1813.]

CHARA nidifica. Eng. Bot. 1703; at Cocken, Durham.-Specimens in the Herbarium of the late W. Weighell. CHARA flexilis. In the rivulet at the west end of Giggleswick Tarn, and in stagnant waters near the little Tarn, Yorkshire; Mr. Windsor.

ZOSTERA marina. On the shore at Inverary. N. J. W.-Great quantities of this plant are cast up among the rejectamenta of the sea, on the coast of Nor thumberland and Durham; though seldom found growing on the shores.

LIGUSTRUM vulgare. About Dorking, Surrey. N. J. W-St. Vincent's Rocks, Bristol; Mr. Thompson.

CIRCEA alpina. Between Keswick and Lodore, and in Ashness-gill, above Barrow Force, Cumberland. N. J. W. VERONICA saxatilis. Glen Tilt, north of Blair Athol. N. J. W.

VERONICA alpina. Mountains north of Loch Errauk, in Badenoch.-Specimens from the late Mr. M'Kay, of Edinburgh.

VERONICA Serpyllifolia. Fl. Brit. V. humifusa. Dicks. Tr. Linn. Soc. On Ben Lawers. Mr. M'Kay.-On Cheviot, Northumberland. N. J. W. VERONICA Scutellata. At Hill Close Carr, Durham. Robson.

VERONICA montana. High ridge wood Dear Settle, Yorkshire. Windsor.

PINGUICULA lusitanica. Galloway, Scotland, Rev. Mr. M'Richie.-Nutshaling Common and Town Hill Common, Hampshire; Mr. J. Woods.

PINGUICULA vulgaris. Wallis's Northumberland, page 222.-"There is a variety in mountainous boggy meadows, with a very large flower, of a duller purple, and a remarkable long spur." Can this be Pinguicula grandiflora of Eng. Bot. 2184? N. J. W.

UTRICULARIA intermedia. English Bot. 2489.-In Prestwick Carr, Northumberland, growing intermixed with Utricularia vulgaris. This is U. minor of Winch's Guide, p. 3. N. J. W.

UTRICULARIA minor. Burgh Common, Suffolk; Mr. J. Woods.

LYCOPUS europeus. By the river Mole, at Brockham, Surrey. N. J. W.-By the Avon, at Bath; Mr. Thompson.

SALVIA verbenaca. Brandon Hill, and below St. Vincent's Rocks, Bristol, Mr. Thompson.

VALERIANA rubra. Near Dartford, Kent. N. J. IV.

VALERIANA dentata. Fallow fields near Box bill and Brockham, Surrey. N. J. W.

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CROCUS vernus. Harlestone, Norfolk ; Mr. D. Turner.

IRIS. "We have the blue-flowered Iris, (Iris vulgaris Germanica sylvestris, C.B. Pin. p. 30,) in boggy places, but it is not common;" Wallis, p. 241. Iris fætidissima must certainly be the plant intended, though I never observed it in Nor thumberland. N.J. W.

SCHEN US mariscus. Conzye Tarn, near Kendal; Mr. J. Woods.

SCHENUS nigricans. Burgh Common, Suffolk, and Bagshot Heath; Mr. J. Woods.Between Preston and Swinton, Yorkshire; Mr. Windsor.—Brindal; Mr. Hooker. Town Hill Common, Hants; Mr. Woods.

SCHENUS compressus. Near Giggleswick Tarn, Yorkshire; Mr. Windsor. Bagshot Heath and Sydenham Common; Mr. J. Woods.

SCHENUS rufus. On the shores of Wear, and salt marshes at Hartlepool, Durham. N. J. W.-Thornton Loch, East Lothian, and Isle of Arran; Mr. M.Kay.

SCHENUS fuscus. Galway, Ireland; Mr. M'Kay.

} SCHEN US monoicus. Whiddy Bank, Teesdale Forest, Durham ; Croukley Fell, Yorkshire; Birkdale, Westmore land; in all which places this rare plant was first discovered by the Rev. J. Harriman.

