Part 28

FAMILY COMPACT, the name given to an alliance organized by the Duc de Choiseul, first minister of Louis XV, between the various members of the Bourbon family, then sovereigns of France, Spain, the Two Sicilies, Parma, and Piacenza, mutually to guarantee each other's possessions. It was signed 15th Aug., 1761, and entailed on Spain a war with England.

FAMINE, an extreme scarcity of food affecting considerable numbers of people at the same time. Its causes are either natural, such as crop failures due to disease or to excessive or deficient rainfall, the effect of these being aggravated when the crop concerned is one on which the population mainly depends; or political and economic, such as war, or defects in the organization of production and distribution. In the Early and Middle Ages famines were frequent; but the rapidity of modern communication and transport made famines rare in Europe, until the conditions caused by the Great War produced great scarcity in Central Europe. In Ireland the years 1814, 1816, 1822, 1831, 1846 were marked by failure of the potato crop, and in the last-mentioned year the dearth was so great that L10,000,000 were voted by Parliament for relief of the sufferers. India has been the seat of many great famines, which recur at more or less regular intervals; but of late the British officials have been successful in organizing preventive and relief measures, such as improvement in railways and irrigation, the multiplication of industries, and the institution of a famine insurance grant. Amongst the more recent famines are that in North-West India (1837-8), in which above 800,000 perished; that in Bengal and Orissa (1865-6), when about a million perished; that in Bombay, Madras, Mysore (1877); that of 1896-7; and that of 1900 in Bombay, Punjab, &c., perhaps the most serious on record, when the Government spent L10,000,000 in relief. In China a great famine took place in 1877-8, in which over 9 millions are said to have perished; another took place in 1888-9, owing to the overflow of the Yellow River.

FAN, the name of various instruments for exciting a current of air by the agitation of a broad surface. (1) An instrument made of wood or ivory, feathers, thin skin, paper, variously constructed and mounted, and used by ladies to agitate the air and cool the face. As an article of luxury the fan was well known to the Greeks and Romans. Fans are said to have been introduced into England from Italy in the reign of Henry VIII, and Queen Elizabeth was very fond of them. There is a collection of fans at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. (2) Any contrivance of vanes or flat discs revolving by the aid of machinery, as for winnowing grain, for cooling fluids, urging combustion, or assisting ventilation, is also so called.

FANAR'IOTS, or PHANARIOTS, the inhabitants of the Greek quarter, or Phanar, in Constantinople, particularly the noble Greek families resident there since the times of the Byzantine emperors. The dragoman or interpreter of the Porte and other high officials used to be taken from their number. They have now mostly lost their influence at Constantinople, and have in many cases transferred themselves to Athens.

FANAT'ICISM, a term applied more particularly to the extravagance manifested in religious matters by those who allow themselves to be hurried away by their fancy and feelings, to the adoption not only of wild enthusiastic views, but also of inordinate and not infrequently persecuting measures. By an extension of the term it is also sometimes applied to other forms of extravagance.

FANCY, a term approaching imagination in meaning. In its general acceptation it refers both to the forms of the imagination and to the mental faculty which produces them; but it is used frequently for the lighter or more fantastic forms of the imagination, and for the active play of that faculty which produces them. See _Imagination_.

FANEUIL HALL (fan'[=u]-il), a public building in Boston, famous as the place where stirring speeches were made at the outbreak of the war for American independence. It was built between 1740 and 1742 by a Huguenot merchant named Peter Faneuil.

FANFARE (Sp. _fanfarria_, brag), a short, lively, loud, and warlike piece of music, composed for trumpets and kettle-drums. Also small, lively pieces performed on hunting-horns, in the chase.

FAN-FOOT, a name given to a North African lizard of the genus Ptyodactylus (_P. lobatus)_, one of the geckoes, much dreaded in Egypt for its supposed venomous properties.

FANNING ISLAND, a coral island in the centre of Polynesia, lat. 3deg 51' N., long. 159deg 22' W. Since 1888 it belongs to Britain, is a landing-place of the Canada-Australia cable, and the stretch from this to Vancouver, 3458 miles, is the longest in the world. The island was discovered by Edmund Fanning in 1798. Area, 15 sq. miles; pop. about 200. It forms one of a small group sometimes called Fanning Islands.

