NATURALISTS' CALENDAR. Mean Temperature . . . 37 · 42.

February 15.

1826. Ember Week.

Ember weeks are those in which the Ember days fall. A variety of explanations have been given of the word Ember, but Nelson prefers Dr. Marechal's, "who derives it from the Saxon word importing, a circuit or course; so that these fasts being not occasional, but returning every year in certain courses, may properly be said to be Ember days, because fasts in course." The Ember days are the Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after the first Sunday in Lent, and after the 13th of December. It is enjoined by the xxxi. canon of the church, "that deacons and ministers be ordained, or made, but only on the Sundays immediately following these Ember feasts."*

1731. Their majesties king George II. and the queen, being desirous of seeing "the noble art of printing," a printing press and cases were put up at St. James's palace on the 15th of February, and the duke (of York) wrought at one of the cases, to compose for the press a little book of his own writing, called "The Laws of Dodge-Hare." The two youngest princes, likewise, composed their names, &c., under the direction of Mr. S. Palmer, a printer, and author of the "History of Printing," which preceded Mr. Ames's more able work.+

NATURALISTS' CALENDAR.

Mean Temperature ... 39 22.

February 16.

CHRONOLOGY.

A question was carried in the house of commons for building a bridge over the Thames, from Palace-yard to the Surrey side. During the debate, that river overflowed its banks by reason of a strong spring tide; the water was higher than ever known before, and rose above two feet in Westminster - hall, where the courts being sitting, the judges, &c. were obliged to be carried out. The water

Audley's Companion to the Almanac. + Gentleman's Magazine.

came into all the cellars and ground rooms near the river on both sides, and flowed through the streets of Wapping and Southwark, as its proper channel; a general inundation covered all the marshes and lowlands in Kent, Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, and Lincolnshire, and some thousands of cattle were destroyed, with several of their owners in endeavouring to save them. The tide being brought in by a strong wind at N.W. was the highest in Lincolnshire of any for 135 years past. Seventeen breaches were made, about sunrise, in the banks of the river between S alding and Wisbech, with several between Wisbech and Lynn, and irreparable damage done; some graziers having lost all their cattle. At Clay, in Norfolk, waters came over the great beach, almost demolished the town, and left nine feet of water in the marshes. At Gold Ongar, Essex, Mr. Cooper, and four of his servants, were drowned in endeavouring to save some sheep, the sea wall giving way of a sudden. The little isles of Candy and Foulness, on the coast of Essex, were quite under water; not a hoof was saved thereon, and the inhabitants were taken from the upper part of their houses into boats. The particular damages may be better conceived than related.*

NATURALISTS' CALENDAR. Mean Temperature ... 38 90.

February 17.
Sittings after Term.

On the day after the expiration of every term, the courts of law continue to sit at Westminster, and try causes; and some judges come into London at the same time, for the same purpose. These sittings are called the "sittings after term," and during these periods, suits, arising out of clashing claims of important interests, are usually decided by the verdicts of special juries, and other litigations are disposed of.

The origin and progress of every possible action, in a court of law, are succinctly portrayed by "the Tree of Common Law”—an engraving in vol. i. p. 234. It stands there for " ornament and use ;"-there are plenty of books to explain technical terms, and show the practice of the courts; any uninformed person,

Gentleman's Magazine

therefore, may easily obtain further information as to the modes; and any respectable attorney will advise an inquirer, who states all the particulars of his case, concerning the costs of attempting to sue or defend, and the chances of success. After proceeding so far, it will be requisite to pause, and then, as paramount to the legal advice, common sense should weigh consequences well, before giving "instructions to sue," or "defend," in

that wide and pathless maze Where law and custom, truth and fiction, Craft, justice, strife, and contradiction, With every blessing of confusion, Quirk, error, quibble, and delusion, Are all, if rightly understood, Like jarring ministers of state, 'Mid anger, jealousy, and hate, In friendly coalition joined, To harmonize and bless mankind.

