In the centre of the village, and near the church, is a square piece of forestry of Selborne, while here we have now only some of the more remarkable trees noted.

The wych elm, the first tree alluded to has been a subject always annotated upon, this species being far less commonly grown in England than in Scotland. In the former country it is supplanted almost entirely by the small-leaved or English elm, as it is commonly named, a tree which reaches a large size, and of which there are magnificent specimens in our public parks or promenades; but it produces a wood of inferior quality, and as it is now planted in the hedgerows of the small enclosures of the south, it must very materially injure the crops by its spreading roots, which shoot up and would soon cover the ground. The tree mentioned in this letter is the ulmus campestris, Linn. it yields a timber valuable for various agricultural purposes, and is esteemed for making naves for 'cart-wheels; it is of a more spreading character than the others, and often attains to a large size. The Selborne elm, though of less size than some others, the measurements of which have been recorded, must have been a large and very

fine tree.

The oak trees mentioned in the latter part of this letter gained their peculiar character by being very thickly planted, and as it might be called "neglected." According to our notion of timber management thinning is indispensable, but to obtain trees of the kind alluded to, the thicker they can be grown, the better. Beech trees with a clean stem of from fifty to seventy feet are very valuable for keel pieces, but the practice of growing wood of any kind in this way has scarcely been practised. Larch planted for hop-poles, or sweet chesnut grown for the same purpose, are treated in this manner; and what in commerce is called Norway poles, are I believe the first thinnings of the Baltic forests, which

*

In

ground surrounded by houses, and vulgarly called "The Plestor." the midst of this spot stood, in old times, a vast oak, with a short squat body, and huge horizontal arms extending almost to the extremity of the area. This venerable tree, surrounded with stone steps, and seats above them, was the delight of old and young, and a place of much resort in summer evenings; where the former sat in grave debate, while the latter frolicked and danced before them. Long might it have stood, had not the amazing tempest in 1703 overturned it at once, to the infinite regret of the inhabitants, and the vicar, who bestowed several pounds in setting it in its place again: but all his care could not avail; the tree sprouted for a time, then withered and died. This oak I mention to show to what a bulk planted oaks also may arrive: and planted this tree must certainly have been, as will appear from what will be said farther concerning this area, when we enter on the antiquities of Selborne.

On the Blackmoor estate there is a small wood called Losel's, of a few acres, that was lately furnished with a set of oaks of a peculiar growth and great value; they were tall and taper like firs, but standing near together had very small heads, only a little brush without any large limbs. About twenty years ago the bridge at the Toy, near Hampton Court, being much decayed, some trees were wanted for the repairs that were fifty feet long without bough, and would measure twelve inches diameter at the little end. Twenty such trees did a purveyor find in this little wood, with this advantage, that many of them answered the description at sixty feet. These trees were sold for twenty pounds apiece.

In the centre of this grove there stood an oak, which, though shapely and tall on the whole, bulged out into a large excrescence about the middle of the stem. On this a pair of ravens had fixed their residence for such a series of years, that the oak was distinguished by the title of the Raven Tree. Many were the attempts of the neighbouring youths to get at this eyry: the difficulty whetted their inclinations, and each was ambitious of surmounting the arduous task. But, when they arrived at the swelling, it jutted out so in their way, and was so far beyond their grasp, that the most daring lads were awed, and acknowledged the undertaking to be too hazardous: so the ravens built on, nest upon nest, in perfect security, till the fatal day arrived in which the wood was to be levelled. It was in the month of February, when these birds usually sit. The saw was applied to the butt,-the wedges were inserted into the opening, the woods echoed to the heavy blow of the beetle or malle or mallet, the tree nodded to its fall; but still the dam sat on. At last, when it gave way, the bird was flung from her nest; and, though her parental affection deserved a better fate, was whipped down by the twigs, which brought her dead to the ground.+

have been spindled up by the more vigorous trees to great length and uniformity of thickness, and which in all probability would have been ultimately killed. * Vide the plate in the antiquities.

We have always found the raven, whether nesting upon a rock or upon tree, most unapproachable after she had been disturbed or alarmed.

LETTER III.

TO THE SAME.

THE fossil-shells of this district, and sorts of stone, such as have fallen within my observation, must not be passed over in silence. And first I must mention, as a great curiosity, a specimen that was ploughed up in the chalky fields, near the side of the Down, and given to me for the singularity of its appearance, which, to an incurious eye, seems like a petrified fish of about four inches long, the cardo passing for an head and mouth. It is in reality a bivalve of the Linnæan Genus of Mytilus

and the species of Crista Galli; called by Lister, Rastellum; by Rumphius, Ostreum plicatum minus; by D'Argenville, Auris Porci, s. Crista Galli; and by those who make collections, Cock's Comb. Though I applied to several such in London, I never could meet with an entire specimen; nor could I ever find in books any engraving from a perfect one. In the superb museum at Leicester House permission was given me to examine for this article; and, though I was disappointed as to the fossil, I was highly gratified with the sight of several of the shells themselves in high preservation. This bivalve is only known to inhabit the Indian ocean, where it fixes itself to a zoophyte, known by the name Gorgonia. The curious foldings of the suture the one into the other, the alternate flutings or grooves, and the curved form of my specimen being much easier expressed by the pencil than by words, I have caused it to be drawn and engraved.*

