SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES, BY SIR WM. JARDINE, BART. THE value of "White's Natural History of Selborne" will be best estimated by the number of editions it has passed through, by the extent of the annotations written upon it (many of them by persons of considerable eminence in science), and by the demand which still continues for the work. In 1829, when Mr. Constable had proceeded so far with his "Miscellany," I was requested to read over and add some notes explanatory of various passages in "Selborne," which he then proposed to form one of the volumes of his collection. To this I agreed, and that edition is the only one with which I have had any connection whatever. At the disarrangement of Mr. Constable's affairs, the “Miscellany " fell into other hands; and editions, in 1832 and 1836, were re-published under my name, with woodcuts and illustrations, of which I knew nothing. Subsequently, various other editions have been published, some of them copying my notes, others annotating upon them, while one or two contained much original information, and were illustrated by beautiful woodcuts. Mr. Bohn having resolved to re-publish the work, under the charge of Mr. Jesse, in his Standard Library, requested me to make any additions I might think necessary to what I had written in 1829. The request was made too late for these to be inserted in the body of the work; but, as many of the notes of 1829 were not in accordance with our knowledge and the general state of Natural History in 1850, I considered the opportunity for correction to be favourable, and have, accordingly, made a few observations and alterations, which are now given in the form of an Appendix,—not that in these I consider the subject exhausted, but that in a work which is so likely to come extensively into the hands of persons of almost every class and age, it is of the utmost importance that all error should be avoided. JARDINE HALL, 14th Nov., 1850. W. J. THE BEECH-TREE.-Letter I., page 13, note. The loveliness of the beech is a matter of opinion; but, much as we admire the tree, and liberally plant it, we would adhere, so far as that epithet is concerned, to what we have before written. The beech is a tree selected by all for its expanse and shade (patula fagus). We quoted Gilpin in favour of the ash; of the beech he says" On the whole, however, the massy, full-grown, luxuriant beech is rather a displeasing tree;" and Loudon, though aware of its graceful hanging branches, writes of its "lumpish head." Nevertheless, we are not insensible to what belongs to it, and agree with Sir T. D. Lauder in the opinion that a noble beech is a magnificent object," and with Mr. Selby that it "combines magnificence with beauty." 66 GEOLOGY OF SELBORNE.-Letter I., page 16, note *. The first of the various editions of "Selborne" which took notice of the geology of the district, was that by E. T. Bennet, Esq., in 1836, who, we believe, examined the locality for the purpose. Mr. Jenyns afterwards used an extract of the note in question for his edition in 1843; and as it is essential to the proper understanding of the text, and the note we appended in 1829, Mr. Bennet will, we trust, not find fault with our now extending the information he has so well given :"The parish of Selborne is situate on the lower part of the chalk formation, and embraces within it the upper members of the weald. In crossing it from east to west, each strata is visited in the order of super-position. They are four in number; comprising the Chalk, the Upper Green Sand, the Gualt, and the Lower Green Sand." It is upon the chalk, so favourable to the growth of beech woods, that the "Hanger" is placed; but the "Freestone," upon which the " Shakey" oak wood grows, is a part of the green sand, which is here in the form of rock, which "usually rises slowly in a lengthened and widely-spread flat until it terminates suddenly by an abrupt or cliff-like fall, constituting a terrace or escarpment." This is quite different from the rock alluded to in the former note, which usually here and in many parts of Scotland has the name of Freestone also applied to it. It is the presence of iron which forms the colouring matter of the Red Sandstone or Freestone, and of the Red Till, that is obnoxious to the larch; and the decay has been observed, also, though not at so early an age, in trees planted on the older or Silurian rocks, where iron, or the traces of it, was present. THE ELM-TREE.-Letter II., pages 16, 17, notes † and *. The elms commonly prevalent in Great Britain are now considered as only two; the one alluded to in the text and note, U. montana (Bauhinus), and U. campestris (Linnæus), the one most commonly met with in Scotland, and producing wood of considerable value; the other, frequent everywhere in the south of England, forming the common hedge-row timber and brushwood, often a part of the fence itself, and also appearing as the often magnificent and picturesque trees of our avenues and public parks. The other elms, under various names, may generally be traced as varieties to the stock of one or other of theseU. suberosa of authors being one of the more distinct, and, though given a separate place by Mr. Selby, is given so with doubt. The largest recorded Wych elm trees, are, in England, that in Sir Walter Bagot's Park in Staffordshire, mentioned in previous note; in Scotland, the "Trysting-tree," in Teviotdale, Roxburghshire, measured in the beginning of the century, at four feet from the ground, thirty feet in circumference; and in Ireland, a tree at Bawn, about 120 years of age, was 9 feet 8 inches in diameter. FOSSIL SHELLS.-Letter III., page 20. By some oversight in the printing of the edition in "Constable's Miscellany," the last sentence in the first paragraph of this letter has been omitted, and the same occurs in Mr. Jenyn's edition, and in almost every other, no doubt because there was no engraving contiguous. The sentence is-"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." This is of little import, but it is as well to have the edition complete. In the large original quarto copy of 1789, a whole plate is devoted to this fossil. In the various late editions, it has been annotated upon, and first, again, by Mr. Bennet, who states that it is the Ostrea carinata (Lamark), a fossil limited and apparently peculiar to the upper green sand (not the chalk), the stratum on which the village of Selborne is built. (See note, Bennet's Edit., page 12.) METEOROLOGY.-Letter V., page 24. In Mr. Bennet's edition, a continuation of the Meteorological Register is added for six years-(the fourth edition, 1789, gives it only up to January, 1787)—the two last years of which (1792 and 1793) the amount of rain was very large, far exceeding any of the former quantities; in the first it amounted to 44 93 inches, and in the second to no less than 48.56, exceeding all the previous years, except 1782-3, when it was 50-25 inches. The intelligent gentleman referred to in the note to the above page, was Thomas Barker, of an ancient and respectable family in the county of Rutland, and brother-in-law to our author. BOG TIMBER.-Letter VI., page 27, note *. From Mr. Bennet's note upon the timber of the Selborne bogs, it would appear that in 1835 the supply was not exhausted, several trees having been at that time dug up. In the south of Scotland the oak is the most abundant tree found in the bogs, is very general, in some places extremely abundant, and the brushwood of our present copses frequently accompany it. In the north of Scotland, again, pine-wood is commonly met with and used as we before mentioned, as well for making lights to "burn the water," or to spear salmon by torchlight, for which it answers admirably. |