an abscess, which approached to a suppuration, touched the saddle. In August, 1785, he impaired his health still farther by assisting at a review, where he was exposed without a cloak to a heavy rain for four or five hours. On his return to Potsdam he was seized with a fever; and, for the first time, became unable to assist at the military exercises. His malady, however, did not prevent him from dictating the disposition of these exercises during the three days they lasted. About the end of autumn the fever left him, but was succeeded by a violent cough; by which he was greatly weakened and prevented from sleeping; but this did not interrupt either the execution of business, or the routine of his literary exertions; wherein he continued to employ himself till the day before he died. On the 17th and 18th of May, 1786, he was unable to assist at the ordinary reviews. At last his disorder terminated in a dropsy. Being now no longer able to remain in bed, he sat day and night in an arm-chair with springs, which could be moved at pleasure. For nearly a month before his death the swelling of his feet gave him violent pain, so that he wished an incision to be made; but the surgeon refused to perform the operation, suspecting that it might hasten his death. Nature, however, accomplished his desires; his right leg opened, and discharged such a quantity of matter, that he was greatly relieved. But on the 16th August, 1786, his throat began to rattle violently; and he soon after fell into a stupor; though from this he recovered so far as to be able to speak. His respiration and voice became gradually more feeble; and he expired on the morning of the 17th, at nineteen minutes after two, in the seventy-fifth year of his age, and forty-seventh of his reign. This great monarch was of the middle size, had large blue eyes and a piercing look. He spoke German incorrectly and in a very rough manner; but talked French very fluently and agreeably. His constitution was naturally feeble, but he had greatly improved it by his laborious life. He had the art of relieving every one from that embarrassment, which is apt to occur in accosting a monarch. His universal knowledge enabled him to converse on all subjects. He talked of war with military men, of verses with the poet, of agriculture with the farmer, of jurisprudence with the lawyer, of commerce with the merchant, and politics with the Englishman. He had a very retentive memory; was fond of solitude and gardening; and took great pleasure in dogs, of which animals he constantly kept a number about him, giving them little balls to play with. In company he was fond of asking questions and jesting; in which last he proceeded such lengths as undoubtedly were unbecoming in a superior towards his inferiois. In military affairs he was excessively severe, not to say cruel; of which the following anecdote may serve as an instance. In the first war of Silesia, wishing to make some alteration in his camp during the night, he forbade every person, under pain of death, to keep, after a certain hour, a fire or other light in his tent. He himself went the rounds; and in passing the tent of a captain Zittern he perceived a light. Enterin the tent, he found the captain sealing a letter to his wife, for whom he had a great affection. What are you doing there?' said he, ' do not you know the order?' The captain fell on his knees and asked pardon. Sit down,' cor. tinued the king, and add a few words I am going to dictate to you.' Zittern obeyed; and the king dictated "To morrow I shall die on a scaffold.' The unfortunate man wrote them, and next day was executed. His cruel treatment of Baron Trenck is well known. In matters of domestic legislation, he was more arbitrary than just; of which we have a notable example in the famous case of Arnold the miller. This man had refused to pay the rent of his mill, on pretence that the stream which turned it had been divert. ed into a fish-pond. But as the water which ran into the pond also ran out of it into the same channel as before, the miller evidently suffered no damage. The judges therefore gave sentence against him, but the king not only reversed their sentence but disgraced them. For this he was celebrated through all the newspapers in Europe; and yet he was in the wrong, and afterwards even acknowledged nimself to have been so: but, notwithstanding this, he not only made no reparation to the parties injured, but allowed them to he in prison all his life-time. He entertained most unaccountable prejudices against certain places and persons, which neither conduct nor merit could eradicate. One of these unfortunate places was Westphalia, on which he never conferred any bounty; and one day a native of that country, a man of great merit, being proposed to him for a place, he refused, saying, 'He is a Westphalian; he is good for nothing.' Voltaire justly accuses him of ingratitude to the count de Seckendorf; who saved his life, and against whom he conceived the most implacable hatred. His neglect of others who afforded him the most essential service was shameful. When a robust butcher prevented him from falling, horse and all, over a precipice, where both would undoubtedly have been killed, the king only turned about and saying, Thank you friend, rode off without ever enquiring farther about his preserver. With regard to his literary merits, Voltaire boasts of having corrected his works, and others of having furnished him with materials for his history. He has been accused of stealing whole hemistichs of poetry from Voltaire, Boileau, Rousseau, and others; nor does the charge seem void of foundation. Such of his verses, as have undergone no correction, are very indifferent. But while we thus mention the foibles of Frederick, it is but just to record his acts of virtue. Upon his accession he treated his mother