to 

 remain, and as the season advanced and the supplies of food and warmth failed, they 

 sought retreats which by-and-by they were probably unable to leave. Some found in 

 such places have been dead at the time or have died almost immediately after being 

 discovered, and a few have revived just according to the time they were concealed, or 

 were able to withstand the cold or want of sustenance. Our winter visitants are in the 

 same way occasionally detained ; a short time since we took a woodcock which had the 

 tip of the wing slightly injured, it could perhaps fly about thirty yards. This bird could 

 not have migrated, but it had not the scarcity of food to contend with that a summer 

 visitant would incur, and there is no doubt it would have lived through the season, as it 

 was perfectly healthy and in good condition. 



