The Natural History of Selborne

• 1792: August 24, 1792 – John Berriman’s hops at the end of the Foredown very fine.
• 1791: August 24, 1791 – Gathered kidney-beans, scarlet.  Cut 80 cucumbers.
• 1789: August 24, 1789 – A fern-owl sits about on my field walks.
• 1788: August 24, 1788 – A stag, which has haunted Hartley wood the summer thro’ was roused by a man that was mowing oats just at the back of village.  Several young persons purused him with guns, & happening to rouse him again on the side of Nore hill, shot at him; & then collecting some hounds from Emshot, & Hawkley, they drove him to a large wood in the parish of Westmeon, where they lost him, & called-off their dogs.
• 1787: August 24, 1787 – Nep. Ben White left us.
• 1784: August 24, 1784 – White turnip-radishes mild, & good, & large.
• 1783: August 24, 1783 – Paid for four wasps-nests.  On this day the Duke of Kingstone India man, outward bound, Captain Nutt, was burnt at sea off the island of Ceylon.  Mr Charles Etty, one of the mates, was wonderfully saved, tho’ he could not swim an inch, by clinging to a yard-arm that had been flung over board; by which he was kept above water about an hour & 1/4, ’till he was taken up by a boat, & carryed, naked as he was, aboard the Vansittart India-man Captain Agnew, who treated him with great humanity, & landed him in a few days at Madras.  This ship, cargoe, & more than 70 lives were lost by the carelessness of a mate in drawing rum, who permitted the candle to catch the spirits; so that the whole vessel was in flames at once, without any chance of extinguishing them.  She burnt about four hours, & then blew up: so that nothing was saved except what cloaths some had on their backs.  She had soldiers aboard, & some passengers, & a few women, & children.  Potatoes very fine, tho’ the ground has scarce ever been moistened since they were planted.  They were also very good last year, tho’ the summer was mostly wet & cold.  Fern-owl glances, & darts about in my garden in pursuit of phalaenae, with inconceivable swiftness.
• 1782: August 24, 1782 – Newton great pond runs over.
• 1781: August 24, 1781 – Tho’ white butterflies abound, & lay many eggs on the cabbages; yet thro’ over-heat, & want of moisture, they do not hatch and turn to palmers; but dry & shrivel to nothing.  One swift still frequents the eaves of the church; & moreover has, I discover, two young nearly fledged, which show their white chins at the mouth of the crevice.  This incident of so late a brood of swifts is an exception to the whole of my observations ever since I have bestowed any attention on that species of hirundines!
• 1775: August 24, 1775 – Wasps abound, & destroy the fruit.  Clouds about.  Worms copulate.
• 1773: August 24, 1773 – Peaches & nectarines redden.  China-asters begin to blow.
• 1772: August 24, 1772 – Trench more celeri.  Sowed spinage.  Hops suffer from the wind.  Planted small cabbages.
• 1768: August 24, 1768 – Much wheat bound up in the afternoon.  Goldfinch sings.  Oats are cutting.

