Part 47

FURNEAUX, TOBIAS (1735-1781), English navigator, was born at Swilly near Plymouth on the 21st of August 1735. He entered the royal navy, and was employed on the French and African coasts and in the West Indies during the latter part of the Seven Years' War (1760-1763). He served as second lieutenant of the "Dolphin" under Captain Samuel Wallis on the latter's voyage round the globe (August 1766-May 1768); was made a commander in November 1771; and commanded the "Adventure" which accompanied Captain Cook (in the "Resolution") in Cook's second voyage. On this expedition Furneaux was twice separated from his leader (February 8-May 19, 1773; October 22, 1773-July 14, 1774, the date of his return to England). On the former occasion he explored a great part of the south and east coasts of Tasmania, and made the earliest British chart of the same. Most of his names here survive; Cook, visiting this shore-line on his third voyage, confirmed Furneaux's account and delineation of it (with certain minor criticisms and emendations), and named after him the islands in Banks Straits, opening into Bass's Straits, and the group now known as the Low Archipelago. After the "Adventure" was finally separated from the "Resolution" off New Zealand in October 1773, Furneaux returned home alone, bringing with him Omai of Ulaietea. This first South Sea Islander seen in the British Isles returned to his home with Cook in 1776-1777. Furneaux was made a captain in 1775, and commanded the "Syren" in the British attack of the 28th of June 1776 upon Charleston, South Carolina. His successful efforts to introduce domestic animals and potatoes into the South Sea Islands are worthy of note. He died at Swilly on the 19th of September 1781.

See Hawkesworth's _Narrative of Wallis' Voyage_; Captain Cook's _Narrative of his Second Voyage_; also T. Furneaux's life by Rev. Henry Furneaux in the _Dictionary of National Biography_.

FURNES (Flem. _Veurne_), an old-fashioned little town amid the dunes near the coast in West Flanders, Belgium, about 26 m. S.W. of Bruges. Pop. (1904) 6099. It is the centre of a considerable area extending to the French frontier, and its market is an important one for the disposal of corn, stock, hops and dairy produce. During the Norman raids Furnes was destroyed, and the present town was built by Baldwin Bras de Fer, first count of Flanders, about the year 870. At the height of the prosperity of the Flemish communes in the 14th century there were dependent on the barony of Furnes not fewer than fifty-two rich villages, but these have all disappeared, partly no doubt as the consequence of repeated French invasions down to the end of the 18th century, but chiefly through the encroachment of the sea followed by the accumulation of sand along the whole of this portion of the coast. Furnes contains many curious old houses and the church of St Walburga, which is a fine survival of the 13th century with some older portions. The old church and buildings, grouped round the Grand Place, which is the scene of the weekly market, present a quaint picture which is perhaps not to be equalled in the country. Near Furnes on the seashore is the fashionable bathing place called La Panne.

Furnes one day a year becomes a centre of attraction to all the people of Flanders. This is the last Sunday in July, when the fete of Calvary and the Crucifixion is celebrated. Of all popular festivities in Belgium this is the nearest approach to the old Passion Play. The whole story of Christ is told with great precision by means of succeeding groups which typify the different phases of the subject. The people of Furnes pose as Roman soldiers or Jewish priests, as the apostles or mere spectators, while the women put on long black veils so that they may figure in the procession as the just women.