FANO, a seaport of Italy, on the Adriatic, province of Pesaro e Urbino, 29 miles north-west of Ancona. It is a handsome town, and has a triumphal arch erected to Augustus, and other antiquities. Pop. (commune), 25,000.

FAN-PALM, a name sometimes given to the talipot palm or _Cor[)y]pha umbraculif[)e]ra_, a native of Ceylon and Malabar. See _Talipot Palm_.

FANS, an African race of people inhabiting the region of the west coast about the Gaboon River and the Ogoway. They are an energetic race, skilled in various arts, and are rapidly increasing in numbers (about 300,000). They are cannibals, but contact with Europeans is leading them to give up the practice.

FANSHAWE, Sir Richard, an English diplomatist, poet, and translator, born in 1608, died at Madrid in 1666. He studied at Cambridge, was secretary of the English Embassy at Madrid, and took the Royal side on the outbreak of the Civil War in 1641. He was made a baronet in 1650, was taken prisoner at Worcester, but permitted to go at large on bail. After the Restoration he was employed on several diplomatic missions, and in 1664, as Ambassador at Madrid, negotiated a peace between England, Spain, and Portugal. His poetical abilities were above mediocrity, as is evinced by his translations of the _Lusiads_ of Camoens, the _Pastor Fido_ of Guarini, the Odes of Horace, and the fourth book of the _Aeneid_.

[Illustration: Fan-tail Pigeon]

FAN-TAIL, a variety of the domestic pigeon, so called from the fan-like shape of their tails. Also a name applied to certain birds (species of Rhipidura) of the fly-catcher family, native to India, Australia, and New Zealand.

FANTEES', a people of West Africa inhabiting the coast district of the Gold Coast Colony, between the Ashantis and the sea. They were at one time the most numerous and powerful people situated immediately on the Gold Coast seaboard; but their power was almost entirely broken after 1811 by repeated invasions of the Ashantis, and they have since lived under British protection. The soil is fertile, producing fruits, maize, and palm-wine.

[Illustration: Fan-tracery Vaulting, Gloucester Cathedral]

FAN-TRACERY, in architecture, elaborate geometrical curved work, which spreads over the surface of a vaulting, rising from a corbel and diverging like the folds of a fan. Fan-tracery vaulting is much used in the Perpendicular style, in which the vault is covered by ribs and veins of tracery, of which all the principal lines diverge from a point, as in Henry VII's chapel, Westminster Abbey.

FARAD, the practical unit of capacity for electricity, in the electromagnetic system of units. The capacity of a conductor or condenser whose potential is raised by one volt when given a charge of one coulomb. This unit is too large for most purposes, and capacities are usually expressed in microfarads (q.v.).

FAR'ADAY, Michael, one of the greatest of English chemists and physicists, was born in humble circumstances at Newington Butts, near London, 22nd Sept., 1791, died 25th Aug., 1867. Early in life he was apprenticed to a bookbinder in London, but occupied himself in his leisure hours with electrical and other scientific experiments. Having been taken by a friend to Sir Humphry Davy's lectures, he attended the course, and became so interested that he decided to abandon his trade. With this end he sent his notes of the lectures to Sir Humphry Davy, who was so struck with the great ability they showed that he appointed him his assistant at the Royal Institution. In 1829 he became lecturer at the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich, and in 1833 he was appointed to the newly established chair of chemistry at the Royal Institution. It was while in this office that he made most of his great electrical discoveries. His communications to the _Philosophical Transactions_ were published separately in three volumes (1839, 1844, 1855). In 1832 he received the honorary degree of D.C.L. from Oxford, and was made an honorary member of the Academy at Berlin. In 1835 he received a pension of L300 a year from Lord Melbourne. As an experimentalist Faraday was considered the very first of his time. As a popular lecturer he was equally distinguished, and used to draw crowds to the Friday evening lecture at the Royal Institution. Amongst his published works we may mention the following: _Researches in Electricity_ (1831-55), _Lectures on Non-metallic Elements_ (1853), _Lectures on the Forces of Matter_ (1860), _Lectures on the Chemical History of a Candle_ (1861).--BIBLIOGRAPHY: J. Tyndall, _Faraday as a Discoverer_; S. P. Thompson, _Michael Faraday: his Life and Work_.

FARADIZATION, or FARADISM, the medical application of the induced currents which Faraday discovered in 1831.

FARALLO'NES, a group of small islands in the Pacific, about 30 miles from the entrance to the Bay of San Francisco.

