INTRODUCTION xiii 



to have been fond of both pursuits, though their opportunities 

 were limited. Books cannot have helped him much. There 

 were, it is true, Willughby and Ray, but, to say nothing of 

 the Latin in which many of their works were written, they 

 were fitter to satisfy than to excite curiosity. In White's 

 youth there was nothing in the least like the Natural History 

 of Selborne, but only dry treatises and collections of mar- 

 vellous tales, little better than the bestiaries of the dark 

 ages. 



White's notes, many of which are preserved in manuscript 

 in the British Museum, were written down at short intervals, 

 while the circumstances were fresh. They were often copied 

 into private letters; they formed the groundwork of his 

 published papers, and in the end they yielded the best part 

 of the Natural History of Selborne. From 1768 onwards 

 White recorded his observations in the Naturalists Journal 

 (London: Printed for W. Sandby, in Fleet St., MDCCLXVII). 

 His copy of the first year's journal is marked : " Gil. White, 

 1768. The gift of the Honourable Mr. Barrington the In- 

 venter. The Insects are named according to Linnaeus : the 

 plants according to the sexual system : the birds according to 

 Ray.' 1 In 1771 and following years the Naturalists Journal 

 is marked as " Printed by Benjamin White, at Horace's 

 Head, in Fleet Street " (no date). The later issues have an 

 engraved instead of a letterpress title-page. White some- 

 times ruled his own books, or if he returned to Barrington's 

 form, wrote across many of the columns. The diaries, of 

 which there are six bound volumes, are now in the British 

 Museum, having been purchased of the Rev. G. Taylor in 

 1881. It was from them that Dr. Aikin compiled the 

 Naturalises Calendar and the Observations on Various Parts 

 of Nature. 



It is characteristic of Gilbert White that he takes little 

 note of the progress made by natural history in his own life- 

 time. It was the age of Linnaeus, and White cannot be 

 reproached with inattention to him at least. But the reader 

 of his published and private letters might fail to be reminded 

 that Buffon and Reaumur and De Geer were then writing 

 their histories, that John Hunter was dissecting and making 



