128 NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 



cussion of the voice : so that till those obstructions are 

 removed no more of it's 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 distance ; and perhaps success might 

 be the easier insured could some canal, lake, or stream 

 intervene. From a seat at the centrum phonicum he and 

 his friends might amuse themselves sometimes of an even- 

 ing with the prattle of this loquacious nymph ; of whose 

 complacency and decent reserve more may be said than 

 can with truth of every individual of her sex ; since she 

 is 



" quas nee reticere loquenti, 



Nee prior ipsa loqui didicit resonabilis echo." 



I am, &c. 



P.S. The classic reader will, I trust, pardon the follow- 

 ing lovely quotation, so finely describing echoes, and 

 so poetically accounting for their causes from popular 

 superstition ; 



" Quae bene quom videas, rationem reddere possis 

 Tute tibi atque aliis, quo pacto per loca sola 

 Saxa pareis formas verborum ex ordine reddant, 

 Palanteis comites quom monteis inter opacos 

 Quserimus, et magna disperses voce ciemus. 

 Sex etiam, aut septem loca vidi reddere voces 

 Unam quom jaceres : ita colles collibus ipsis 

 Verba repulsantes iterabant dicta referre. 

 Haec loca capripedes Satyros, Nymphasque tenere 

 Finitimi fingunt, et Faunos esse loquuntur ; 

 Quorum noctivago strepitu, ludoque jocanti 

 Adfirmant volgo taciturna silentia rumpi, 

 Chordarumque sonos fieri, dulceisque querelas, 

 Tibia quas fundit digitis pulsata canentum : 

 Et genus agricolum lat& sentiscere, quom Pan 

 Pinea semiferi capitis velamina quassans, 



