NATURAL HISTORY 
LETTER XXVIIL 
TO THE SAME. 
DEAR SIR, Selborne, Jan. 2, 1776. 
It is the hardefl thing in the world to lliake off fuperftitious pre- 
judices : they are fucked in as it were with our mother's milk; 
and, growing up with us at a time when they take the faflefl hold 
and make the moft lafting impreffions, become fo interwoven into 
our very conflitutions, that the flrongefl good fenfe is required to 
difengage ourfelves from them. No wonder therefore that the 
lovv-er people retain them their whole lives through, fmce their 
minds are not invigorated by a liberal education, and therefore 
not enabled to make any efforts adequate to the occafion. 
Such a preamble feems to be neceffary before we enter on the 
fuperftitions of this diftridt, lell we fhould be fufpeded of exag- 
geration in a recital of pradlices too grofs for this enlightened 
age. 
But the people of Tring, in Hertfordjlnrcy would do well to re- 
member, that no longer ago than the year 1751, and within twenty 
miles of the capital, they feized on two fuperannuated wretches, 
crazed with age, and overwhelmed with infirmities, on a fufpicion 
ofwitchcraft ; and, by trying experiments, drowned them in ahorfe- 
pond. 
In a farm-yard near the middle of this village flands, at this day, 
a row of pollard-aflies, which, by the feams and long cicatrices 
down their fides, manifeftly fhew that, in former times, they have 
been cleft afunder. Thefe trees, when young and flexible, were 
fevered and held open by wedges, while ruptured children, ftrip- 
ped 
