Dear Sir,

¹In the first place I am to acknowledge your favour of Decem^r: 23: which I had no proper leisure nor opportunity of answering before the time at which you proposed to leave Flintshire. I am also to express my thanks for your friendly letter of last week from London in which you press me to give you a meeting in town. If nothing was wanting but inclination I should with pleasure have set out before now: & I am now become a very bad traveller: however I will endeavour to give you a meeting if possible.

As to the manner how swifts procure materials for their nests I am much at a loss: indeed I rather suspect, & with good reason, that they do not (themselves) procure any at all. For after much & careful observation at the time of breeding I never could see one swift carrying in any thing necessary for building. But as the housesparrow & swift use exactly the same materials, that is to say grasses from an hay-rick, & hen’s feathers; I am ready to suspect that the latter take up with the old nests of the former; & perhaps sometimes take away their new nests: for I often see swifts at their first coming squabbling with sparrows at the eaves of the church: & the cock-sparrows up in arms, & much disturbed at the intrusion of these migrants. Now the swallow & martin; which are known to procure their own materials, are seen building every day: but how the swift should convey long grasses, & large feathers from year to year without being ever discovered so to do by the curious observer, is to me very strange.

Hedge-hogs abound in my garden & fields. The manner in which they eat the root of the plantain in my grass-walks is very curious. With their upper mandible (which is much longer than their lower) they bore under the plant, & so eat the root off upwards, leaving the tuft of leaves untouched. In this respect they are serviceable, as they destroy a very troublesome weed: but they deface the walks in some measure by digging little round holes. It appears by the dung that they drop on the turf, that beetles are no inconsiderable part of their food.

In June last I procured a litter of four or five young hedgehogs, which appeared to be be five or six days old. They, I find, like puppies, are born blind; & could not see when they came to my hands. No doubt their spines are soft & flexible at the time of their birth, or else the poor dam would have but a bad time of it at the critical minute of parturition: but it is plain that they soon harden; for these little pigs had such stiff prickles on their backs & sides as would easily have fetched blood had they not been handled with caution. Their spines are quite white at this age; & they have little hanging ears, which I don’t remember to have seen in the old ones. They can in part at this age draw their skin down over their faces: but are not able to contract themselves into a ball, as they do for the sake of defence when full grown. The reason, I suppose, is, because the muscles are not then arrived at their full tone & firmness.

I have discovered an anecdote with respect to the field-fare (turdus pilaris) which I think is curious & particular enough: This bird, tho’ it sits on trees in the day time, & procures the greatest part of it’s food from white-thorn hedges; yea moreover builds on very high trees, as may be seen by the Fauna Suecica: yet it always appears with us to roost on the ground. They are seem to come in flocks just before it is dark, & to settle, & nestle among the heath on our forests: & besides the larkers in dragging their nets by night frequently catch them in wheat-stubbles: & the bat-fowlers, who catch many red-wings in the hedges, never entangle any of this species. Why these birds in the matter of roosting should differ from all their congeners; & from themselves also with respect to their proceedings by day, is a fact that I am by no means able to account for.

²You are, I understand, embarked in the great & extensive work of an universal zoology. It will be very seldom, I fear, that I shall be able to d you any assistance. I have some what to inform you of concerning the moose-deer: but in general foreign animals fall seldom in my way: my little intelligence is confined to the narrow sphere of my own observation.

As a naturalist I may say

------- ego apis Matinæ ³

More modoque ⁴

Grata carpentis thyma per laborem⁵

Plurimum, cirea nemus avidique ⁶

Tiburis ripas, operosa parvus⁷

---- fingo.⁸

With my respects to Mr: Barrington, & thanks for his two letters

I conclude your obliged, & Humble servant

Gil: White

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Editorial notes

1. The core text section is written in the hand of an amenuensis, likely John (Jack) White, Gilbert White's nephew and son of Gilbert Whites Brother John White.
2. The remainder of this letter and salute are in Gilbert White's hand
3. translation: I am the morning bee
4. Translation: more usually
5. Translation: The carpenter's time is welcome through his labor.
6. Most of all, I craved the cherry trees
7. translation: the banks of the small, busy river
8. translation:... I imagine