FURNESS, HORACE HOWARD (1833- ), American Shakespearian scholar, was born in Philadelphia on the 2nd of November 1833, being the son of William Henry Furness (1802-1896) minister of the First Unitarian church in that city, a powerful preacher and writer. He graduated at Harvard in 1854, and was admitted to the bar in 1859, but soon devoted himself to the study of Shakespeare. He accumulated a collection of illustrative material of great richness and extent, and brought out in 1871 the first volume of a new Variorum edition, designed to represent and summarize the conclusions of the best authorities in all languages--textual, critical and annotative. The volumes appeared as follows: _Romeo and Juliet_ (1871); _Macbeth_ (1873) (revised edition, 1903); _Hamlet_ (2 vols., 1877); _King Lear_ (1880); _Othello_ (1886); _The Merchant of Venice_ (1888); _As You Like It_ (1890); _The Tempest_ (1892); _A Midsummer Night's Dream_ (1895); _The Winter's Tale_ (1898); _Much Ado about Nothing_ (1899); _Twelfth Night_ (1901); _Love's Labour's Lost_ (1904). The edition has been generally accepted as a thorough and scholarly piece of work; its chief fault is that, beginning with _Othello_ (1858), the editor used the First Folio text as his basis, while in others he makes the text of the Cambridge (Globe) editors his foundation. His wife, Helen Kate Furness (1837-1883), compiled _A Concordance to the Poems of Shakespeare_ (1872).

FURNESS, a district of Lancashire, England, separated from the major portion of the county by Morecambe Bay. It is bounded S.E. by this inlet of the Irish Sea, S.W. by the sea, W. by the Duddon estuary and Cumberland, and N. and E. by Westmorland. Its area is about 250 sq. m. It forms the greater part of the North Lonsdale parliamentary division of Lancashire, and contains the parliamentary borough of Barrow-in-Furness. The surface is almost entirely hilly. The northern half is included in the celebrated Lake District, and contains such eminences as the Old Man of Coniston and Wetherlam. Apart from the Duddon, which forms part of the western boundary, the principal rivers are the Leven and Crake, flowing southward into a common estuary in Morecambe Bay. The Leven drains Windermere and the Crake Coniston Lake. The usage of the term "Lake District," however, tends to limit the name of Furness in common thought to the district south of the Lakes, where several of the place-names are suffixed with that of the district, as Barrow-in-Farness, Dalton-in-Furness, Broughton-in-Furness. Between the Duddon and Morecambe Bay lies Walney Island, 8 m. in length, and in the shallow strait between it and the mainland are several smaller islands. That part of Furness which forms a peninsula between the Leven estuary and Morecambe Bay, and the Duddon estuary, is rich in hematite iron ore, which has been worked from very early times. It was known and smelted by British and Romans, and by the monks of Furness Abbey and Conishead Priory, both in the district. It was owing to the existence of this ore that the town of Barrow grew up in the 19th century; at first as a port from which the ore was exported to South Wales, while later furnaces were established on the spot, and acquired additional importance on the introduction of the Bessemer process, which requires a non-phosphoric ore such as is found here. The hematite is also worked at Ulverston, Askam, Dalton and elsewhere, but the furnaces now depend in part upon ore imported from Spain. The supposed extension of the ore under the sands of the Duddon estuary led to the construction of a sea wall to facilitate the working. The district is served by the main line of the Furness railway, from Carnforth (junction with the London & North-Western railway), passing the pleasant watering-place of Grange, and approximately following the coast by Ulverston, Dalton and Barrow, with branches to Lake Side, Windermere, and to Coniston.

Furness Abbey.