• 1792: August 23, 1792 – Some wheat bound; & some gleaning.  I have not seen one wasp.
• 1790: August 23, 1790 – John Hale made a large wheat-rick on a staddle.
• 1789: August 23, 1789 – Boy brought me the rudiments of a hornet’s nest, with some maggots in it.  Every ant-hill is in a strange hurry & confusion; & all the winged ants, agitated by some violent impulse, are leaving their homes; &, bent on emigration, swarm by myriads in the air, to the great emoulment of the hirundines, which fare luxuriously.  Those that escape the swallows return no more to their nests, but looking out for new retreats, lay a foundation for future colonies.  All the females at these times are pregnant.  The males that escape being eaten, wander away & die.
• 1788: August 23, 1788 – Some mushrooms spring on my hotbeds.  Mr Sam Barker, from a measurement taken, adjudged Wolmer pond to contain 66 acres, & an half, exclusive of the arm at the E. end: the pond keeper at Frinsham avers that his pond measures 80 acres.  Zizania aquatica, Linn: called by the English setlers wild Rice; & by the Canadian French– Folle Avoin.  In consequence of an application to a Gentleman at Quebec, my Bro. Thomas White received a cask of the seed of this plant, part of which was sent down to Selborne.  His desire was to have received it in the ear, as it then would have been much more likely to have retain’d it’s vegetative faculty: but this part of his request was not attended to; for the seed arrived stript even of it’s husk.  It has a pleasant taste, & makes a pudding equal to rice, or millet.  This kind of corn, growing naturally in the water, is of great service to the wild natives of the south west part of N. America: for as Carver in his travels says, they have no farther care & trouble with it than only to tye it up in bunches when it first comes into ear, & when ripe to gather it into their boats; every person or family knowing their own by some distinction in the bandage.  Carver observes, that it would be very advantageous to new settlers in that country, as it furnishes at once a store of corn the first year; & by that means removes the distress & difficulty incident to new colonies till their first crop begins to ripen.  Linnaeus has given this plant the name of Zizania: but what could induce the celebrated Botanist to degrade this very beneficial grain with the title of that pernicious weed which the enemy in the parable served among the good-corn while men slept, does not so easily appear.  (Matt. 13 chapter)
• 1787: August 23, 1787 – Much wheat carried.  The Ewel, & Pound-field thrown open.  Cool autumnal feel.  Nightingales seen in Honey-lane: they were the last that I observed.  Cut at one time 191 fine cucumbers.
• 1786: August 23, 1786 – We kept a young fern-owl for several days in a cage, & fed it with bread, & milk.  It was moping, & mute by day; but, being a night bird, began to be alert as soon as it was dusk. *Sent it back to the brakes among which it was first found.
• 1785: August 23, 1785 – Martin’s & swallows congregate by hundreds on the church & tower.  These birds never cluster in this manner, but on sunny days.  They are chiefly the first broods, rejected by their dams, who are busyed with a second family.
• 1782: August 23, 1782 – The pond on Selborne-down is brimfull, & has run over.
• 1781: August 23, 1781 – Caught 8 hornets with a twig tipped with bird-lime.  No wasps in my garden, nor at the grocer’s, or butcher’s shop.  Five or six hornets will carry off a whole nectarine in the space of a day.
• 1779: August 23, 1779 – Sun, clouds, thunder shower, red even: Great blackness.
• 1778: August 23, 1778 – Flies torment the horses in a most unusual manner.
• 1775: August 23, 1775 – Sixteen wasps nests destroyed.
• 1774: August 23, 1774 – Missel-thrushes congregate & are very wild.  Thistle-down floats.  Thompson, who makes this appearance a circumstance attendant on his summer evening,
  “Wide o’er the thistly lawn, as swells the breeze,/A whitening shower of vegetable down/Amusive floats…”
  seems to have misapplyed it as to the season: since thistles which do not blow ’til the summer-solstice, cannot shed their down ’til autumn.
• 1772: August 23, 1772 – Sun.  Showers with wind.  Vast showers.  Young stoparolas come forth.
• 1771: August 23, 1771 – Young swallows & martins come out every day.  Still weather.  Wheat-harvest becomes pretty general.

• 1792: August 22, 1792 – The seeds of the lime begins to fall.  Some wheat under hedges begins to grow.
• 1790: August 22, 1790 – There is a covey of partidges in the North field, seventeen in number.
• 1789: August 22, 1789 – Mr Ben White came to us from Newton.
• 1788: August 22, 1788 – The swallows are very busy skimming & hovering over a fallow that has been penned; probably the dung of the sheep attracts many insects, particularly scarabs.
• 1786: August 22, 1786 – Mushrooms are brought me from Hartley.  I do not meet with one wasp.  Young fern-owls are found, a second brood.
• 1782: August 22, 1782 – Goody Hammond goes off from the garden to glean wheat.  The quantity of rain from Jan. 1st 1782 to Aug 23rd is 40 inc. 52 h.
• 1780: August 22, 1780 – Timothy is sluggish, & scarce moves.
• 1772: August 22, 1772 – Planted-out endive, & trenched some celeri.  Ground strangely hard, & bound: will require much rain to soften it.  Invigorated by this burning season such legions of Chrysomelae oleraceae saltatoriae (vulg: called turnep-flies) swarm in the fields that they destroy every turnep as fast as it springs: they abound also in gardens, & devour not only the tender plants, but the tough outer leaves of cabbages.  When disturbed on the cabbages they leap in such multitueds as to make a pattering noise on the leaves like a shower of rain. They seem to relish the leaves of the horse-radish.
• 1771: August 22, 1771 – Bank-martins bring out their second brood.  Swifts.  No swifts seen after this day.
• 1768: August 22, 1768 – Young gold-finches come forth.  Wheat in very bad condition.

