NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 15/ 



summer evening walk, and was calling after them, stumbled upon a 

 very curious one in a spot where it might least be expected. At first 

 he was much surprised, and could not be persuaded but that he was 

 mocked by some boy ; but repeating his trials in several languages, 

 and finding his respondent to be a very adroit polyglot, he then 

 discerned the deception. 



This echo in an evening, before rural noises cease, would repeat ten 

 syllables most articulately and distinctly, especially if quick dactyls 

 were chosen. The last syllables of 



" Tityre, tu patulse recubans . . ." 



were as audibly and intelligibly returned as the first ; and there is no 

 doubt, could trial have been made, but that at midnight, when the air 

 is very elastic, and a dead stillness prevails, one or two syllables more 

 might have been obtained ; but the distance rendered so late an 

 experiment very inconvenient. 



Quick dactyls, we observed, succeeded best ; for when we came to try 

 its powers in slow, heavy, embarrassed spondees of the same number of 

 syllables, 



' ' Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens . . . " 



we could perceive a return but of four or five. 



All echoes have some one place to which they are returned stronger 

 and more distinct than to any other; and that is always the place 

 that lies at right angles with the object of repercussion, and is not too 

 near, nor too far off. Buildings, or naked rocks, re-echo much more 

 articulately than hanging woods or vales ; because in the latter the 

 voice is as it were entangled, and embarrassed in the covert, and 

 weakened in the rebound. 



The true object of this echo, as we found by various experiments, 

 is the stone-built, tiled hop-kiln in G ally-lane, which measures in front 

 forty feet, and from the ground to the eaves twelve feet. The true 

 centrum phonicum, or just distance, is one particular spot in the king's 

 field, in the path to Nbre-hill, on the very brink of the steep balk above 

 the hollow cart-way. In this case there is no choice of distance ; but 

 the path, by mere contingency, happens to be the lucky, the identical 

 spot, because the ground rises or falls so immediately, if the speaker 

 either retires or advances, that his mouth would at once be above or 

 below the object. 



We measured this polysyllabical echo with great exactness, and found 

 the distance to fall very short of Dr. Plot's rule for distinct articulation ; 

 for the Doctor, in his history of Oxfordshire, allows a hundred and 

 twenty feet for the return of each syllable distinctly ; hence this echo, 

 which gives ten distinct syllables, ought to measure four hundred 

 yards, or one hundred and twenty feet to each syllable ; whereas our 

 distance is only two hundred and fifty -eight yards, or near seventy-five 

 feet, to each syllable. Thus our measure falls short of the Doctor's, as 

 five to eight; but then it must be acknowledged that this candid 

 philosopher was convinced afterwards, that some latitude must be 

 admitted of in the distance of echoes according to time and place. 



