Nothing, indeed, that concerned his beloved village
was to him ungrateful. It is, without doubt, this careful love of his
for the things that were his own, at his door, common things if you
will, common only in England of my heart, that has endeared him to
innumerable readers, many of whom have never set foot upon our shores
and would only not be utter strangers here if they did, because of him.
Such at least is the only explanation I can give of his immortality,
his constant appeal to all sorts and conditions of men.
Day by day as I wandered through the lanes and the woods that he had
loved with so wonderful and unconscious an affection, in a repose that
we have lost and a quietness we can only envy him, I tried to discover,
I tried to make clear to myself, what it really is that on a dull
evening at home, in a sleepless night in London, or in the long winter
evenings anywhere, draws me back again and again to that curious book.
But even there in Selborne the secret was hidden from me. In truth one
might as well inquire of the birds why they delight us, or of the
flowers why we love them so; for in some way I cannot understand
Gilbert White was gently at one with these and spoke of them sweetly
like a lover and a friend having a gift from God by which he makes us
partakers of his pleasure.
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