Notes: The ‘turnep-fly’ is now known as Phyllotreta, the flea beetle. No less a personage than Sir Humphrey Davy suggested a mix of lime, soot and urine to deter the turnip-fly– a method still recommended on the small scale (minus the urine).

• 1792: August 21, 1792 – My large American Juniper, probably Juniperus Virginiana, has produced this summer a few few small blossoms of a strong flavour like that of the juniper-berries: but I could not distinguish whether the flowers were male, or female; so consequently could not determine the sex of the tree, which is dioecious.  The order is dioecia monadelphia.
• 1791: August 21, 1791 – Many creatures are endowed with a ready discernment to see what will turn to their own advantage & emolument; & will often discover more sagacity than could be expected.  Thus Benham’s poultry watch for waggons loaded with wheat, & running after them pick up a number of grains which are shaken from the sheaves by the agitation of the carriages.  Thus when my brother used to take down his gun to shoot sparrows, his cats would run out before him to be ready to pick up the birds as they fell.
• 1786: August 21, 1786 – Kidney-beans bear by heaps; & cucumbers abound.  Coveys of partidges are said to be very large.  Butchers meat keeps badly.
• 1782: August 21, 1782 – Hay, of cow-grass, is housing.  Wheat-sheaves are bound in single bands.
• 1781: August 21, 1781 – No wasps; but several hornets, which devour the nectarines.  The wasps are probably kept down by the numbers of breeders that the boys destroyed for me in the spring.
• 1779: August 21, 1779 – Sun, brisk air, sweet even.  Many people have finished wheat-harvest.
• 1774: August 21, 1774 – Sun, sweet day, full moon.
• 1773: August 21, 1773 – Sweet harvest day.  Wheat housed all this afternoon.  With respect to the singing of birds Aug. is much the most silent month: for many species begin to reassume their notes in September.  The goldfinch sings now every day.
• 1772: August 21, 1772 – Young swallows come forth.  Orleans plums begin to change color.  Dark clouds in the S.E.
• 1770: August 21, 1770 – Sowed spinnage, & lettuces to stand the winter.
• 1769: August 21, 1769 – Vast showers about.  People here housed all day. Vine-leaves begin to turn purple.

• 1792: August 20, 1792 – Thomas, in mowing the walks, finds that the grass begins to grow weak, & to yield before the scythe. This is an indication of the decline of heat. Yucca filamentosa, silk grass, glows with a fine large white flower. It thrives abroad in a warm aspect. Habitat in Virginia.
• 1791:  – John White called in his way from Funtington to Salisbury.  The whole country is one rich prospect of harvest scenery!!  Fern-owl glances along over my hedges.
• 1790: August 20, 1790 – On this day farmer Spencer built a large wheat-rick near his house the contents of which all came from a field near West-croft barn at the full distance of a mile.  Five waggons were going all day.
• 1788: August 20, 1788 – Nep. Ben returned to London.
• 1787: August 20, 1787 – Nep. T.H. Wh. came from Fyfield.
• 1785: August 20, 1785 – Men house, & rick wheat in cold, damp condition.
• 1784: August 20, 1784 – On this day my Niece Brown was delivered of her 4th child, a girl, which makes the 41st of my nephews & nieces now living.  Boiled up some apricots with sugar to preserve them.
• 1776: August 20, 1776 – Timothy, the tortoise weighs just six pounds three quarters & two ounces & an half: so is encreased in weight, since Aug. 1775, just one ounce & an half.
• 1775: August 20, 1775 – Hops are uneven some grown large, some just blown.
• 1774: August 20, 1774 – Vast dew, sweet day.  Aster chinensis.
• 1773: August 20, 1773 – Wasps begin to appear.  No swifts since last week.
• 1772: August 20, 1772 – Barometer falls very fast.  Vast rock-like clouds abound.  The drought lasted 10 weeks & four days.

