Page:White - The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne.djvu/220

 soft and pliant, is very proper for the dusting of beds, curtains, carpets, hangings, etc. If these besoms were known to the brushmakers in town, it is probable they might come much in use for the purpose above-mentioned.* (*A besom of this sort is to be seen in Sir Ashton Lever's Museum.)

I am, etc.

Letter XXVII To The Honourable Daines Barrington

Selborne, December 12, 1775.

Dear Sir,

We had in this village more than twenty years ago an idiot-boy, whom I well remember, who, from a child, showed a strong propensity to bees; they were his food, his amusement, his sole object. And as people of this cast have seldom more than one point in view, so this lad exerted all his few faculties on this one pursuit. In the winter he dosed away his time, within his father's house, by the fireside, in a kind of torpid state, seldom departing from the chimney-corner; but in the summer he was all alert, and in quest of his game in the fields, and on sunny banks. Honeybees, humble- bees, and wasps, were his prey wherever he found them: he had no apprehensions from their stings, but would seize