FARAN'DOLA, an exciting dance popular amongst the peasants of the south of France and the neighbouring part of Italy. The men and women, placed alternately and facing different ways, form a long line winding out and in with a waving motion.

FARCE, a subdivision of comedy, characterized chiefly by exaggeration and lack of rational character drawing. Farce stands in the same relationship to comedy as melodrama does to tragedy. Many farces commence with an impossible postulate, such as _The Comedy of Errors_. Jonson's _Silent Woman_ is one of the best English farces. Gilbert's _Engaged_ and _Foggerty's Fairy_ are notable modern examples.

FARCY, a disease to which horses are liable, intimately connected with glanders, the two diseases generally running into each other. It is supposed to be a disease of the absorbents of the skin, and its first indication is generally the appearance of little tumours called farcy buds on the face, neck, or inside of the thigh. By an order in Council animals affected with farcy must be destroyed.

FARDEL-BOUND, a term applied to cattle and sheep affected with a disease caused by the retention of food in the maniplies or third stomach, between the numerous plaits of which it is firmly impacted. Over-ripe clover, vetches, or rye-grass are liable to produce the disease.

FAREHAM, a town of England, in Hampshire, at the north-west extremity of Portsmouth harbour, giving name to a parliamentary division of the county. It has building-yards, potteries, and brickworks, and a considerable trade. Pop. 10,066.

FAREL, Guillaume, one of the earliest and most active of the Swiss reformers, was born in 1489 in Dauphiny, died in 1565. At an early period he was led by his intercourse with the Waldenses to adopt similar views. After preaching in various parts of Switzerland, he came to Geneva, where he was so successful at the religious conferences of 1534 and 1535 that the Council formally embraced the Reformation. He was instrumental, also, in persuading Calvin to take up his residence in Geneva. At attempt on the part of the two reformers to enforce too severe ecclesiastical discipline was the cause of their having to leave the city in 1538. Farel took up his residence at Neufchatel, where he died.

FARGO, a town of N. Dakota, United States, on the Red River of the North and the N. Pacific Railroad. Pop. 14,330.

FARIA Y SOUSA, Manuel de, Portuguese historian and poet, born 1590, of an ancient and illustrious family, died about 1649. Among his writings are: _Discursos Morales y Politicos, Epitome de las Historias Portuguesas_; _Comentarios sobre la Lusiada_; and a collection of poems.

FARIBAULT, a town of Minnesota, United States, 53 miles south of St. Paul's. Here are the State asylum for the deaf, dumb, and blind, and an episcopal divinity college. Pop. 9000.

FARIDPUR (fa-r[=e]d-poer'), a district of India, in Eastern Bengal; area, 2267 sq. miles; pop. 1,937,650. Chief town, Faridpur, on the Mara Padma. Pop. 11,000.

FARI'NA, a term given to a soft, tasteless, and commonly white powder, obtained by trituration of the seeds of cereal and leguminous plants, and of some roots, as the potato. It consists of gluten, starch, and mucilage.

FARINEL'LI, Carlo, an Italian singer, born at Naples in 1705, died in 1782. His true name was Carlo Broschi, and to develop his vocal powers he was made a eunuch. He sang in Vienna, Paris, and London with the greatest success. On visiting Spain, where he intended only a brief sojourn, he found King Philip V plunged in a profound melancholy. He succeeded in rousing him from it by the powers of his voice, and became his prime favourite and political adviser. But the penalty of his advancement was that for ten years he had to sing every night to his royal master the same six airs. On his return to Italy, in 1762, he found himself almost forgotten, but continued to exercise a splendid hospitality in his country house, near Bologna.

FARI'NI, Luigi Carlo, an Italian statesman and author, born in 1812, died 1st Aug., 1866. He studied medicine at Bologna, and practised as a physician. He became known as a nationalist and patriot in the political movements of 1841, had to leave the country for a time, but returned and was made a member of the Reform Ministry at Rome during the disturbances of 1848. Disapproving equally the views of the old Conservative and the extreme Republican party, he went to Piedmont, where he was elected a Deputy, and fought with great energy both in pamphlets and in Parliament on behalf of Cavour and the Piedmontese Constitutionalists. After the peace of Villafranca, he was chosen dictator of the duchies of Parma and Modena, and was mainly instrumental in inducing them to unite with the Piedmontese monarchy. His _History of the Papal States from 1814 to 1850_ is well known. In 1862 he became President of the Ministry, but lost his reason in 1863.

