June 17. 1854.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



569 



second correspondent writes to say, " If you can 

 procure the Circle of the Seasons, by Dr. Forster, 

 published in 1830, you will there find very copious 

 extracts from the books in question." Before we 

 go any farther I would ask, is Dr. Forster the 

 author of this book ? The copy I have met with 

 in a public library is anonymous, and is thus en- 

 titled : The Circle of the Seasons, and Perpetual 

 Key to the Calendar and Almanac : London, 

 Thomas Hookham, 1828, pp. 432. 12mo. It is a 

 valuable book, and forms a complete Catholic 

 Floral Directory. Though the Anthologia and the 

 Florilegium are lavishly quoted, no references are 

 given save the bare names. 



It is easy to see why Mr. Weale, the "compiler" 

 of the Catholic Florist, declined giving the in- 

 formation requested. The quotations in question 

 are all second-hand from the Circle of the Seasons. 

 The very preface of the Florist is not original ; 

 the most valuable part of it (commencing at p. 1 1 .) 

 I have discovered to be a verbatim reprint from 

 The Truthteller, or, rather, from Hone's Every- 

 Day Booh, vol. i. pp. 103. 303., where some ex- 

 tracts are given from the contributions to this 

 periodical from a correspondent with the signature 

 Crito. These quotations in Hone first drew my 

 attention to The Truthteller, and I advertised for it, 

 but without success. It was edited, I believe, by 

 Thomas Andrews. I have met with the second 

 series of this periodical, published in London in 

 1825, and I should be glad to get the whole 

 of it.* 



[* The Truthteller was discontinued at the end of 

 vol. i. The first number was published Sept. 25, 

 1824, and the last on Sept. 17, 1825. The publisher 

 and editor, W. A. Andrews, closes his labours with the 

 following remarks : " Having given The Truthteller a 

 year's trial, we feel ourselves called upon, as a matter 

 of justice to our family, to discontinue it as a news- 

 paper. The negligence of too many of our subscribers, 

 in not discharging their engagements to us, and the in- 

 difference of others of the Catholic body, to support the 

 vindicator of their civil and religious principles, leave 

 us no alternative but that of dropping it as a news- 

 paper, or carrying it on at a loss." Only two of 

 Crito's papers on Botany were given in The Truthteller, 

 viz. in No. 15., p. 115., and No. 16., p. 123. He pro- 

 bably continued them in The Catholic Friend, also 

 published by W. A. Andrews. 



The following extract from a letter signed F„ and 

 dated Jan. 4, 1825, given in The Truthteller, vol. i. 

 No. 16. p. 126., recommends the publication, among 

 other works, of a " Catholic Calendar. There 

 should also be a Catholic Calendar, something like 

 The Perennial Calendar, but more portable, and fuller 

 of religious information, in which, under each saint, 

 his or her particular virtues, intelligence, good works, 

 or martyrdom, should be succinctly set forth, so as to 

 form a sort of calendar of human triumphs, such as is 

 recommended by Mr. Counsellor Basil Montagu in 

 his Essays." In a note the writer adds, " This I be- 



In Forster's Perennial Calendar, London, 1824, 

 the Anthologia is quoted at pp. 101. 108. 173.211. 

 265. 295. : one of these passages is requoted in 

 Hone, vol. i. p. 383. I may here remark that 

 this work of Hone's is furnished with a Floral 

 Directory. 



I feel rather piqued, both on my own account 

 and for the honour of " N". & Q.," at being baffled 

 by two English books, and I am somewhat sur- 

 prised that thirty years should have elapsed 

 without any inquiry having been made respecting 

 the remarkable quotations adduced by Dr. Forster. 

 The Queries I now propose are : Who was the com- 

 piler of the Circle of the Seasons ? Are the Antho- 

 logia and the Florilegium quoted in any works 

 previous to Forster's time ? Eirionnach. 



P. S. — Can I get a copy of the Catholic Friend, 

 which is referred to in the preface of the Catholic 

 Florist as a scarce and valuable work ; and also 

 a copy of the Catholic Instructor : London, 1844 ? 



March, 1854. 



Thanks to Mr. Pinkerton, I am enabled to 

 turn my surmise into certainty, and have the 

 pleasure of clearing up a literary hoax, which has, 

 it seems, passed without challenge till my note of 

 interrogation appeared in these pages. The Antho- 

 logia and the Florilegium are purely imaginary 

 titles for certain pieces in prose and verse, the pro- 

 duction of Dr. Forster, and have no existence save 

 in the Circle of the Seasons. 



In the Autobiography of the eccentric Doctor — 

 which is entitled Recueil de ma Vie, mes Ouvrages 

 et mes Pensees : Opuscule Philosophique, par 

 Thomas Ignace Marie Forster : Bruxelles, 1836 — 

 at p. 55. he enumerates the Anthologia and Flori- 

 legium among his " Pieces Fugitives," and ends the 

 list in the following words : 



" Encore je me confesse d'avoir ecrit toutes ces 

 essais detaches dans le Perennial Calendar, auxquels 

 j'ai attache quelques signatures, ou plus proprement des 

 lettres, comme A. B. S. It. etc." 



In the solitude of his garden at Hartwell he con- 

 ceived the idea of making a Floral Directory, which 

 he eventually carried out, and published under 

 the title of the Circle of the Seasons. See p. 21. 



Mr. Pinkerton has most kindly lent me a rare 

 and privately-printed book of Forster's, entitled 

 Harmonia Musarum, containing Nuga Cantahri- 

 genses, Florilegium Sanctce Aspirationis, and Antho- 

 logia Borealis et Australis, chiefly from a College 

 Album, edited by Alumnus Cantabrigensis (N.B. 

 Not published) : 1843, pp. 144, 8vo. 



The preface is signed T. F., and is dated "Bruges, 

 Sept. 15, 1 843." In it he says : 



" The harmony of the Muses has been divided into 

 three parts — the first being the Nugee Cantab. The 



lieve will soon be undertaken." This letter seems to 

 have been written by Dr. Forster. — Ed.] 