SCIRPUS fluitans. In ponds at Forest Hall, Northumberland. N. J. W.. Salesmoor, near Manchester; Mr. Rob

son.

SCIRPUS multicaulis. Chirley Common, near London; Burgh Common, Suffolk; Mr. J. Woods. On the shores of Derwent-water Lake, Cumberland. N.J. W.

SCIRPUS pauciflorus. Nutshaling, Town Moor, and Netley Coinmons, Hampshire; and Dropmore Common, Bucks; Mr. J. Woods.Geggleswick Tarn, Yorkshire; Mr. Windsor.

SCIRPUS acicularis. Wanstead Park; Mr. E. Forster.-Giggleswick Tarn, Mr. Windsor.Shores of Loch Clunie, Scot land. N. J. W.

SCIRPUS sylvaticus. Ditches about Smokall Wood, Bath; Mr. Thompson. Rangill in Bolland, Yorkshire; Mr. Windsor.-By the Mole at Brocklam and Betchworth, Surrey. N.J. W.

ERIOPHORUM polystachion. Foal foot and Giggleswick Tarn, Yorkshire; Mr. Wind.or.

ALOPECURUS bulbosus. Weymouth ; Mr. Grolt.

1815.]

was republished in 1809 by Francis Maseres, esq. in the last volume of his "Occasional Essays." We learn from Egane that the table of impositions was carefully concealed among the arcana imperii of the court of Rome, and that it was en. trusted only to the apostolical penitentia ries, vested by the pope with the power of absolving sins in the reserved cases, under an oath of secrecy, not only to conceal the mysteries of the church from the laity, but even from the ordinary priests and friars. This account of Egane is confirmed by Father O'Leary, in his "Caution to the common People against Perjury," published at Cork, in 1783. "In this diocese," says he, "and several others, their crime is considered as a reserved case, from which no man but the bishop can absolve, let them be ever so penitent. This restraint shews the enor mity of the guilt: whereas the inferior elergy can reconcile ordinary sinners, upon sincere repentance and a firm resolution of amendment. But the perjurer, having exceeded the ordinary bounds, let his repentance be ever so sincere, must have an extraordinary power." Your correspondent observes, that Sir John, in a note to his printed speech, adds, "that the Roman chancery is a spiritual court, which has cognizance of the collation of benefices, dispensations from canonical impediments of marriage, and absolutions from canonical censures incurred by scandalous crimes, but in no case of absolutions from sin." What! did not the court of Rome lay claim to a power of absolving from sins? Did it not pretend to exercise that power? And does not the pope stili pretend to possess that power? Dr. Robertson observes, that during the pontificate of Leo X. when indulgences were hawked about in Germany for sale, Tetzel and his associates, who were employed to dispose of them, said, "If any man purchase letters of indulgence his soul may rest secure with respect to its salvation. The souls confined in purgatory, for whose redemption indulgences are purchased, as soon as the money tinkles in the chest, instantly escape from that place of torment and ascend into heaven." The

recourse to

same historian adds, that “men of piety regretted the delusion of the people, who being taught to rely for the pardon of their sins on the indulgences which they purchased, did not think it incumbent on them either to study the doctrines taught

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by genuine Christianity, or to practise the duties which it enjoins." The truth is, that the popes "did not scruple to call these indulgences a plenary remission of all sins, past, present, and future, and to offer them as a certain and immediate passport from the troubles of this world to the eternal joys of heaven; and to give some sort of colour and support to this infamous traffic, they confidently asserted that the superabundant merits of Christ, and of his faithful servants, formed a fund of which the pope was the sole manager; and that he could, at his own discretion, dispense these merits as the sure means of procuring pardon from God, in any proportion, for any species of wickedness, and to any person he pleased.*" Ravenstonedale, March 13. J. ROBINSON.