Apart from its industrial importance and scenic attractions, Furness has an especial interest on account of its famous abbey. The ruins of this, beautifully situated in a wooded valley, are extensive, and mainly of fine transitional Norman and Early English date, acquiring additional picturesqueness from the warm colour of the red sandstone of which they are built. The abbey of Furness, otherwise Furdenesia or the further _nese_ (promontory), which was dedicated to St Mary, was founded in 1127 by a small body of monks belonging to the Benedictine order of Savigny. In 1124 they had settled at Tulketh, near Preston, but migrated in 1127 to Furness under the auspices of Stephen, count of Boulogne, afterwards king, at that time lord of the liberty of Furness. In 1148 the brotherhood joined the Cistercian order. Stephen granted to the monks the lordship of Furness, and his charter was confirmed by Henry I., Henry II. and subsequent kings. The abbot's power throughout the lordship was almost absolute; he had a market and fair at Dalton, was free from service to the county and wapentake, and held a sheriff's tourn. By a succession of gifts the abbey became one of the richest in England and was the largest Cistercian foundation in the kingdom. At the Dissolution its revenues amounted to between L750 and L800 a year, exclusive of meadows, pastures, fisheries, mines, mills and salt works, and the wealth of the monks enabled them to practise a regal hospitality. The abbot was one of the twenty Cistercian abbots summoned to the parliament of 1264, but was not cited after 1330, as he did not hold of the king _in capite per baroniam_. The abbey founded several offshoot houses, one of the most important being Rushen Abbey in the Isle of Man. In 1535 the royal commissioners visited the abbey and reported four of its inmates, including the abbot, for incontinence. In 1536 the abbot was charged with complicity in the Pilgrimage of Grace, and on the 7th of April 1537, under compulsion, surrendered the abbey to the king. A few monks were granted pensions, and the abbot was endowed with the profits of the rectory of Dalton, valued at L33, 6s. 8d. per annum. In 1540 the estates and revenues were annexed by act of parliament to the Duchy of Lancaster. About James I.'s reign the site and territories were alienated to the Prestons of Preston-Patrick, from whom they descended to the dukes of Devonshire.

Conishead Priory, near Ulverston, an Augustinian foundation of the reign of Henry II., has left no remains, but of the priory of Cartmel (1188) the fine church is still in use. It is a cruciform structure of transitional Norman and later dates, its central tower having the upper storey set diagonally upon the lower. The chancel contains some superb Jacobean carved oak screens, with stalls of earlier date.

FURNISS, HARRY (1854- ), British caricaturist and illustrator, was born at Wexford, Ireland, of English and Scottish parents. He was educated in Dublin, and in his schooldays edited a _Schoolboy's Punch_ in close imitation of the original. He came to London when he was nineteen, and began to draw for the illustrated papers, being for some years a regular contributor to the _Illustrated London News_. His first drawing in _Punch_ appeared in 1880, and he joined its staff in 1884. He illustrated Lucy's "Diary of Toby, M.P.," in _Punch_, where his political caricatures became a popular feature. Among his other successes were a series of "Puzzle Heads," and his annual "Royal Academy guy'd." In _Royal Academy Antics_ (1890) he published a volume of caricatures of the work of leading artists. He resigned from the staff of _Punch_ in 1894, produced for a short time a weekly comic paper _Lika Joko_, and in 1898 began a humorous monthly, _Fair Game_; but these were short-lived. Among the numerous books he illustrated were James Payn's _Talk of the Town_, Lewis Carroll's _Sylvie and Bruno_, Gilbert a Beckett's _Comic Blackstone_, G.E. Farrow's _Wallypug Book_, and his own novel, _Poverty Bay_ (1905). _Our Joe, his great Fight_ (1903), was a collection of original cartoons. His volume of reminiscences, _Confessions of a Caricaturist_ (1901), was followed by _Harry Furniss at Home_ (1904). In 1905 he published _How to draw in Pen and Ink_, and produced the first number of _Harry Furniss's Christmas Annual_.

FURNITURE (from "furnish," Fr. _fournir_), a general term of obscure origin, used to describe the chattels and fittings required to adapt houses and other buildings for use. Wood, ivory, precious stones, bronze, silver and gold have been used from the most ancient times in the construction or for the decoration of furniture. The kinds of objects required for furniture have varied according to the changes of manners and customs, as well as with reference to the materials at the command of the workman, in different climates and countries. Of really ancient furniture there are very few surviving examples, partly by reason of the perishable materials of which it was usually constructed; and partly because, however great may have been the splendour of Egypt, however consummate the taste of Greece, however luxurious the life of Rome, the number of household appliances was very limited. The chair, the couch, the table, the bed, were virtually the entire furniture of early peoples, whatever the degree of their civilization, and so they remained until the close of what are known in European history as the middle ages. During the long empire-strewn centuries which intervened between the lapse of Egypt and the obliteration of Babylon, the extinction of Greece and the dismemberment of Rome and the great awakening of the Renaissance, household comfort developed but little. The Ptolemies were as well lodged as the Plantagenets, and peoples who spent their lives in the open air, going to bed in the early hours of darkness, and rising as soon as it was light, needed but little household furniture.

