A RAMBLE IN EPPING FOREST. 
PPING FOREST in April has no connection with the 
Epping forest of the Bank Holiday and the school 
treat. Its grassy glades are unsullied by the paper 
bags of the cheap-tripper, the merry-go-rounds are 
motionless. We feel almost like intruders as we thread its 
winding paths under the budding hornbeams and hawthorns. 
It is an effort, perhaps, to go so far for one short afternoon ; 
but it is well worth it — w'orth the hideous railway journey 
from Liverpool Street, through sordid streets and evil-smelling 
factories — to breathe that pure, delicious air, to tread on 
emerald daisy-sprinkled grass, and to have one’s ears glad- 
dened with song of lark and nightingale. There had been a 
hailstorm that morning, and the hailstones still lay in white 
heaps in the shadow of the bushes ; but the keen wind which 
stirs the blackthorn to bloom is tempered here, and we need 
not hurry our footsteps. Indeed we must walk leisurely, or we 
should miss the countless flowers scattered at our feet — the 
little white chickweed, the wild strawberry, the delicate wood- 
sorrel and wood-anemone, the polished celandine, and the 
dog-violet. The cuckoo calls ceaselessly, and the wood-pigeon 
mourns gently over our heads. Insect life is scarce, only an 
occasional bumble bee and a few small pendent caterpillars are 
to be seen. We long to stay another hour, and reluctantly 
leave the wood ; but when the train carries us once more 
through bricks and mortar, we can close our eyes and still 
wander in imagination down leafy paths, and hear the cuckoo 
above the traffic’s roar. 
April 'I'-j, 1901. ■ M. C. B. 
REVIEWS AND EXCHANGES. 
The Life and Letters of Gilbert White of Selhorne. By his great-grand-nephew, 
Rashleigh Holt-W hite. 2 vols. John Murray. Price 32s. 
The steady sale of the many lovingly-executed editions of “ The Natural 
History of Selhorne ” evinces a cult of the eighteenth-century naturalist that has 
certainly long demanded an authoritative biography. His senior living repre- 
sentative, one of our Vice-Presidents, has now given to the world what is at the 
least an invaluable approximation to a definitive biography. Illustrated with ten 
excellent portraits of members of the family — every Selbornian knows that there is 
no portrait of Gilbert White himself in existence — and with many other interest- 
ing views and relics, with a pedigree, and, above all, with a long series of letters 
from and to the naturalist never before published, Mr. Holt-White’s work 
certainly enables us to form a far more accurate and complete mental portrait of 
his illustrious ancestor than was ever before possible. Every Selbornian will, 
therefore, be anxious to read it, and we can assure them that there is in it a most 
fascinating treat in store for them. At the same time, just as we have sometimes 
urged that modern interest in White of Selhorne demands a complete edition of 
all his extant works, so we cannot but regret that the modesty of the editor of 
these “ Letters” has made him stop short of a full biography. Every one does 
