1831.] 



Domestic and Foreign. 



565 



ble little book, descriptive of the seasons 

 presenting successively, in their poe- 

 tic and picturesque features, the objects 

 and appearances of nature most remark- 

 able in the garden, the fields, and the 

 waters. The characteristics of what are 

 usually called Seasons were obviously 

 susceptible of greater sub-divisions, and 

 Mr. H. has found ample materials for 

 discriminating every month. These ma- 

 terials are represented as the results of 

 personal observation, and they bear the 

 impress of truth and nature, in that 

 peculiarity and novelty of detail, 

 which never fails to accompany original 

 researches. The reader, besides, will 

 find a table of the migrations of birds 

 lists of garden-plants as they flower in 

 each month a botanical calendar of the 

 most beautiful and interesting plants 

 catalogues of insects notices of rural 

 occupations, and of angling in all 

 which respects it is hignly useful as a 

 book of reference. 



In August, fairy rings in the grass are 

 most conspicuous, of which Mr. Howitt 

 gives by far the most plausible account 

 we have any where seen more than 

 plausible, indeed, for it is built upon 

 incontestable facts, and such as seem 

 adequate to explain the effects. Fungi 

 and insects always abound in them ; but 

 the insects are a consequence of the 

 fungi, and not a cause of the circle, for 

 where there are fungi there will be in- 

 sects to devour them. The commence- 

 ment of these circles, too, favour the 

 fungi theory. That commencement is, 

 indisputably, nothing but a small mush- 

 room bed, made by the dung of cattle 

 lying undisturbed, where first deposited, 

 till it becomes incorporated with the 

 soil. Where this occurs a tuft of rank 

 grass springs, and in the centre a crop 

 of fungi appears and perishes. This is 

 the nucleus of the fairy ring. The next 

 year the tuft is found to have left a 

 green spot, of perhaps a foot and a half 

 diameter, which has already parted in 

 the centre. This expansion goes on 

 from year to year the area of the circle 

 is occupied by common grass, and suc- 

 cessive crops of fungi give a vivid 

 greenness to the ring which bounds it. 

 That only a few tufts are converted into 

 fairy rings may be owing to their not 

 being sufficiently enriched to become 

 mushroom beds ; but that all fairy rings 

 have this origin, will be found to admit 

 of little doubt. This, though true, is 

 nevertheless an humiliating expose 7 of 

 the charmed fairy-rings ; but 



Do not all charms fly 

 At the mere touch of cold philosophy ? 



As a naturalist, and given to prowling, 

 Mr. H. exclaims, and not without rea- 

 son, against the shutting up of foot- 

 paths upon estates in the country. The 



exclusive spirit of country gentlemen 

 would gladly keep the world to the high 

 roads. They look with jealousy upon 

 any one who crosses a field. Trespass 

 formerly meant mischief, an actual in- 

 jury, by breaking, destruction ; but now 

 to be seen in an enclosure is enough to 

 constitute a crime a violation of the 

 statutes. The country squires have 

 had influence to get such an appearance 

 denounced as a crime, and as a body are 

 armed with authority to carry their own 

 paltry wishes into execution. The un- 

 lucky botanist cannot now venture, in 

 the county, out of the lanes with any 

 safety. 



Achievements of the Knights of Malta, 

 by Alexander Sutherland, Esq., Author of 

 Tales of a Pilgrim, 2 vols ; forming the 62d 

 and 63d of Constable's Miscellany. Vertot 

 and Boisgelin have both written histo- 

 ries of the Knights of Malta. Vertot 

 brought the story down to the beginning 

 of the eighteenth century, and Boisge- 

 lin is confined to the period in which 

 the order occupied Malta, beginning, 

 that is, with 1530, and terminating with 

 their expulsion by the French in 1797 

 so that neither work has the whole story. 

 Mr. Sutherland has traced the whole, 

 from their origin as Knights Hospi- 

 tallers of St. John in the eleventh cen- 

 tury, glancing at each of their seventy 

 grand masters through their successive 

 migrations, from Palestine, Rhodes, and 

 Malta, to their present insignificance at 

 Paris. 



On their extrusion from Malta by the 

 French, they were taken under the pro- 

 tection of Paul of Russia, who assumed 

 the style -and title of Grand Master. 

 Alexander chose to call himself the Pro- 

 tector of the order, and under his aus- 

 pices the Pope, in 1805, named Tom- 

 masi, an Italian knight, to the important 

 dignity, and he, we believe, still sur- 

 vives, and is in full possession of his 

 honours. The formalities of the order 

 are still maintained with some splendour 

 at Paris. Its members are still also nu- 

 merous, and many are of distinction, 

 especially among the French knights; 

 but their revenues are gone, and with 

 them of course all their power and in- 

 fluence. It just serves to gratify per- 

 sonal vanity. Three or four years ago 

 an attempt was made to get up a loan 

 at the Stock Exchange, to enable the 

 knights to recover Rhodes,' but the 

 speculation failed, like that of his High- 

 ness, the Cacique of Poyah. Mr. S.'s 

 history will require no supplement ; and 

 may be safely recommended as a com- 

 petent account of the career of the once 

 potent White-Cross Knights. 



A corresponding sketch of the Red- 

 Cross Knights, or Templars, will be a 

 desirable accompaniment. Mr. Suther- 