Indoor life and the growth of sedentary habits exercised a powerful influence upon the development of furniture. From being splendid, or at least massive, and exceedingly sparse and costly, it gradually became light, plentiful and cheap. In the ancient civilizations, as in the periods when our own was slowly growing, household plenishings, save in the rudest and most elementary forms, were the privilege of the great--no person of mean degree could have obtained, or would have dared to use if he could, what is now the commonest object in every house, the chair (q.v.). Sparse examples of the furniture of Egypt, Nineveh, Greece and Rome are to be found in museums; but our chief sources of information are mural and sepulchral paintings and sculptures. The Egyptians used wooden furniture carved and gilded, covered with splendid textiles, and supported upon the legs of wild animals; they employed chests and coffers as receptacles for clothes, valuables and small objects generally. Wild animals and beasts of the chase were carved upon the furniture of Nineveh also; the lion, the bull and the ram were especially characteristic. The Assyrians were magnificent in their household appointments; their tables and couches were inlaid with ivory and precious metals. Cedar and ebony were much used by these great Eastern peoples, and it is probable that they were familiar with rosewood, walnut and teak. Solomon's bed was of cedar of Lebanon. Greek furniture was essentially Oriental in form; the more sumptuous varieties were of bronze, damascened with gold and silver. The Romans employed Greek artists and workmen and absorbed or adapted many of their mobiliary fashions, especially in chairs and couches. The Roman tables were of splendid marbles or rare woods. In the later ages of the empire, in Rome and afterwards in Constantinople, gold and silver were plentifully used in furniture; such indeed was the abundance of these precious metals that even cooking utensils and common domestic vessels were made of them.

The architectural features so prominent in much of the medieval furniture begin in these Byzantine and late Roman thrones and other seats. These features became paramount as Pointed architecture became general in Europe, and scarcely less so during the Renaissance. Most of the medieval furniture, chests, seats, trays, &c., of Italian make were richly gilt and painted. In northern Europe carved oak was more generally used. State seats in feudal halls were benches with ends carved in tracery, backs panelled or hung with cloths (called cloths of estate), and canopies projecting above. Bedsteads were square frames, the testers of panelled wood, resting on carved posts. Chests of oak carved with panels of tracery, or of Italian cypress (when they could be imported), were used to hold and to carry clothes, tapestries, &c., to distant castles and manor houses; for house furniture, owing to its scarcity and cost, had to be moved from place to place. Copes and other ecclesiastical vestments were kept in chests with ornamental lock plates and iron hinges. The splendour of most feudal houses depended on pictorial tapestries which could be packed and carried from place to place. Wardrobes were rooms fitted for the reception of dresses, as well as for spices and other valuable stores. Excellent carving in relief was executed on caskets, which were of wood or of ivory, with painting and gilding, and decorated with delicate hinge and lock metal-work. The general subjects of sculpture were taken from legends of the saints or from metrical romances. Renaissance art made a great change in architecture, and this change was exemplified in furniture. Cabinets (q.v.) and panelling took the outlines of palaces and temples. In Florence, Rome, Venice, Milan and other capitals of Italy, sumptuous cabinets, tables, chairs, chests, &c., were made to the orders of the native princes. Vasari (_Lives of Painters_) speaks of scientific diagrams and mathematical problems illustrated in costly materials, by the best artists of the day, on furniture made for the Medici family. The great extent of the rule of Charles V. helped to give a uniform training to artists from various countries resorting to Italy, so that cabinets, &c., which were made in vast numbers in Spain, Flanders and Germany, can hardly be distinguished from those executed in Italy. Francis I. and Henry VIII. encouraged the revived arts in their respective dominions. _Pietra dura_, or inlay of hard pebbles, agate, lapis lazuli, and other stones, ivory carved and inlaid, carved and gilt wood, marquetry or veneering with thin woods, tortoise-shell, brass, &c., were used in making sumptuous furniture during the first period of the Renaissance. Subjects of carving or relief were generally drawn from the theological and cardinal virtues, from classical mythology, from the seasons, months, &c. Carved altarpieces and woodwork in churches partook of the change in style.

