218 NATURAL BISTOBY OF SELBORNS. 



of a 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 evening 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 . . . 



" quse nee retieere loquenti, 



Nee prior ipsa loqui didicit resonabilis echo." 



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 : — 



" Quse bene quom videas, rationem reddere possis 

 Tute tibi atque aliis, quo pacto per loca sola 

 Saxa paries 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 coUes collibus ipsis 

 Verba repulsantes iterabant dicta referre. 

 Hsec loca capripedes Satyros, Nymphasque teuere 

 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 late sentiscere, quom Pan 

 Pinea semiferi capitis velamina quassans, 

 TJnco ssepe labro calamos percurrit bianteis, 

 Fistula silverstrem ne cesset fuudere musam."* 



— Lucretius, Lib. iv. 1. 576. 



* 



*' "Whence may'st thou solve, ingenuous ! to the world 

 The rise of echoes, formed in desert scenes, 

 Mid rocks, and mountains, mocking every sound, 

 When late we wander through their solemn glooms, 



