290 CORRESPONDENCE OF GILBERT WHITE 



Northumberland.— I will not say i am glad you are older, but 

 i may say, i am a gainer, that you had lost the furor which 

 you had in 1756. I believe your people might smell the 

 powder from Bagshot ; for i think i have smelt the smoke of 

 I .on. Ion at Windsor; & Gunpowder is more pungent than 

 culinary smoke. 



My dear Sir, pray pardon me for saying you ought to love 

 your Spaniel as well as if you still was a sportsman. Dogs 

 deserve to be loved for their Virtue, more than their useful- 

 ness ; — You say your Firs have made surprising leading 

 shoots. I last Autumn removed some large Hornbeams & 

 Beeches viz. about a yard round, & they grow well ; one ot 

 the Beeches has shot 38 inches. I remain, with great esteem, 

 dear Sir, your obliged servant, R: MARSHAM. 



Nov. 1 st yesterday my Turkey laid her 15 th egg. so 113 

 this year. — I have measured an Oak this day (at 5 feet) which 

 i planted an Acorn in 1719, 8 feet & 6 inches round. I shall 

 be glad to know if the Wall-creeper lives near you. 



[Franked by " W. Fellowes," 3d November.] 



LETTER XV. 



WHITE TO MARSHAM. 



Selborne : Novem 1 3. 1792. 



Dear Sir, 

 An extract from the Natural History of Gibraltar by the late 

 Reverend John White. 



" In the first year of my residence at Gibraltar which was 

 1756, it appeared extraordinary to me to see birds of the 

 Swallow kind very frequent in the streets all the winter thro'. 

 Upon enquiry I was told that they were Bank Martins : & 

 having at that time been but little conversant in Nat. Hist., 

 they passed with me as such for some years without any far- 