• 1792:  – My shrub, Rhus cotinus, known to the nursery-men by the title of Cocygria, makes this summer a peculiar shew, being covered all over with it’s “bracteae paniculae filiformes,” which give it a feathery plume-like appearance, very amusing to those that have not seen it before.  On the extremities of these panicles appear about midsumer a minute white bloom which with us brings no seeds to perfection.  Towards the end of August the panicles turn red & decay.
• 1791: August 19, 1791 – The young men left us, & went to Funtington.  A second crop of beans, long pods, come in. Sweet day, golden eve, red horizon.  Some what of an autumnal feel.
• 1790:  – Mrs Barker & her daughters Mary & Elizabeth, & Mrs Chandler, & her infant daughter and nursemaid went all in a cart to see the great oak in the Holt, which is deemed by Mr Marsham of Stratton to be the biggest on this Island.  Bro. Thos. & Dr Chandler rode on horse-back.  They all dined under the shade of this tree.  At 7 feet from the ground it measures in circumference 34 feet: has in old times lost several boughs, & is tending towards decay.  Mr Marsham computes that at 14 feet length this oak contains 1000 feet of timber.
• 1789: August 19, 1789 – Timothy Turner’s brew-house on fire: but much help coming in & pulling off the thatch, the fire was extinguished, without any farther damage than the loss of the roofing.  The flames burst thro’ the thatch in many places.  We are this day annoyed in the brown parlor by multitudes of flying ants, which come forth, as usual, from under the stairs.
• 1788: August 19, 1788 – Farmer Lasham has much wheat out, which was not ripe when other people cut, & housed.
• 1787: August 19, 1787 – Showers about: Rain-bows.  Vivid Aurora.
• 1786: August 19, 1786 – Mushrooms come in Mr White’s avenue at Newton.
• 1785: August 19, 1785 – Sam & Charles leave us.  Gleaners get much wheat.
• 1781: August 19, 1781 – Mr Pink’s turnips are infested with black caterpillars; he turned 80 ducks into the field, hoping they would have destroyed them; but they did not seem much to relish this sort of food.  I have known whole broods of ducks destroyed by their eating too freely of hairy caterpillars.
• 1775: August 19, 1775 – Wheat-harvest in general seems to be finished, except where there is turnep wheat.  Fifteen wasps nests have been destroyed round the village; yet those plunderers devour the plum, & eat holes in the peaches & nectarines before they are ripe; & will soon attack the grapes.  Grapes begin to turn colour: they are forward this year.  Harvest-weather was much finer at Ringmer than Selborne.  Some wheat a little grown at Newton.
• 1773: August 19, 1773 – Terrible storm all night, which made sad havock among the hops, & broke off boughs from the trees.
• 1772: August 19, 1772 – All the pastures are burnt up, & scarce any butter made.  Wheat in fine order, & heavy.
• 1771: August 19, 1771 – Swifts abound.  Swallows & martins bring out their second broods which are perchers.  Thunder: wind.
• 1770: August 19, 1770 – Ponds begin to fail.  Hops are perfectly free from lice.
• 1769: August 20, 1769 – Bulls begin to make their shrill autumnal note.
• 1768: August 19, 1768 – White wheat begins to grow.  Plums ripe.

