FONTANA (Felix), a distinguished Italian physiologist and philosopher, was born 15th of April 1730, at Pomarolo, in the Tyrol.

He began his education at Roveredo, and pursued it in the schools of Verona and Parma; whence he was afterwards removed to the unversities of Padua and Bologna. He then visited Rome, and Florence, where he obtained from the emperor Francis I., then grand duke of Tuscany, the appointment of professor of philosophy at Pisa; but the grand duke Peter Leopold (also afterwards emperor) invited him to settle at Florence, and gave him an establishment as fisico or naturalist, and director of the cabinet of natural history to his household. In 1757 Fontana engaged in an investigation, tending to confirm the doctrines of Haller respecting the irritability of the muscles, considered as a distinct inherent quality of those organs, and Haller published several of his letters as a part of his own Memoires upon that subject, Florence, 1775. One of the most important of Fontana's works is his Ricerche fisiche sopra 'l veneno della vipera, Lucca, 1767; containing a great variety of experiments, calculated to show that the poison of the viper acts by mixing with the blood, and destroying the irritability of the muscles to which it is conveyed. In 1766 our author published an essay entitled Nuove Osservazioni sopra i Globetti rossi del Sangue, confuting the assertions which had lately been advanced by Della Torre, respecting the complicated structure and changes of form of the globules of the blood. In the next year Osservazioni sopra la Ruggine del Grano, describing an animalcule like an eel, to which he attributes the rust of coin. There is also a Lettre sur l'ergot. Journ. Phys. VII. p. 42. The Lettera sopra le Idatidi e le Tenie, Opuscoli Scelti. VI. p. 108, Milan, 1783, contains an account of the hydatids which produce the symptoms of vertigo in sheep. Fontana entered also minutely, but not very accurately, into the chemical discoveries which occupied so much attention throughout Europe in the latter half of the last century, and seems to have had the merit of first applying the discoveries of Priestley respecting nitric oxide to the examination of the qualities of the atmosphere, by means of the eudiometer. This is the subject of his Descrizione e usï di alcuni stromenti per misurar la salubrità dell' aria, 8vo. Flor. 1774, 4to. 1775; and it is further illustrated in his Recherches Physiques sur la Nature de l'Air Dephlogistiqué et de l'Air Nitreux, 8vo. Par. 1776. The Philosophical Transactions for 1779, p. 187, contain his Experiments and Observations on the Inflammable Air breathed by various Animals, consisting of a repetition of Scheele's attempt to breathe hydrogen gas. To the Memoirs of the Italian Society Fontana also contributed several short essays.

In 1790 our author remarks that his chemical pursuits had, of late, been interrupted by the attention required for the completion of his wax models of anatomical subjects, and by the duplicates which he was preparing for the cabinet of Vienna at the request of the emperor. At a later period, a series of copies of these models was ordered by Buonaparte to be sent to Paris; VOL. IX-PART 2.

but, it being there found inferior to the preparations already existing in the Ecole de Medicine, it was sent to Montpelier. Fontana was latterly engaged in the preparation of a colossal model of a man, built up anatomically of all his component parts, represented in wood; but this design he never completed. Wearing the habit of an ecclesiastic (though he never, we believe, took orders), Fontana was called abbé, and treated with great respect by the French generals on their irruptions into Tuscany in 1799; a circumstance which gave rise to a jealousy on the part of his Imperial patrons, and he was for a short time imprisoned, on the re-establishment of the Austrian authorities. His last illness arose from a fall from his horse, in January 1806: he died the 9th of March of that year, and was buried near the tomb of Galileo, in the church of the Holy Cross, Florence.

FONTANA (George), a distinguished Italian mathematician, brother of the preceding, was born in 1735, and educated at Roveredo and Rome, where he entered the order of the Pia Schola. He early formed an intimacy with the marquis Julio Fagnani, who inspired him with a taste for the mathematics. In 1763 count de Firmian appointed him professor of logic and metaphysics, and director of the library, at Pavia. Five years after, he succeeded Boscovitch in the chair of mathematics, and filled it with the greatest reputation during nearly thirty years. In 1796 he was appointed a member of the legislative body of the Cisalpine republic. After the battle of Marengo, having become professor emeritus of the university, he removed to Milan. On the new organization of the republic of Italy, he became a member of the electoral college De' Dotti; but, in the midst of his literary and political labors, was seized by a violent fever, which caused his death, August the 24th, 1803.