To some

"whimsical miscellanies," subjoined at the place aforesaid, can be added or annexed, more or many others, of the same or the like kind. The realities of law may be relieved by the pleasures of imagination, and the heaviness of the present sittings" be enlivened by a reported case, in the words of the reporter, (Stevens's Lect.) premising, however, that he first publicly stated, with his head in his wig, and with a nosegay in his hand,

.66

"Law is-law,-law is law, and as, in such and so forth, and hereby, and aforesaid, provided always, nevertheless, notwithstanding. Law is like a country dance, people are led up and down in it till they are tired. Law is like a book of surgery, there are a great many terrible cases in it. It is also like physic, they that take least of it are best off. Law is like a homely gentlewoman, very well to follow. Law is also like a scolding wife, very bad when it follows us. Law is like a new fashion, people are bewitched to get into it; it is also like bad weather, most people are glad when they get out of it." The same learned authority observes, that the case before referred to, and hereafter immediately stated, came before him, that is to say,

Bullum v. Boatum.

Boatum v. Bullum. There were two farmers, farmer A and farmer B. Fariner A was seized or possessed of a bull; farmer B was seized or possessed of a ferry-boat. Now the owner of the ferry-boat, having made his boat Last to a post on shore, with a piece of

hay, twisted rope fashion, or as we say, vulgo vocato, a hay-band. After he had made his boat fast to a post on shore, as it was very natural for a hungry man to do, he went up town to dinner; farmer A's bull, as it was very natural for a hungry bull to do, came down town to look for a dinner; and the bull observing discovering, seeing, and spying out, some turnips in the bottom of the ferry-boat the bull scrambled into the ferry-boathe eat up the turnips, and to make an end of his meal, he fell to work upon the hay-band. The boat being eaten from its moorings, floated down the river, with the bull in it: it struck against a rockbeat a hole in the bottom of the boat, and tossed the bull overboard. Thereupon the owner of the bull brought his action against the boat, for running away with the bull, and the owner of the boat brought his action against the bull for running away with the boat.

At trial of these causes, Bullum v. Boatum, Boatum v. Bullum, the counsel for the bull began with saying,

jury,

My lord, and you, gentlemen of the

"We are counsel in this cause for the bull. We are indicted for running away with the boat. Now, my lord, we have heard of running horses, but never of running bulls before. Now, my lord, the bull could no more run away with the boat than a man in a coach may be said to run away with the horses; therefore, my lord, how can we punish what is not punishable? How can we eat what is not eatable? Or how can we drink what is not drinkable? Or, as the law says, how can we think on what is not thinkable? Therefore, my lord, as we are counsel in this cause for the bull, if the jury should bring the bull in guilty, the jury would be guilty of a bull."

The counsel for the boat affirmed, that the bull should be nonsuited, because the declaration did not specify of what colour he was; for thus wisely, and thus learnedly spoke the counsel: "My lord, if the bull was of no colour, he must be of some colour; and if he was not of any colour, of what colour could the bull be? I overruled this objection myself (says the reporter) by observing the bull was a white bull, and that white is no colour: besides, as I told my brethren, they should not trouble their heads to talk of colour in the law, for the law can colour any thing. The causes went to reference and by the

award, both bull and boat were acquitted, it being proved that the tide of the river carried them both away. According to the legal maxim, there cannot be a wrong without a remedy, I therefore advised a resh case to be laid before me, and was of pinion, that as the tide of the river carried both bull and boat away, both bull and poat had a right of action against the waterbailiff.

Upon this opinion an action was commenced and this point of law arose, how, whether, when, and whereby, or by whom, the facts could be proved on oath, as the boat was not compos mentis. The evidence point was settled by Boatum's attorney, who declared that for his client he would swear any thing.

