Nothing has been faid as yet refpefting the tenure or holding
of the Selborne eftates. Temple and Norton are manor farms and
freehold; as is the manor of Chapel near Oakhanger, and alfo the
eftate at Oakhanger-houfe and Black-moor. The Priory and Grange
are leafehold under Magdalen college, for twenty-one years, renewable
every feven: all theftnaller eftates in and round the village
are copyhold of inheritance under the college, except the little
remains of the Gurdon-manor, which had been of old leafed out
upon lives, but have been freed of late by their prefent lord, as
fall: as thofe lives have dropped. '
Selborne feems to have derived much of it’s profperity from the
near neighbourhood of the Priory. For monafteries were of con-
fiderable advantage to places where they had their fites- and
eftates, by caufing great refort, by procuring markets and fairs*
by freeing them from the cruel oppreflion of foreft-laws, and by
letting their lands at eafy rates. But, as foon as the convent was
fupprefled, the town which it had occafioned began to decline*
and the market was lefs frequented; the rough and fequeftered
fituation gave a check to refort, and the negledted: roads tendered
it lefs and lefs acceflible ''
That it had been a confiderable place for fize formerly appears
from the Iargenefs of the church, which much exceeds thofe of
the neighbouring villages; by the ancient extent erf the burying
ground', which, from human bones occafionally dug up, is. found
to have been much encroached upon; by giving a name to the
hundred; by the old foundations and ornamented, ftones, and
tracery of windows that have been difeovered on the north-call
fide of the village; and by the many veftiges of difufed fifh-
ponds ftiil to be feen around it.. For ponds and ftews were multiplied
in the times of popery, that the affluent might enjoy fome
| ........................variety
variety a t : their tables on fall days ;■ therefore the.'more t h e y ^ J - / * -—
abounded the better probably was the cond.it.io.n. .o.f. .th e l i f e r s
bitants;
More particulars refpeBing the> old family tortoise,
omitted in the Natural Hiftory. .
Because we call this creature an abjedf reptile, we are too apt
to undervalue his abilities, and depreciate his powers of inftindt.
Y.et he is, as Mr. Pope fays of his lord,
_ _ _ “ Much too wife to walk into a well:”
and has fo much difeernment as not to fall down an liaha; but
to flop and withdraw from the brink with the readieft precaution.
Though he loves warm weather be avoids the hot fun; becaufe
his thick Ihell, when once heated, would, as the poet fays of folid
armour— “ feald with fafety.” He therefore fpends the more
fultry hours under the umbrella of a large cabbage-leaf, or amidft
the waving forefts of an afparagus-bed.
But as he avoids heat in the fummer, fo, in the decline of the
year, he improves the faint autumnal beams, by getting within the
refledfion of a fruit-wall: and, though he never has read that
planes inclining to the horizon receive a greater (hare of
J ii 2, warmth,
i l
Will