A Selborne Year: The ""Naturalist's Journal"" for 1784

Dadswell (The Perennial Naturalist, A Study of Gilbert White) here takes us on a delightful excursion into the English countryside of the 18th century through White's 1784 journal. The entries are brief and, like diaries of modern gardeners, often focus on the weather, which was wretched that year. A cold, wet spring was followed by a damaging hailstorm and floods in early June; August was chill and rainy; and the heavy snows of early December lasted well into January of the next year. White kept a careful record of his plantings; he used a hot-bed and cold frame to start cucumbers and melons. He mentions birds and other wildlife, crop harvests and a succession of flowering plants as well as visitors and local events. Nichola Armstrong's 50 full-color illustrations are charming and add in transporting us to the village of Selbourne, which was White's entire world. (September 4)