At the trial, the water-bailiff's charter was read, from the original record in true law Latin, to support an averment in the declaration that the plaintiffs were carried away either by the tide of flood, or the tide of ebb. The water-bailiff's charter stated of him and of the river, whereof or wherein he thereby claimed jurisdiction, as follows:-Aquæ bailiffi est magistratus in choisi, sapor omnibus, fishibus, qui habuerunt finnos et scalos, claws, shells, et talos, qui swimmare in freshibus, vel saltibus, riveris, lakos, pondis, canalibus et well boats, sive oysteri, prawni, whitini, shrimpi, turbutus solus; that is, not turbots alone, but turbots and soals both together. Hereupon arose a nicety of law; for the law is as nice as a new-laid egg, and not to be understood by addle-headed people. Bullum and Boatum mentioned both ebb and flood, to avoid quibbling; but it being proved, that they were carried away neither by the tide of flood, nor by the tide of ebb, but exactly upon the top of high water, they were nonsuited; and thereupon, upon their paying all costs, they were allowed, by the court, to begin again, de novo.

NATURALISTS' CALENDAR.
Mean Temperature... 37. 82.

February 18. Revivification of Trees. Mr. Arthur Aikin, in his "Natural History of the Year," narrates the first vital function in trees on the conclusion of winter. This is the ascent of the sap after the frost is moderated, and the earth sufficiently thawed. The absorbent vessels composing the inner bark reach to the extremity of the fibres of the roots,

and thus, through the roots, imbibe water, which, mixing there with a quantity of saccharine matter, forms sap, and is fron thence abundantly distributed through the trunk and branches to every individual bud. The birch tree in spring, o being tapped, yields its sap, which is fermented into wine. The palm tree in the tropics of the same season yields its sap by the same method, which is made into palm wine, and the sap of the sugar maple in North America being boiled, yields the maple sugar.

"This great accession of nourishment (the sap) causes the bud to swell, to break through its covering, and to spread into blossoms, or lengthen into a shoot bearing leaves. This is the first process, and, properly speaking, is all that belongs to the springing or elongation of trees; and in many plants, that is, all those which are annual or deciduous, there is no other process; the plant absorbs juices from the earth, and in proportion to the quantity of these juices increases in size : it expands its blossoms, perfects its fruit, and when the ground is incapable by drought or frost of yielding any more moisture, or when the vessels of the plant are not able to draw it up, the plant perishes. But in trees, though the beginning and end of the first process is exactly similar to what takes places in vegetables, yet there is a second process, which at the same time that it adds to their bulk, enables them to endure and go on increasing through a long series of years.

"The second process begins soon after the first, in this way. At the base of the footstalk of each leaf a small bud is gradually formed; but the absorbent vessels of the leaf having exhausted themselves in the formation of the bud, are unable to bring it nearer to maturity in this state it exactly resembles a seed, containing within it the rudiments of vegetation, but destitute of absorbent vessels to nourish and evolve the embryo. Being surrounded, however, by sap, like a seed in moist earth, it is in a proper situation for growing; the influence of the sun sets in motion the juices of the bud and of the seed, and the first operation in both of them is to send down roots a certain depth into the ground for the purpose of obtaining the necessary moisture. The bud accordingly shoots down its roots upon the inner bark of the tree, till they reach the part covered by the earth.

Winter now arriving, the cold and defect of moisture, owing to the clogged condition of the absorbent vessels, cause the fruit and leaves to fall, so that, except the provision of buds with roots, the remainder of the tree, like an annual plant, is entirely dead: the leaves, the flowers, and fruit are gone, and what was the inner bark, is no longer organized, while the roots of the buds form a new inner bark; and thus the buds with their roots contain all that remains alive of the whole tree. It is owing to this annual renovation of the inner bark, that the tree increases in bulk; and a new coating being added every year, we are hence furnished with an easy and exact method of ascertaining the age of a tree by counting the number of concentric circles of which the

trunk is composed. A tree, therefore, properly speaking, is rather a congeries of a multitude of annual plants, than a perennial individual.