with great respect; ordered that she should bear the title of queen mother, and that instead of addressing him as his majesty she should call him son. As he was passing soon after between Berlin and Potsdam, 1000 boys, who had been marked out for military service by his father, surrounded his coach, and cried out Merciful king deliver us from our slavery.' He promised them their liberty, and next day ordered their badges to be taken off. He granted a general toleration of religion; and among other concessions allowed the profession of free-masonry. The reign of this monarch was illustrious, as well for the variety of charac ters he sustained, as for the important vicissitudes he experienced. But the pacification of Dresden, in 1745, enabled him to appear in a character far more glorious than that of the conqueror of Silesia. He was now entitled to the noblest eulogy, as the wise legislator of his country. Exclusive of his general attention to agriculture, commerce, and manufactures, he peopled, in particular, the deserts of Pomerania, by encouraging, with royal bounties, a great number of industrious emigrants to settle in that province; the face of which, in a very few years, underwent the most agreeable alteration. Above sixty new villages arose amidst a barren waste; and every part of the country exhibited marks of successful cultivation. Those desolate plains, where not a footstep had been seen for ages, were now converted into fields of corn; and the happy peasants, under the protection of a patriot king, sowed their grounds in peace, and reaped their harvests in security. FREDERICK (Colonel), the son of Theodore, king of Corsica, by an Irish lady, was born in Spain. He came to England in 1754, and taught the Italian language for some years. He afterwards went to the continent, where he obtained the rank of Colonel, and the cross of merit, from the late duke of Wirtemberg; for whom he acted as agent, upon his return, and disposed of a regiment to the East India Company. He married a German lady while abroad, by whom he had a son, who fell in the American war, and also a daughter. His finances falling low at last, he shot himself, at Westminster Abbey, on the 1st February 1796. He was a man of general knowledge, and considerable talents. He wrote 1. Memoires pour servir l'histoire de Corse, 8vo. 1768. 2. The description of Corsica; with an account of its union to the crown of Great Britain, 8vo. &c. 1796. FREDERICK, a county of Maryland, bounded on the north by Pennsylvania, east by Baltimore, south-west by the Potomac, and west by Washington; extending thirty miles every way. Fredericktown is the capital. FREDERICK, a county of Virginia, bounded on the north by Berkley, east and south by the Shanandoah, and west by Hampshire; thirty miles long, and twenty broad. It abounds with limestone and iron ore; iron works have been erected in various parts. Winchester is the chief town. FREDERICKSBURG, a town of Virginia, in Spotsylvania county, on the south-west bank of the Rappahannock, 110 miles from its mouth. The chief street runs parallel with the river. It is fifty miles S. S. W. of Alexandria. FREDERICKSHALL, a town of Norway in the province of Aggerhuys, on the frontiers of Sweden, and on the extremity of the Swinesund, at the mouth of the Tiste. The harbour is safe and commodious; but the saw-dust brought down the river from the mills occasions an annual expense to clear it. It contains 3000 inhabit ants; and lies thirty-one miles south-east of Christiania, and fifty north of Uddevalla. FREDERICKSTADT, a respectable manufacturing town of Denmark, in the duchy of Sleswick, at the confluence of the Treen and Eyder. Silk, woollen, starch, and oil, are its chief manufactures It was founded in 1621, by a body of Arminians who emigrated from Holland upon the decisions of the synod of Dort. Population 2200. Eighteen miles W. S. W. of Sleswick. FREDERICKSTEIN, a strong fortress of Norway, on the summit of a rock, which overhangs Frederickshall; famous for the death of Charles XII. killed while besieging it, in 1718. FREDERICKSWERK, a sea-port of Denmark, in a bay on the north coast of the island of Zealand. Here are a cannon foundry, and manufactures of various military articles, established in the year 1756, by general Classen. FREDERICKTOWN, a flourishing town of Maryland, capital of Frederick county seated on Caroll's creek, &c. It is forty-seven miles west by north of Baltimore, and 148 south-west of Philadelphia. FREE, adj. & v.a. FREE DOM, N. s. FREELY, adv. FREE NESS, n. s. Sax. Fлeah, Fлeo; Bel. vry; Goth. fri; Teutonic frey. We shall give the numerous applications of this word, and the illustrations in the usual order, and then present it distinctly in every word in which it is used in composition. At liberty; not a vassal; not enslaved; not a prisoner; not dependent; uncompelled; unrestrained: of choosing, as opposed to bondage or necessity; permitted; allowed; licentious; open; ingenuous; frank; without reserve; liberal; spontaneous; clear from; guiltless; innocent; exempt from; invested with franchises; possessing any thing without vassalage; admitted to the privileges of any body corporate; without expense; a free-school, is a charity-school; to set at liberty; to rescue from slavery or captivity; to manumit; to loose; to rid from; to clear from any thing ill: with of or from; to clear from impediments or obstructions. -This song I have heard say Id. Legend Hypsipyle and Medea. In prison though thy bodie be At large kepe thine herte fre A trewe hert ne will not plie, For no manace that it mai drie. Id. Romaunt of the Rose. Yet shall they not escape so freely all; For some shall pay the price of others guilt: And he, the man that made Sansfoy to fall, Shall with his owne blood price that he hath spilt. Spenser's Faerie Queene. The laws themselves they do