• 1792: August 18, 1792 – Blackcaps eat the berries of the honey-suckles. Mrs J. White, after long & severe campaign carried on against the Blattae molendinariae, which have of late invaded my house, & of which she has destroyed many thousands, finds that at intervals a fresh detachment of old ones arrives; & particularly during the hot season: for the windows being left open in the evenings, the males come flying in at the casements from the neighbouring houses, which swarm with them. How the females, that seem to have no perfect wings that they can use, can contrive to get form house to house, does not so readily appear. These, like many insects, when they find their present abodes over-stocked, have powers of migrating to fresh quarters. Since the Blattae have been so much kept under, the Crickets have greatly encreased in number.
• 1791: August 18, 1791 – Timothy grazes.  John White came from Salisbury.  Cut 133 more cucumbers.  Michaelmas daisies begin to blow.  Farmer Spencer, & Farmer Knight make each a noble wheat-rick: the crop very good, & in fine order.
• 1789: August 18, 1789 – Many pease housed.  Harvest-scenes are now very beautiful!  Turnips thrive since the shower.
• 1785: August 18, 1785 – Colchicum, autumnal crocus, emerges, & blows.
• 1784: August 18, 1784 – Spinage very thick on the ground.  Men hoe turnips, stir their fallows, & cart chalk.
• 1783: August 18, 1783 – The Colchicum, or autumnal crocus blows.  On the evening of this day, at about a quarter after nine o’the clock, a luminous meteor of extraordinary bulk, & shape was seen traversing the sky from N.W. to S.E.  It was observed at Edinburg, & several other Ern. parts of this Island.  No accounts of it, that I have seen, have been published from any of the western counties.  It was also taken notice of at Ostend.  This meteor, I find since, was seen at Coventry, & Chester.  4 swifts at Guildford; 1 swift at Meroe; 1 swift at Dorking.
• 1782:  – Linnets congregate & therefore have probably done breeding.  Saw a Papilio Machaon in my garden: this is only the third of this species that ever I have seen in this district.  It was alert, & wild.  It is the only swallow-tailed fly in this island.
• 1781: August 18, 1781 – Some wasps at the butcher’s shop.
• 1775: August 18, 1775 – Grey.  Sweet afternoon.
• 1774: August 18, 1774 – Two swifts were seen again on this day at Fyfield: none afterwards.  Two last swifts seen at Blackburn in Lancashire.
• 1773: August 18, 1773 – Wheat lies in a bad way.  Much cut, little bound, & scarce any housed.
• 1772: August 18, 1772 – The swifts seem for some days to have taken their leave.  Apricots.  None seen after that time.
• 1771: August 18, 1771 – No dew, rain, rain, rain.  Swans flounce & dive.  Chilly & dark.
• 1769: August 18, 1769 – Martins congregate on the roofs of houses.
• 1768: August 18, 1768 – Martins continue to hatch new broods.  Flies begin to abound in the windows.

• 1791: August 17, 1791 – Holt White, & Harry Woods came from Fyfield.
• 1789: August 17, 1789 – Cool air.  Wheat gleaned.
• 1785: August 17, 1785 – Few mushrooms to be found.  Sowed second crop of white turnip-radishes.  Abram Loe came the second time
• 1784: August 17, 1784 – Farmer Spencer, & farmer Knight are forced to stop their reapers, because their wheat ripens so unevenly.
• 1782: August 17, 1782 – Cranberries, but not ripe.
• 1781: August 17, 1781 – The small pond in Newton great farm field, near the verge of the common, is full nearly of good clear water! while ponds in vales are empty.  One swift!  The crevice thro’ which the swift goes up under the eaves of the church is so narrow as not to admit a person’s hand.
• 1780: August 17, 1780 – Fell-wort blows on the hanger.
• 1779: August 17, 1779 – Much wheat housed.  Drank tea at the hermitage.
• 1777: August 17, 1777 – White butter-flies settle on wet mud in crowds.  *No swift seen after August 14: so punctual are they in their migrations, or retreat!  The latest swift I ever saw was only once on Aug. 21, but they often withdraw by the 10.
• 1775: August 17, 1775 – Rabbits make incomparably the finest turf, for they not only bite closer than larger quadrupeds; but they allow no bents to rise: hence warrens produce much the most delicate turf for gardens.  Sheep never touch the stalks of grasses.
• 1774: August 17, 1774 – Wheat harvest general.  Large sea-gulls.
• 1773: August 17, 1773 – Swifts seem to be gone; very early.  Vast clouds on the horizon.  Wheat bound.