"The sap in trees always rises as soon as the frost is abated, that when the stimulus of the warm weather in the early spring acts upon the bud, there should be at hand a supply of food for its nourish ment; and if by any means the sap is prevented from ascending at the proper time, the tree infallibly perishes. Of this a remarkable instance occurred in London, during the spring succeeding the hard winter of the year 1794. The snow and ice collecting in the streets so as to become very inconvenient, they were cleared, and many cartloads were placed in the vacant quarters of Moorfields; several of these heaps of snow and frozen rubbish were piled round some of the elm-trees that grow there. At the return of spring, those of the trees that were not surrounded with the snow expanded their leaves as usual, while the others, being still girt with a large frozen mass, continued quite bare; for the fact was, the absorbents in the lower part of the stem, and the earth in which the trees stood, were still exposed to a freezing cold. In some weeks, however, the snow was thawed, but the greater number of the trees were dead, and those few that did produce any leaves were very sickly, and continued in a languishing state all summer, and then died."

NATURALISTS' CALENDAR. Mean Temperature . ... 37.92

February 19.

1826-Second Sunday in Lent. The First Bird's Nest in Spring.

Of all our native birds, none begins to build so soon as the raven: by the latter end of this month it has generally laid its eggs and begun to sit. The following anecdote, illustrative of its attachment to its nest, is related by Mr. White in his "Natural History of Selborne." "In the centre of this grove there stood an oak, which, though shapely and tall on the whole, bulged out into a large excrescence about the middle of the stem. On this a pair of ravens had fixed their residence for such a series of years, that the oak was distinguished by the name of the the neighbouring youths to get at this raven-tree. Many were the attempts of eyry; the difficulty whetted their inclinations, and each was ambitious of surmounting the arduous task. But when they arrived at the swelling, it jutted out so much in their way, and was so far beyond their grasp, that the most daring undertaking to be too hazardous. So the lads were awed, and acknowledged the fect security, till the fatal day arrived in ravens built on, nest upon nest, in perwhich the wood was to be levelled. It was in the month of February, when those birds usually sit. The saw was applied to the butt, the wedges were inserted into the opening, the woods echoed to the heavy blows of the beetle and mallet, the

tree nodded to .ts fall, but still the dam sat on.

At last, when it gave way, the bird was flung from her nest; and though her parental affection deserved a better fate, was whipped down by the twigs, which brought her dead to the ground.'

MS. Ballad.

purpose; the only alteration is in the travellers, for whom he has substituted a family on their removal from one cabin to another.

Mr. Crofton Croker's "Researches in the South of Ireland," besides accounts of scenery and architectural remains, and illustrations of popular manners and superstition, conveys a very good idea of the roads and the methods of travelling in that part of the sister kingdom. The usual conveyance is called a car; its wheels are either a solid block rounded to the desired size, or they are formed of three pieces of wood clamped together. The wheels are fixed to a massive wooden axletree; this supports the shafts, which are as commonly constructed on the outside as on the inside of the wheels. In one of these machines Mr. Croker, with a lady and gentleman who accompanied him on his tour, took their seats. The car and horse were precisely of that description and condition in the engraving. Mr. W. H. Brooke painted a picture of this gentleman's party, from whence he has obligingly made the drawing for the present

This, which is the common Irish car, is used throughout the province of Leinster, the midland counties, and some parts of the north. The country, or farmer's car always has the wheels on the outside of the shafts, with a balustrade or upright railing fixed from the shaft to the side bars, which rise diagonally from them; this sort of enclosure is also at the back. This car is open at top for the convenience of carrying hay, corn, vegetables, tubs, packages, and turf, which is generally placed in wicker baskets, called a "kish;" two or four of these placed side by side occupy the entire body. The car, with the wheels between the shafts, is used to. like purposes, but has the additional hr. nour of being rendered a family convey ance, by cart ropes intertwisted or crossing