NATURAL HISTORY OP SELBORNE. 153 



LETTEK XXXVL* 



TO THE SAME. 



SELBORNE, Nov. 22nd, 1777. 



DEAR Sin, You cannot but remember that the 26th and 27th of last 

 March were very hot days, so sultry that everybody complained and 

 were restless under those sensations to which they had not been 

 reconciled by gradual approaches. 



This sudden summer-like heat was attended by many summer coin- 

 cidences ; for on those two days the thermometer rose to sixty -six in 

 the shade ; many species of insects revived and came forth ; some bees 

 swarmed in this neighbourhood; the old tortoise, near Lewes, in 

 Sussex, awakened and came forth out of its dormitory ; and, what is 

 most to my present purpose, many house-swallows appeared and were 

 very alert in many places, and particularly at Chobham, in Surrey. 



But as that short warm period was succeeded as well as preceded by 

 harsh severe weather, with frequent frosts and ice, and cutting winds, 

 the insects withdrew, the tortoise retired again into the ground, and 

 the swallows were seen no more until the 10th of April, when, the 

 rigour of the spring abating, a softer season began to prevail. 



Again ; it appears by my journals for many years past that house- 

 martins retire, to a bird, about the beginning of October ; so that a 

 person not very observant of much matters would conclude that they 

 had taken their last farewell ; but then it may be seen in my diaries 

 also that considerable flocks have discovered themselves again in the 

 first week of November, and often on the 4th day of that month only 

 for one day ; and that not as if they were in actual migration, but 

 playing about at their leisure and feeding calmly, as if no enterprise of 

 moment at all agitated their spirits. And this was the case in the 

 beginning of this very month ; for on the 4th of November, more than 

 twenty house-martins, which, in appearance, had all departed about the 7th 

 of October, were seen again for that one morning only sporting between 

 my fields and the Hanger, and feasting on insects which swarmed in 

 that sheltered district. The preceding day was wet and blustering, but 

 the 4th was dark, and mild, and soft, the wind at south-west, and the 

 thermometer at 58'4 ; a pitch not common at that season of the year. 

 Moreover, it may not be amiss to add in this place, that whenever the 

 thermometer is above 50, the bat comes flitting out in every autumnal 

 and winter-month. 



From all these circumstances laid together, it is obvious that torpid 

 insects, reptiles, and quadrupeds, are awakened from their profoundest 



* This letter was first published byBarrington in his "Miscellanies," in an essay 

 " On the Torpidity of the Swallow Tribe, when they Disappear," p. 225, and is 

 prefaced as follows : "I shall here subjoin a letter which I received from that 

 ingenious and observant naturalist, the Kev. Mr. White, of Selborne, in Hamp- 

 shire." It appears to have been printed as received. The opinions given in this 

 letter have been generated apparently by his correspondence with Barrington, 

 and those contained in the last paragraph especially, or in Letter LV. , cannot be 

 maintained. 



