OF SELBORNE 221 



" aut ubi concava pulsu 



Saxa sonant, vocisque ollensa resultat imago." 



This ■wild and fanciful assertion will hardly be admitted 

 by the philosophers of these days ; especially as they all 

 now seem agreed that insects are not furnished with any 

 organs of hearing at all. But if it should be urged, that 

 though they cannot hear yet perhaps they may feel the 

 repercussion of sounds, I grant it is possible they may.. 

 Yet that these impressions are distasteful or hurtful, 1 

 deny, because bees, in good summers, thrive well in my 

 outlet, where the echoes are very strong : for this village 

 is another Anathoth, a place of responses or echoes. 

 Besides, it does not appear from experiment that bees, 

 are in any way capable of being affected by sounds : for 

 I have often tried my own with a large speaking-trumpet 

 lield close to their hives, and with such an exertion of 

 voice as would have hailed a ship at the distance of a 

 mile, and still these insects pursued their various em- 

 ployments undisturbed, and without showing the least, 

 sensibility or resentment. 



Some time since its discovery this echo is become 

 totally silent, though the object, or hop-kiln remains : 

 nor is there any mystery in this defect, for the field 

 between is planted as an hop-garden, and the voice of 

 the speaker is totally absorbed and lost among the poles 

 and entangled foliage of the hops. And when the poles 

 are removed in autumn the disappointment is the same ; 

 because a tall quick-set hedge, nurtured up for the pur- 

 pose of shelter to the hop ground, entirely interrupts the 

 impulse and repercussion of the voice : so that till those 

 obstructions are removed no more of its garrulity can be 

 expected. 



Should any gentleman of fortune think an echo in his- 

 park or outlet a pleasing incident, he might build one at 

 little or no expense. For whenever he had occasion for 