FONTANES (M. de), a political writer and member of the French Institute, was born of a noble family at Mort in 1761. He edited in the commencement of the French revolution a journal, entitled The Moderator, and after the fall of Robespierre joined La Harpe and others in Le Memorial, which was, together with about forty more of the same description, suppressed by the National Convention on the 6th of September, 1797, the proprietors, editors, &c., being all included in a common sentence of banishment. M. de Fontanes now came to England, where he contracted an intimacy with M. de Chateaubriand, in company with whom he returned to his native country, and joined Messrs. Ronald and La Harpe in conducting the Mercure de France. Shortly after he obtained a seat in the corps legislatif, of which body he became the president. In 1808 he was appointed grand-master of the university of Paris; and, in 1814, possessing the dignity of a senator, he made a decided speech in favor of the restoration of the Bourbons. He was placed on the committee for drawing up the constitutional charter; and, on the re-establishment of that body, raised to the peerage. M. de Fontaines died at Paris, March 17th, 1821.

FONTENELLE (Bernard de), a celebrated French author, born in 1657. He discharged 2 C

which sheep are confined; the place where sheep are housed; the flock of sheep; a limit; a boundary.

Then said he, O cruel Goddes! that governe
This world with binding of your word eterne,
And writen in the table of Athament

Your parlement and your eterne grant,—
What is mankind unto yhold

Than is the shepe that rouketh in the to fold.

Chaucer. The Knightes Tale.

Time drives the flocks from field fold, When rivers rage and rocks grow cold; And Philomel becometh dumb,

And all complain of cares to come.

Raleigh.

We see that the folding of sheep helps ground, as well

by their warmth as by their compost.

Bacon.

His eyes he opened, and beheld a field
Part arable and tilth; whereon were sheaves
New reaped; the other part, sheep walks and folds.
Milton.

In thy book record their groans,
Who were thy sheep, and in their ancient fold
Slain.

towers.

Id.

Id.

Dryden.

The bridegroom sun, who late the earth espoused, Leaves his star-chamber; early in the east He shook his sparkling locks, head lively roused, While Morn his couch with blushing roses drest; His shines the Earth soon latcht to gild her flowers: Phosphor his gold fleeced drove folds in their bowers, Which all the night had grazed about the' Olympic Fletcher's Purple Island. FOLD, n. s., v. a. & v. n. Sax. Fild, Faldan; Goth. faldan. See the foregoing word. A double; a complication; an involution; one part added to another; one part doubled upon another. From the foregoing signification is derived the use of fold in composition. Fold signifies the same quantity added: as two-fold, twice the quantity; twenty-fold, twenty times repeated. To double; to complicate; to inclose; include; to close over another of the same kind; to join with another of the same kind.

The two leaves of the one door were folding, and the two leaves of the other door were folding. 1 Kings vi. 34. Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep.

Prov. vi. 10. They be folden together as thorns. Nah. i. 10. But other fell into good ground, and brought forth frait; some an hundred fold, some sixty fold, some thirty fold. Matt.

As a vesture shalt thou fold them up. Heb. i. 12.
And if that excellent were hire beautee,
A thousand fold more vertuous was she.

Chaucer. The Doctoure's Tale.
She in this trice of time
Commits a thing so monstrous, to dismantle
So many folds of favour!

Shakspeare. King Lear. I have seen her rise from her bed, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it, write upon't, read it, seal it, and again return to bed. Shakspeare.

We will descend and fold him in our arms. Id.
Witness my son, now in the shade of death,
Whose bright outshining beams thy cloudy wrath
Hath in eternal darkness folded up.

The inward coat of a lion's stomach has stronger folds than a human, but in other things not much different. Arbuthnot.