General Remarks.-The lowest temperature is ascertained by a register thermometer on Six's construction, which presents the greatest degree of cold since the last observation, and always refers to a period of twenty-four hours, although the greatest cold is generally admitted to be about an hour before sun-rişe. From an accurate account lately kept of the temperature at eleven at night, it has not been possible hitherto to obtain any rule for comparing these observations, the thermometer falling so irregularly in the course of the night, and in three instances last month (January) as much as 12, although the difference in the mean of these observations, for that month, was only 4°. It is highly necessary this should be perfectly understood before any conclusions are drawn. The following table of temperatures, formed from observations made at different periods, may nevertheless be found interesting.

1813.]

For the Monthly Magazine. ACCOUNT of POLISH PRUSSIA, the present SEAT of WAR, from MALTE BRUN's late PICTURE of POLAND.

W comprized the cities of Dantzic and ESTERN Prussia, in which are Thorn, as well as the district of the Netze, according to the cadastre of 1804, contain ed an extent of sixteen hundred square leagues of twenty-five to the degree, and a population of 817,000 inhabitants, amongst

which were several thousands of new set

tlers, chiefly emigrants from the kingdom of Wirtemberg The soil is various; a dry sterile sand covers the heights which are to the west of the Vistula, on the side of Pomerania; this was formerly the great desert of Waldaw, a tract of land which is now peopled. Along the banks of the rivers, particularly the Vistula and the Netze, is found a black, rich, moist, slimy soil, covered with corn and grass, and entirely free from wood. The islands and the low lands, formerly marshes, but now drained and in part surrounded with dykes, are known by the name of the Werders. The fertility of this little Delta of the Vistula is prodigious for so northerly a climate. The worst corn harvests re

turn twelve per cent the best thirty, and beyond that. The peasants of the Werders enjoy civil liberty under the protection of the king or the neighbouring cities. On the right bank of the Vistula, and on the side of Eastern Prussia, the soil is of a thick clayey nature, the country abounding with lakes, or covered with immense forests. Oaks grow here to an enormous size, yet none are found equal to those which the Teutonic knights made use of as redoubts and fortifications, as Eneas Sylvius relates in his History. A Prussian author of the 17th century saw

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an oak, the trunk of which was twentyseven ells in circumference. The Prus sian engineers have lately discovered in Western Prussia more than three millions of acres of woods and forests.

In the interior of this province yellow amber is found in the beds of pit coal; the fields are strewn with fragments of granite and stones of a similar nature.

We have been able to ascertain from authentic accounts a table of the different productions of this province; taking one year with another, the harvest amounts to 9,430 wispel of wheat, (the wispel contains twenty-four bushels;) 14,300 wispel of rye; 68,400 wispel of barley; 64,530 of oats; 4,700 of peas; 13,330 sf buckwheat; flax, tobacco, apples, and other. fruits, form also a considerable object. The account of domestic animals in 1801 was as follows: 195,295 horses; 418,364 horned cattle; 906,671 sheep; 305,339 cloth, hose, hats, linens, leather, and hogs; there were also 41,542 bee-hives: potash, were manufactured to the value of more than two millions of crowns.

The soil of Eastern Prussia is of a moreuniform fertility, but the climate is much more rigorous than that of Western Prussia. They cultivate, however, all sorts of grain, as well as maize, millet, flax, hemp, hops, and madder. The cul ture of potatoes is carried to as great an extent in Eastern Prussia as in Ireland, and this production serves as the principal food to the greatest part of the inha bitants. The forests are very extensive, and abound with timber for building and fire-wood. They gather the kermes, here called Russian cochineal. It is estimated that there is to every square mile, one with the other, 4,821 acres of wood, which, to an extent of 704 square leagues, gives a total of about 3,400,000 acres. Bears and other wild beasts, common to Poland, abound also here. The fishery is of great importance, both on the coas of the Baltic, on the two gulphs of water called the Frisch-Haff, Curisch-Haff, as well as in the numerable lakes, which, join forests, give the country an agreeable variety. On t gle of ancient Prussian than two hundred lake dius of twenty leag and Spirding are th