2 THE NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 
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country beyond Alton and Farnham, form a noble and exten- 
sive outline. 
At the foot of this hill, one stage or step from the uplands, 
lies the village, which consists of ote single straggling street, 
three-quarters of a mile in length, in a sheltered vale, and 
running parallel with the Hanger. The houses are divided 
from the hill by a vein of stiff clay (good wheat-land), yet 
stand on a rock of white stone, little in appearance removed 
from chalk; but seems so far from being calcareous, that it 
endures extreme heat. Yet that the freestone still preserves 
somewhat that is analogous to chalk, is plain from the beeches 
which descend as low as those rocks extend, and no farther, 
and thrive as well on them, where the ground is steep, as on 
the chalks. ee 
The cart-way of the village divides, in a remarkable man- 
ner, two very "incongruous soils. ‘To the southwest is a rank 
clay, that requires the labor of years to render it mellow; 
while the gardens to the northeast, and small enclosures 
behind, consist of a warm, forward, crumbling mould, called 
black malm, which seems highly saturated with vegetable and 
animal manure ; and these may perhaps have been the original 
site of the town; while the woods and coverts might extend 
down to the opposite bank. 
At each end of the village, which runs from southeast to 
northwest, arises a. small rivulet: that at the northwest end 
frequently fails ; but the other is a fine perennial spring, little 
influenced by drought or wet seasons, called Well-head.! 
This breaks out of some high grounds joining to Nore Hill, 
a noble chalk promontory, remarkable for sending forth two 
1 This spring produced, September roth, 1781, after a severe hot sum- 
mer, and a preceding dry spring and winter, nine gallons of water in a 
minute, which is 540 in an hour, and 12,960, or 216 hogsheads, in twenty- 
four hours, or one natural day. At this time many of the wells failed, 
and all the ponds in the vale were dry. — W. 