FOLENGIO (Theophilus), of Mantua, known also by the title of Merlin Coccaye, an Italian poet. He was born at Mantua in 1491, and became a Benedictine; but soon after quitted his habit, and, after leading a rambling life for some years, resumed it again. He wrote several works, mostly of a licentious nature; but is memorable for his macaronic verses. This mode of writing, which has not very frequently been imitated with success, consists in interweaving with Latin verse a number of words and phrases in the vernacular tongue, thrown in at random, and made to fit the metre by Latin terminations. Folingio, if not the inventor of macaronic verse, was the first who brought it into vogue. He died in 1544.

FOLIA CEOUS, adj. FOLIAGE, n. s. FO'LIATE, v. a. FOLIATION, n. s. FOLIATURE, n. s. FO'LIOMORT, adj.

Lat. foliaceous, foliatus, foliatio, from folium; Fr.feuillage. Consisting of laminæ or leaves. Leaves; tufts of leaves; the apparel of leaves to a plant. To beat into lamina or leaves. Foliation is the act of beating into thin leaves; it is also one of the parts of the flower, being the collection of those fugacious colored leaves called petala, which constitute the compass of the flower, and sometimes guard the fruit which succeeds the foliation, as in apples and pears, and sometimes stand within it, as in cherries and apricots; for these, being tender and pulpous, and coming forth in the spring, would ce injured by the weather if they were not lodged up within their flowers.-Quincy. Foliature, is the state of being hammered into leaves. Foliomort (folium mortuum), is a dark yellow; the color of a leaf faded: vulgarly called philomot. Gold foliated, or any metal foliated, cleaveth.

Bacon.

Id.

The great columns are inely engraven with fruits and foliage, that run twisting about them from the very top to the bottom. Addison.

the office of perpetua. secretary to the Academy of Sciences above forty years with universal applause; and his History of that Academy throws great light upon their memoirs. In his poetical performances, and his Dialogues of the Dead, the spirit of Voiture was discernible, though more extended and more philosophical. His Plurality of Worlds is a singular work, the design of which was to present that part of philosophy to view in a pleasing dress. In his advanced years, he published comedies, which were little fitted to the stage; and An Apology for Des Cartes's Vortices. Voltaire, who declares him to have been the most universal genius the age of Louis XIV. produced, says, 'We must excuse his comedies, on account of his age, and his Cartesian opinions, as they were those of his youth.' He died in 1756, nearly 100 years old.

FONTENOY, a village of France, in the department of Yonne, and ci-devant duchy of Burgundy, remarkable for a bloody battle, in 841, between the Germans and the French, in which the Germans were defeated, and above 100,000 men killed. It lies twenty miles south-east of Auxerre.

FONTEVRAULD, a town of France, in the department of Maine and Loire, and late pro vince of Anjou; famous for its abbey, in the church of which several kings and queens of England lie interred. It is six miles south-east of Saumur, and 160 south-west of Paris.

FONTEVRAULD, or FRONTEVAUX, ORDER OF, in ecclesiastical history, a religious order instituted by Robert d'Arbrissel, about the end of the eleventh century; taken under the protection of the holy see, by pope Pascal II. in 1106; confirmed by a bull in 1113, and invested by his successors with extraordinary privileges. The chief of this order is a female, who is appointed to inspect both the monks and the nuns. divided into four provinces, which are those of France, Aquitaine, Auvergne, and Bretagne, in each of which they have several priories.

It is

FONTICULUS, or FONTANELLA, in surgery, an issue, seton, or small ulcer, made to eliminate the latent corruption of the body.

FONTINALIA, or FONTANALIA, in antiquity, a religious feast held among the Romans in honor of the deities who presided over fountains or springs. Varro says, it was the custom to visit the wells on those days, and to cast crowns into fountains. Scaliger, in his conjectures on Varro, takes this not to be a feast of fountains in general, as Festus insinuates, but of the fountain which had a temple at Rome, near the Porta Capena, called also Porta Fontinalis; and that of this fountain Cicero speaks in his second book De Legibus. The fontinalia were held on the 13th of October.