• 1791: August 16, 1791 – Colchicums, or naked boys appear.
• 1790: August 16, 1790 – Cut 43 cucumbers.  Wheat is binding.  Blackstonia perfoliata, yellow centory, blossoms, on the right hand bank up the North field hill.  The Gentiana perfoliata Lannaei.  It is to be found in the marl-dell half way along the N. field lane on the left; on the dry bank of a narrow field between the N. field hill, & the Fore down; & on the banks of the Fore down.
• 1787: August 16, 1787 – Mr & Mrs R left us.  Farmer Parsons harvests wheat.  Gleaners carry home large loads.
• 1786: August 16, 1786 – Colchicum blows.
  Say what retards, amidst the summer’s blaze/ Th’autumnal bulb, ’till pale, declining days?
• 1785: August 16, 1785 – My goose-berries are still very fine, but are much eaten by the dogs.
• 1783: August 16, 1783 – Farmer Knight of Norton finishes wheat-harvest.  Farmer Lassam of Priory Do. Farmer Hewet of Temple finishes Do.
• 1781: August 16, 1781 – Sowed a crop of winter-spinage, & pressed the ground close with the garden-roller.  The ground turned-up very dry, & harsh.
• 1780: August 16, 1780 – Lord Cornwallis gained a signal victory over General Gates in South Carolina, near Camden.
• 1775: August 16, 1775 – Generation seems to be pretty well over among cimices lineares.  Minute young abroad.
• 1773: August 16, 1773 – Wind covers the walks with leaves, & blows down the annuals.
• 1772: August 16, 1772 – Several birds begin to resume their spring notes, such as the wren, redbreast
• 1771: August 16, 1771 – Rain, driving rain, dry.  Four swifts still.
• 1770: August 16, 1770 – Nuthatch chirps much.

• 1791: August 15, 1791 – Lightening every moment in the W. & the N.W.  Cut 114 cucumbers.  Harvesters complain of the violent heat.
• 1790: August 15, 1790 – The last gathering of wood-strawberries.  Bull-finches & red-breasts eat the berries of the honey-suckles.
• 1786: August 15, 1786 – Planted cuttings of dames violets, & slips of pinks under hand-glasses: planted also more sweet williams, & polyanths.
• 1785: August 15, 1785 – Sam & Charles came from Fyfield.  The harvest seasons are very beautiful!  Farmer Spencer makes a hay-rick.  Wheat very fine and heavy.
• 1784: August 15, 1784 – Women bring cran-berries, but they are not ripe.
• 1783: August 15, 1783 – Took this morning by bird-lime on the tips of hazel-twigs several hundred wasps that were devouring the goose-berries.  A little attention this way makes vast riddance, & havock among these plundering invaders.
• 1782: August 15, 1782 – Potatoes for the first time.  Thierteen swifts over the Lythe: seven at Harteley.  Do they not at this season move from village to village?  The hay is all badly spoiled; & men begin to fear that the wheat will grow as it stands.  That which is lodged is in much danger.  A fledged young swift was found alive on the ground in the church-yard:  it was full of hippoboscae.  We gave it two or three flies, & tossed it up on the church.  Gathered one handful of kidney beans.  The ground is quite glutted with rain.
• 1777: August 15, 1777 – Male & female ants come forth & migrate in vast troops: every ant-hill is in strange commotion & hurry.  The pair of martins which began to build on June 21 brought-out their brood this day in part:  (the rest remain in the nest, Aug 17)
• 1776: August 15, 1776 – Sun, & clouds, sultry, showers about.
• 1775: August 15, 1775 – Dark & still.  Some little farmers have finished wheat-harvest.
• 1774: August 15, 1774 – Showers & sun.  Meonstoke a sweet district.
• 1773: August 15, 1773 – Hops visible improved by the thunder.  If the swifts are gone, as they seem to be, they can never breed but once in a summer; since the swallows & martins in general are but now laying their eggs for a second brood.  As young swifts never perch or congregate on buildings I can never be sure exctly whenthey come forth.  The retreat of the swifts so early is a wonderful fact : & yet it is more strange still, that they withdraw full as soon in the summer at Gibraltar!  Swifts sat hard Hune 9th.
• 1772: August 15, 1772 – On this day at 10 in the morning some sober & intelligent people felt at Noar hill what they thought to be a slight shock of an earthquake.  A mother and her son perceived the house to tremble at the same time while one was aboe stairs & the other below; & each called to the other to know what was the matter.   A young man, in the field near, heard a strange rumbling.  Notwithstanding the long severe drought the little pond on the common contains a considerable share of water in spite of evaporation, & the multitude of cattle that drink at it.  Have ponds on such high situations a power, unkown to us, of recruiting from the air? Evaporation is probably less on the tops of hills; but cattle use a vast proportion of the whole stock of water in a small pond.
• 1768: August 15, 1768 – Young broods of goldfinches appear.