Nantucket was the home of Benjamin Franklin's mother, Abiah, whose father, Peter Folger, was one of the earliest settlers (1663); of Maria Mitchell, and of Lucretia Mott.
Dr Lewis Mott has pointed out that "Round Tables" exist in many parts of Great Britain, the name being often associated with circular trenches, or rings of stones, which were demonstrably employed in connexion with the agricultural festivals held at Pentecost, Midsummer and Michaelmas.
However this may be, and it seems probable that Dr Mott is right in his identification, the pseudo-chroniclers and romance writers certainly had in their minds a genuine table, although, probably, one of magical properties.
Recent grail researches have made it most probable that that mysterious talisman was originally the vessel of the ritual feast held in honour of a deity of vegetation, - Adonis, or another; if the Round Table also, as Dr Mott suggests, derives from a similar source, we have a link between these two notable features of Arthurian tradition, and an additional piece of evidence in support of the view that behind the Arthur of romance there lie not only memories of an historic British chieftain, but distinct traces of a mythological and beneficent hero.
Mott succeeded in forming students' associations in universities and colleges in several European countries, as well as in Turkey in Asia, Syria, India, Ceylon, China, Japan and Australia; and all these associations, over 150 in number, are now linked together in a great International Student Federation.