FONTINALIS, water moss, in botany, a genus of the natural order of musci, belonging to the cryptogamia class. The anthera is hooded; the calyptra, or covering of the anthera, sessile, enclosed in a perichætium or empalement of leaflets different from those of the rest of the plant. There are four species, all natives of Britain. They grow on the banks of rivulets, and on the trunks of trees. The most remarkable is the

F. antipyretica, with purple stalks. The Scandinavians line the insides of their chimneys with this moss, to defend them against the fire; for, contrary to the nature of other mosses, it is difficult of combustion. FOOD, n. s. FOODFUL, adj. FOOD'Y, adj.

Gr. BOTELY; Low German, fode, or foder; Sax. Fæban; Dutch, veeden, to feed; Scot. feed. The general term for what is eaten regimen and diet are specific; both are particular modes of living: the latter respects the quality of food; the former the quantity, as well as quality. Food specifies no circumstances, and is applicable to all living creatures. See Crabbe. Food, then, is victuals; provision for the mouth; any thing that nourishes: the adjectives signify full of food; plenteous: eatable; fit for food.

Worldely fode and sustenaunce I desire none;
Soche living as I finde, soch wol I take,
Rotes that growen on the craggy stone

Shal me suffise with water of the lake.

Chaucer. Lament of Mary Magdeleine. On my knees I beg,

That you'll vouchsafe me raiment, bed, and food. Shakspeare.

Give me some musick: musick, moody food
Of us that trade in love. Id. Antony and Cleopatra.
O dear son Edgar,

The food of thy abused father's wrath,
Might I but live to see thee in my touch,
I'd say I had eyes again.

Id. King Lear.

To vessels, wine she drew;
And into well-sewed sacks poured foody meal.
Chapman

Under my lowly roof thou hast vouchsafed
To enter, and these earthly fruits to taste;
Food not of angels, yet accepted so,
As that more willingly thou could'st not seem
At heaven's high feasts t' have fed. Milton.
They give us food, which may with nectar vie,
And wax that does the absent sun supply. Waller.
There Tityus was to see, who took his birth
From heaven, his nursing from the foodful earth.
Dryden.

FOOD. Although in the article ALIMENT we have presented the reader with extensive Tables of human food, and in that of MEDICINE and STOMACH purpose to treat more fully of the modern theories of digestion, we feel disposed here to offer for the benefit of our unprofessional readers some general observations on the subject of diet, in the course of which we shall be largely indebted to the late valuable work of Dr. Paris on this subject.

The most remarkable distinction of foods, in a medical view, is into those which are already assimilated into the animal nature, and such as are not. Of the first kind are animal substances in general; which, if not entirely similar, are nearly so, to our nature. The second comprehends vegetables, which are much more difficultly assimilated. But as the nourishment of all animals, even those which live on other animals, can be traced originally to the vegetable kingdom, it is plain, that the principle of all nourishment is in vegetables. Though there is perhaps no vegetable which does not afford nourishment to some species of animal or other; yet, with regard to mankind, a very considerable distinction is to be made. Those vegetables which are of a mild

bland, agreeable taste, yield proper nourishment; while those of an acrid, bitter, and nauseous Laste are generally improper. We use, indeed, several acrid substances as food; but the mild, the bland, and palatable, are in the largest proportion in almost every vegetable. Such as are very acrid, and at the same time of an aromatic nature, are not used as food, but as spices or condiments which answer the purposes of medicine rather than any thing else. Sometimes, indeed, acrid and bitter vegetables seem to be admitted as food. Thus celery and endive are used in common food, though both are substances of considerable acrimony; but they are previously blanched, which almost totally destroys their acrimony. Or, if we employ other acrid substances, we generally, in a great measure, deprive them of their acrimony by boiling. In different countries the same plants grow with different degrees of acrimony. Thus, garlic seldom enters our food; but in the southern countries, where the plants grow more mild, they are frequently used for that purpose. The plant which furnishes cassada, being very acrimonious, and even poisonous in its recent state, affords an instance of the necessity of preparing acrid substances even in the hot countries; and there are other plants, such as arum roots, which are so exceedingly acrimonious in their natural state, that they cannot be swallowed with safety; yet, when deprived of that acrimony, afford good nourishment.