*Our author was mistaken in referring this fossil to the Mytilus crista galli of Linnæus. Mr. Bennet, who has explained the subject in a note to his edition

Cornua Ammonis are very common about this village. As we were cutting an inclining path up the Hanger, the labourers found them frequently on that steep, just under the soil, in the chalk, and of a considerable size. In the lane above Wall-head, in the way to Emshot, they abound in the bank in a darkish sort of marl; and are usually very small and soft: but in Clay's Pond, a little farther on, at the end of the pit, where the soil is dug out for manure, I have occasionally observed them of large dimensions, perhaps fourteen or sixteen inches in diameter. But as these did not consist of firm stone, but were formed of a kind of terra lapidosa, or hardened clay, as soon as they were exposed to the rains and frost they mouldered away. These seemed as if they were a very recent production. In the chalk-pit, at the north-west end of the Hanger, large nautili are sometimes observed. In the very thickest strata of our freestone, and at considerable depths, well-diggers often find large scallops or pectines, having both shells deeply striated, and ridged and furrowed alternately. They are highly impregnated with, if not wholly composed of, the stone of the quarry.

LETTER IV.

TO THE SAME.

As in a former letter the freestone of this place has been only mentioned incidentally, I shall here become more particular.

This stone is in great request for hearth-stones, and the beds of ovens and in lining of lime-kilns it turns to good account; for the workmen use sandy loam instead of mortar; the sand of which fluxes,* and runs by the intense heat, and so cases over the whole face of the kiln with a strong vitrified coat-like glass, that it is well preserved from injuries of weather, and endures thirty or forty years. When chiseled smooth, it makes elegant fronts for houses, equal in colour and grain to the Bath stone; and superior in one respect, that, when seasoned, it does not scale. Decent chimney-pieces are worked from it of much closer and finer grain than Portland; and rooms are floored with it; but it proves rather too soft for this purpose. It is a freestone cutting in all directions; yet has something of a grain parallel with the horizon, and therefore should not be surbedded, but laid in the same position that it grows in the quarry. On the ground abroad this

of Selborne, refers it to the Ostrea carinata of Lamarck, a species peculiar to the green-sand formation, upon which the village of Selborne is built, and which from its white colour would be easily confounded with the chalk, especially at a time when geology was much less attended to than at present.

There may probably be also in the chalk itself that is burnt for lime a proportion of sand: for few chalks are so pure as to have none.

To surbed stone is to set it edgewise, contrary to the posture it had in the quarry, says Dr Plot, "Oxfordshire," p. 77. But surbedding does not succeed in our dry walls; neither do we use it so in ovens, though he says it is best for Teynton stone.

*

firestone will not succeed for pavements, because, probably some degree of saltness prevailing within it, the rain tears the slabs to pieces. Though this stone is too hard to be acted on by vinegar, yet both the white part, and even the blue rag, ferments strongly in mineral acids. Though the white stone will not bear wet, yet in every quarry at intervals there are thin strata of blue rag, which resist rain and frost; and are excellent for pitching of stables, paths and courts, and for building of dry walls against banks, a valuable species of fencing much in use in this village, and for mending of roads. This rag is rugged and stubborn, and will not hew to a smooth face, but is very durable; yet, as these strata are shallow and lie deep, large quantities cannot be procured but at considerable expense. Among the blue rags turn up some blocks tinged with a stain of yellow or rust colour, which seem to be nearly as lasting as the blue; and every now and then balls of a friable substance, like rust of iron, called rust balls.

In Wolmer Forest I see but one sort of stone, called by the workmen sand, or forest-stone. This is generally of the colour of rusty iron, and might probably be worked as iron ore; is very hard and heavy, and of a firm, compact texture, and composed of a small roundish crystalline grit, cemented together by a brown, terrene, ferruginous matter; will not cut without difficulty, nor easily strike fire with steel. Being often found in broad flat pieces, it makes good pavement for paths about houses, never becoming slippery in frost or rain; is excellent for dry walls, and is sometimes used in buildings. In many parts of that waste it lies scattered on the surface of the ground; but is dug on Weaver's Down, a vast hill on the eastern verge of that forest, where the pits are shallow and the stratum thin. This stone is imperishable. From a notion of rendering their work the more elegant, and giving it a finish, masons chip this stone into small fragments about the size of the head of a large nail, and then stick the pieces into the wet mortar along the joints of their freestone walls; this embellishment carries an odd appearance, and has occasioned strangers sometimes to ask us pleasantly, "whether we fastened our walls together with tenpenny nails."

* "Firestone is full of salts, and has no sulphur: must be close-grained, and have no interstices. Nothing supports fire like salts; saltstone perishes exposed to wet and frost."-PLOT's Staff. p. 152.