The great period of furniture in almost every country was, however, unquestionably the 18th century. That century saw many extravagances in this, as in other forms of art, but on the whole it saw the richest _floraison_ of taste, and the widest sense of invention. This is the more remarkable since the furniture of the 17th century has often been criticized as heavy and coarse. The criticism is only partly justified. Throughout the first three-quarters of the period between the accession of James I. and that of Queen Anne, massiveness and solidity were the distinguishing characteristics of all work. Towards the reign of James II., however, there came in one of the most pleasing and elegant styles ever known in England. Nearly a generation before then Boulle was developing in France the splendid and palatial method of inlay which, although he did not invent it, is inseparably associated with his name. We owe it perhaps to the fact that France, as the neighbour of Italy, was touched more immediately by the Renaissance than England that the reign of heaviness came earlier to an end in that country than on the other side of the Channel. But there is a heaviness which is pleasing as well as one which is forbidding, and much of the furniture made in England any time after the middle of the 17th century was highly attractive. If English furniture of the Stuart period be not sought after to the same extent as that of a hundred years later, it is yet highly prized and exceedingly decorative. Angularity it often still possessed, but generally speaking its elegance of form and richness of upholstering lent it an attraction which not long before had been entirely lacking. Alike in France and in England, the most attractive achievements of the cabinetmaker belong to the 18th century--English Queen Anne and early Georgian work is universally charming; the regency and the reigns of Louis XV. and XVI. formed a period of the greatest artistic splendour. The inspiration of much of the work of the great English school was derived from France, although the gropings after the Chinese taste and the earlier Gothic manner were mainly indigenous. The French styles of the century, which began with excessive flamboyance, closed before the Revolution with a chaste perfection of detail which is perhaps more delightful than anything that has ever been done in furniture. In the achievements of Riesener, David Rontgen, Gouthiere, Oeben and Rousseau de la Rottiere we have the high-water mark of craftsmanship. The marquetry of the period, although not always beautiful in itself, was executed with extraordinary smoothness and finish; the mounts of gilded bronze, which were the leading characteristic of most of the work of the century, were finished with a minute delicacy of touch which was until then unknown, and has never been rivalled since. If the periods of Francis I. and Henry II., of Louis XIV. and the regency produced much that was sumptuous and even elegant, that of Louis XVI., while men's minds were as yet undisturbed by violent political convulsions, stands out as, on the whole, the one consummate era in the annals of furniture. Times of great achievement are almost invariably followed directly by those in which no tall thistles grow and in which every little shrub is magnified to the dimensions of a forest tree; and the so-called "empire style" which had begun even while the last monarch of the _ancien regime_ still reigned, lacked alike the graceful conception and the superb execution of the preceding style. Heavy and usually uninspired, it was nurtured in tragedy and perished amid disaster. Yet it is a profoundly interesting style, both by reason of the classical roots from which it sprang and the attempt, which it finally reflected, to establish new ideas in every department of life. Founded upon the wreck of a lingering feudalism it reached back to Rome and Greece, and even to Egypt. If it is rarely charming, it is often impressive by its severity. Mahogany, satinwood and other rich timbers were characteristic of the style of the end of the 18th century; rosewood was most commonly employed for the choicer work of the beginning of the 19th. Bronze mounts were in high favour, although their artistic character varied materially.