FARMERS-GENERAL (Fr. _Fermiers generaux_), private contractors, to whom under the old French monarchy was let out the collection of various branches of the revenue, poll-tax, duties on salt and tobacco, and customs. These contractors made enormous profits on the farming of the public revenues. A revenue collected in this way not only imposed a much heavier burden on the people, but the merciless rigour of irresponsible and uncontrolled exactors subjected them to hardships and indignities to which they could not submit without degradation. In 1790 the system was suppressed by the Constituent Assembly, and many of the farmers-general were sent to the guillotine by the Revolutionary Tribunal.

FARNE, or FERNE, ISLANDS, a group of seventeen islets, England, separated from the coast of Northumberland by a channel about 1-3/4 miles wide. They have been the scene of some disastrous shipwrecks, including that of the _Forfarshire_ in 1838. (See _Darling, Grace_.) There are two lighthouses. Pop. 15.

FARNESE (f[.a]r-n[=a]'ze), an illustrious family of Italy, whose descent may be traced from about the middle of the thirteenth century, and which gave to the Church and the Republic of Florence many eminent names, amongst which the following may be mentioned: Pietro Farnese (died 1363), a general of the Florentines in the war against Pisa; Alessandro, who became Pope as Paul III (1534-49), and whose gifts to his natural son Pier Luigi of the duchies of Parma and Piacenza laid the foundation of the wealth and greatness of the family; Ottavio (1520-85), son and successor of Pier Luigi, spent a long and peaceful reign in promoting the happiness of his subjects. Alessandro (1546-92), elder son of Ottavio, became famous as a most successful general of the Spaniards in the wars with the Netherlands and France. Ranuzio (1569-1622), son of Ottavio, was a gloomy and suspicious tyrant. The line became extinct with Antonio in 1731. The name of the Farnese is associated with several famous buildings and works of art. The _Farnese Palace_, at Rome, was built for Pope Paul III, while he was cardinal, by Sangallo and Michel Angelo. It now belongs to France, and is occupied by the French Embassy. Its sculpture gallery was formerly very celebrated, but the best pieces have been removed to Naples, including the following: the _Farnese Bull_, a celebrated ancient sculpture representing the punishment of Dirce, discovered in 1546 in the Baths of Caracalla at Rome; _Farnese Hercules_, a celebrated ancient statue of Hercules by Glycon, found in the Baths of Caracalla in 1540; _Farnese Flora_, a colossal statue of great merit, found in the Baths of Caracalla; _Farnese Cup_, an antique onyx cup, highly ornamented with figures in relief.

FARNHAM, a town of England, county of Surrey, 3 miles S.W. of Aldershot; a well-built place. North of the town is Farnham Castle, the residence of the Bishops of Winchester. The staple trade is in hops. Farnham was the home of Swift's 'Stella' (Hester Johnson). Pop. 12,133.

FARNWORTH, a manufacturing and mining town of Lancashire, England, 3 miles from Bolton. Pop. (urban district), 27,901.

FARO, a seaport of Portugal, province of Algarve, 62 miles S.E. of Cape St. Vincent. It is surrounded by Moorish walls, and has a convenient harbour. Its trade is considerable. Pop. 12,680.

FARO, a promontory forming the north-east point of Sicily at the entrance to the Strait of Messina. The point is strongly fortified, and on it there is a lighthouse over 200 years old.

FAROE ISLANDS (f[=a]'r[=o]; Dan. _Faeroeer_, 'Sheep Islands'), a group of islands in the North Atlantic, lying between Iceland and Shetland. They belong to Denmark, and are twenty-one in number, of which seventeen are inhabited. The islands generally present steep and lofty precipices to the sea. Barley is the only cereal that comes to maturity; turnips and potatoes thrive well. There is no wood, but plenty of excellent turf, and also coal. The inhabitants are chiefly engaged in fishing and the rearing of sheep. Thorshavn, in Stroemoe, the largest island, is the seat of government. Pop. 18,000.

