THE 



NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 



LETTERS TO THOMAS PENNANT. 



LETTER I. 



THE parish of Selborne lies in the extreme eastern 

 corner of the county of Hampshire, bordering on the 

 county of Sussex, and not far from the county of 

 Surrey ; is about fifty miles south-west of London, in latitude 

 fifty-one, and near mid-way between the towns of Alton 

 and Petersfield. Being very large and extensive, it abuts on 

 twelve parishes, two of which are in Sussex viz., Trotton 

 and Rogate. If you begin from the south and proceed 

 westward, the adjacent parishes are Emshot, Newton 

 Valence, Furingdon, Harteley Mauduit, Great Ward-le- 

 ham, Kingsley, Hedleigh, Bramshot, Trotton, Rogate, 

 Lysse, and Greatham. The soils of this district are almost 

 as various and diversified as the views and aspects. The 

 high part of the south-west consists of a vast hill of chalk, 

 rising three hundred feet above the village, and is divided 

 into a sheep-down, the high wood and a long hanging wood, 

 called The Hanger. The covert of this eminence is 

 altogether beech, the most loVely of all forest trees, whether 



