The Natural History of Selborne

• 1793: May 22, 1793 – Neph. Ben. White, & wife came.
• 1792: May 22, 1792 – The Fly-catcher comes to my vines, where probably it was bred, or had a nest last year. it is the latest summer bird, & appears almost to a day! “Amusive bird, say where your snug retreat?”! The white apples are out of bloom, being forward, the Dearling, a late keeping apple, but just in bloom. So the earlier the fruit ripens the sooner the tree blossoms. The Dearling bears only once in two years, but then an enormous burthen. It has produced 10, & 13 bushels of fruit at a crop. The bloom this year is prodigious! [late note:] the crop moderate, & the fruit small.
• 1790: May 22, 1790 – Monk’s rhubarb in full bloom.
• 1789: May 22, 1789 – Hirundines keep out in the rain: when the rain is considerable.  Swifts skim with their wings inclining, to shoot off the wet.
• 1788: May 22, 1788 – Saint-foin & fiery lilly begin to blow.
• 1787: May 22, 1787 – Medlars blow.  Mushrooms in a bed under a shed in Brother Thomas’s garden.
• 1785: May 22, 1785 – Field-crickets cry round the forest.
• 1784: May 22, 1784 – Columbine & monkshoods blow.  The sycomores, & maples in bloom scent the air with a honeyed smell.  Lily of the valley blows.  Lapwings on the down.
• 1782: May 22, 1782 – Men pole their hops, which are backward, but strong.  Some hail.
• 1779: May 22, 1779 – Nightingales have eggs.  They build a very inartificial nest with dead leaves, & dry stalks.  Their eggs are of a dull olive colour.  A boy took my nest with five eggs: but the cock continues to sing: so probably they will build again.
• 1773: May 22, 1773 – May 12: First swifts were seen, many together.  On May 19 at night was a vast rain with thunder & lightening: frequent showers before & since; so that the ground is very moist; & the corn & grass grow.  The floods are much out at Staines.  In the beginning of the month there were frosts, hail, & some snow.  Apricots continue to fall off peaches, & nectarines decent crop.  Apples blow well: pears seem hurt by the frosts.  Vine-shoots very backward; they were pinched by the frost.
• 1772: May 22, 1772 – Tortoise eats.  Fly-catcher appears, and builds.
• 1769: May 22, 1769 – Flesh-flies buz about the room. Melon-fruit begins to blow.

Notes:
Gilbert is quoting himself in the 1792 entry, from his poem The Naturalist’s Summer Evening Walk. Excerpt:

Then be the time to steal adown the vale,
And listen to the vagrant cuckoo’s tale;
To hear the clamorous curlew call his mate,
Or the soft quail his tender pain relate;
To see the swallow sweep the dark’ning plain
Belated, to support her infant train;
To mark the swift in rapid giddy ring
Dash round the steeple, unsubdu’d of wing:
Amusive birds!- say where your hid retreat
When the frost rages and the tempests beat;
Whence your return, by such nice instinct led
When spring, soft season, lifts her bloomy head?
Such baffled searches mock man’s prying pride,
The God of Nature is your secret guide!