Animal food, although it gives strength, yet loads the body; and Hippocrates long ago observed, that the athletic habit, by a small increase, was exposed to the greatest hazards. In the first stage of life animal food is seldom necessary to give strength; in manhood, when we are exposed to active scenes, it is more proper; and in the decline of life a considerable proportion of it is necessary to keep the body in vigor. There are some diseases, says Dr Cullen, which come on in the decay of life, that are at least aggravated by it: among these he ranks the gout as the most remarkable. But the late Dr. Brown, from repeated experience, found that the gout was highly aggravated by vegetable food, and that animal food was the most proper regimen in that disease, and all others arising from debility. It is allowed, however, on all hands, by the friends of both the old and new systems of medicine, that animal food, although it gives strength, is yet of some hazard to the constitution, which, by the frequent repetition of this stimulus, is sooner exhausted than by a diet chiefly vegetable. Therefore it is to be questioned, whether we should desire this high degree of bodily strength, with all the inconveniences and dangers attending it. Those who are chiefly employed in mental researches, and not exposed to much bodily labor, should avoid an excess of animal food. But m nervous disorders, hysterical and hypochondriacal cases, and in general all diseases arising from weakness, fresh animal food, given frequently, and not in too great quantities, either in the form of soup, or that of a steak, will be found a much more speedy and effectual restorative.

Another question, Dr. Cullen observes, has been much agitated, viz. What are the effects of

variety in food? Is it necessary and allowable, or universally hurtful? Variety of a certain kind seems necessary; as vegetable and animal foods have their mutual advantages, tending to correct each other. Another variety, which is very proper, is that of liquid and solid food, which should be so managed as to temper each other; for liquid food, especially of the vegetable kind, is too ready to pass off before it is properly assimilated, while solid food makes a long stay. But this does not properly belong to the question, whether variety of the same kind is necessary or proper, as in animal foods, beef, fish, fowl, &c. It does not appear that there is any inconvenience arising from this mixture or difficulty of assimilation, provided a moderate quantity be taken. When any inconvenience does arise, it probably proceeds from this, that one of the particular substances in the mixture, when taken by itself, would produce the same effects; and indeed it would appear, that this effect is not heightened by the mixture, but properly obviated by it. There are few exceptions to this, if any, e. g. taking a large proportion of acescent substances with milk. The coldness, &c., acidity, flatulency, &c., may appear; and it is possible that the coagulum, from the acescency of the vegetables being somewhat stronger induced, may give occasion to too long retention in the stomach, and to acidity in too great degree. Again, the mixture of fish and milk often occasions inconvenience. The theory of this is difficult, though, from universal consent, it must certainly be just. Can we suppose that fish gives occasion to such a coagulum as runnet? If it does so, it may produce bad effects. Besides, fishes approach somewhat to vegetables, in giving little stimulus; and are accused of the same bad effects as these, viz. bringing on the cold fit of fever. Thus much may be said for variety. But it has also its disadvantages, provoking to gluttony; this and the art of cookery making men take in more than they properly can digest; and hence, perhaps very justly, physicians have almost universally recommended simplicity of diet; for, in spite of rules, man's eating will only be measured by his appetite, and satiety is sooner produced by one than by many substances. But this is so far from being an argument against variety, that it is one for it; as the best way of avoiding a full meal of animal food, and its bad effects, is by introducing a quantity of vegetables. Another means of preventing the bad effects of animal food is to take a large proportion of liquid; and hence the bad effects of animal food are less felt in Scotland on account of their drinking much with it, and using broths, which are at once excellent correctors of animal food and preventives of gluttony.

Dr. Paris thus compares the relative advantages of an animal and vegetable diet, particularly in this country. 'As every description of food,' says he, 'whether derived from the animal or vegetable kingdom, is converted into blood, it may be inferred that the ultimate effect of all aliments must be virtually the same; and that the several species can only differ from each other in the quantity of nutriment they afford,