FARQUHAR (faer'k[.a]r), George, Irish playwright, was born in Londonderry in 1677, and died in 1707. He was for a short time at Trinity College, Dublin, but was, according to one account, sent down for making a profane though clever joke on the miracle of walking on the sea. He became an actor, but left the stage after inadvertently injuring a fellow-actor, owing to his forgetting to substitute a stage-sword for the genuine article. He produced his first comedy, _Love and a Bottle_, in 1698. It is a lively and amusing comedy, and was well received. _The Constant Couple_ (1699) was also successful, as was its sequel _Sir Harry Wildair_. His other best-known plays are _The Recruiting Officer_ (1706), and his masterpiece _The Beaux' Stratagem_ (1707), written when he knew that death was fast approaching him. Farquhar was in dire poverty most of his life; he had a commission in the army for a while, but gave it up owing to some false hopes of promotion held out by the Duke of Ormond. He increased his embarrassments by marrying in 1703 a penniless woman who had fallen in love with his appearance, and pretended to be an heiress. Although he lived and died in great distress, his gaiety never flagged; and _The Beaux' Stratagem_ is one of the most mirthful comedies of the time.

Farquhar was a great playwright, and not much of a literary man. His comedies are all good acting comedies. He had been an actor himself, and so was much more closely in touch with the stage than the aristocratic Congreve. Farquhar stands above his contemporaries by reason of his realism. He did not go to other dramatists for his characters, but went straight to life. Indeed, in several cases his plays seem to have been in part autobiographical; the bard was the hero of the story. His plots are well constructed, especially his later ones. His characters are most of them genial rogues, and while he is no Puritan his morality compares very favourably with the cynical indecency of his contemporaries. His influence upon Fielding, and therefore upon the rise and development of the English novel, was great, as he introduced a return to real models, and eschewed artificiality. Personally Farquhar was a most loveable man, and he appears to have lived and died a very gallant gentleman.

FAR'RAGUT, David Glascoe, admiral of the United States, born in 1801, died 13th Aug., 1870. He entered the navy as midshipman at the age of eleven, was promoted to a lieutenancy in 1821, and was actively engaged in his profession up till 1851, when he was appointed assistant inspector of ordnance. In 1855 he received a commission as captain. In 1861 he was appointed to command the expedition against New Orleans, undertaken on the formation of the Confederacy, and sailed in January of the following year. New Orleans surrendered to the combined attack of the land and naval forces on 28th April, and Farragut proceeded to Vicksburg, which he attacked unsuccessfully. In consequence of his success at New Orleans he was promoted to the rank of vice-admiral, and placed in command of the blockading squadron of the Gulf of Mexico. In Aug., 1864, he attacked the Confederate fleet in the Bay of Mobile, and forced it to surrender, thus making the fall of Mobile merely a question of time. After this exploit he was made admiral, a grade which had not hitherto existed in the United States navy.

FAR'RANT, Richard, one of the earliest English composers of music. Very little is known of his history. He was a gentleman of the Chapel Royal in 1564, and subsequently organist and choir-master. He is supposed to have died about 1580. His music, which is ecclesiastical, is distinguished by purity, simplicity, tenderness, and elevation. The anthems _Call to Remembrance_, and _Hide not Thou Thy Face_, composed by him, are well known.

FARRAR, Frederic William, English divine, son of a clergyman, born in Bombay, 7th Aug., 1831, died 22nd March, 1903. He graduated at Cambridge, 1854, was assistant master at Harrow in 1855, headmaster of Marlborough College in 1871, Archdeacon of Westminster, 1883, and Dean of Canterbury, 1895. He wrote various popular theological works and works of fiction, and was Bampton Lecturer in 1885. Among his principal works are: _The Life of Christ_ (1874), _Life of St. Paul_ (1879), _The Early Days of Christianity_ (1882), _Lives of the Fathers_ (1889), _Darkness and Dawn_.

FARS, or FARSISTAN, a maritime province in the south-west of Persia, abutting on the Persian Gulf. It is mountainous, but has many rich and well-cultivated districts. The most important products are grain, fruit, wine, oil, cotton, tobacco, silk, cochineal, and attar of roses. The manufactures include woollen, silk, and cotton goods; and in these and other articles an active trade is carried on, chiefly with Hindustan. Pop. estimated at 1,700,000.

FARSAN, two islands on the east side of the Red Sea on the coast of Yemen, called respectively Farsan Kebir and Farsan Segir.

[Illustration: Farthingale]

FARTHINGALE, or FARDINGALE, an article of ladies' attire worn in the days of Queen Elizabeth, and closely resembling the more recent crinoline. It was formed of circles of whalebone hoops, and protruded more at the waist than the Victorian crinoline.