specially rage at, as most repugnant to their liberty and natural freedom. Spenser on Ireland, Their use of meats was not like unto our ceremonies, that being a matter of private action in common life, where every man was free to order that which himself did; but this is a publick constitution for the ordering of the church. Hooker. Do faithful homage, and receive free honours, All which we pine for now. Shakspeare. Macbeth. Glo'ster too, a foe to citizens, O'erchanging your free purses; with large fines, That seeks to overthrow religion. Shakspeare. If my son were my husband, I would freelier rejoice in that absence wherein he won honour, than in the embracements of his bed, where he would show most love. Id. Coriolanus. Who alone suffers, suffers most i' th' mind, Leaving free things and happy shows behind. Shakspeare. Make mad the guilty, and appal the free, The child was prisoner to the womb, and is If any be, the trespass of the queen. Shakspeare. Are such allowed infirmities, that honesty Is never free of. Id. Winter's Tale. "Tis not to make me jealous; To say my wife is fair, feeds well, loves company, Is free of speech, sings, plays, and dances well, Where virtue is, these make more virtuous. Shakspeare. Why, sir, I pray, are not the streets as free For me as for you? Id. Taming of the Shrew. We may again Give to our tables meat, sleep to our nights, Free from our feasts and banquets bloody knives. Shakspeare. By our holy Sabbath have I sworn And ever since I strive in vain Bacon. Cowley. It is no marvail, that he could think of no better way to be freed of these inconveniences the passions of those meetings gave him, than to dissolve them. Clarendon. Defaming as impure what God declares Pure; and commands to some, leaves free to all. Milton. Freely they stood who stood, and fell who fell. Not free, what proof could they have given sincere Of true allegiance, constant faith, or love, Where only what they needs must do, appeared; Not what they would? Milton's Paradise Lost. How can we think any one freer than to have the power to do what he will? Id. I hope it will never be said that the laity, who by the clergy are taught to be charitable, shall in their corporations exceed the clergy itself, and their sons, in freeness of giving. Sprat. By nature all things have an equally common use : nature freely and indifferently opens the bosoms of the universe to all mankind. South. In every sin by how much the more free will is in its choice, by so much is the act the more sinful, and where there is nothing to importune, urge, or provoke the will to any act, there is so much an higher and perfecter degree of freedom about that act. Free and familiar with misfortune grow, Be used to sorrow, and inured to woe. Should thy coward tongue Id. Prior. Spread its cold poison through the martial throng, Pope. I know there are to whose presumptuous thoughts Those freer beauties, e'en in them, seem faults. Id. To gloomy cares my thoughts alone are free, Ill the gay sports with troubled thoughts agree. Id. Let such teach others who themselves excel, And censure freely who have written well. Id. Alexandrian verses, of twelve syllabies, should never be allowed but when some remarkable beauty or propriety in them atones for the liberty: Mr. Dryden has been too free of these in his latter works. Id. This prince first gave freedom to servants, so as to become citizens of equal privileges with the rest, which very much increased the power of the people. Swift. FREEDOM OF CONSCIENCE. See TOLERATION. FREEDOM OF A CORPORATION. See CORPORATION. The freedom of cities, and other corporations, is regularly obtained by serving an apprenticeship: but it is also purchased with money, and sometimes conferred by way of compliment. FREE-BENCH. See BENCH, FREE. FREE BOOTER, n. s. ? Free and booty. FREE BOOTING, n. s. SA robber; a plunderer; a pillager; robbery; plunder; the act of pillaging. Under it he may cleanly convey any fit pillage, that cometh handsomely in his way; and when he goeth abroad in the night on freebooting, it is his best and surest friend. Spenser. Perkin was not followed by any English of name, his forces consisted mostly of base people and freebooters, fitter to spoil a coast than to recover a kingdom. Bacon. The earl of Warwick had, as often as he met with any Irish frigates, or such freebooters as sailed under their commission, taken all the seamen. Clarendon. 2 R Not O baseness, to support a tyrant's throne, I shall speak my thoughts like a freeborn subject, such things perhaps as no Dutch commentator could, and I am sure no Frenchman durst. Shall freeborn men, in humble awe, Submit to servile shame; Id. Id. Who from consent and custom draw The same right to be ruled by law, Which kings pretend to reign? FREECHA'PEL, n. s. Free and chapel. Such chapels as are of the king's foundations, and by him exempted from the jurisdiction of the ordinary. The king may also license a subject to found such a chapel, and by his charter exempt it from the ordinary's visitation. FREE COST, n. s. Free and cost. out expense; free from charges. With A lease for ninety-nine years, &c., determina ble upon a life or lives, is not a lease for life to make a freehold, but a lease for years, or chattel determinable upon life or lives; and an estate for 1000 years is not a freehold, or of so high a nature as an estate for life. Co. Lit. 6. He that hath an estate for the term of his own life, or the life of another hath a freehold, and no other of a less estate; though they of a greater estate have a freehold, as tenant in fee, &c., Lit. 57. FREEHOLD, or frank tenement; liberum tenementum. See FEE and TAIL. A FREEHOLD, by the common law, cannot commence in futuro; but it must take effect presently, either in possession, reversion, or remainder. Whatever is part of the freehold goes to the heir; and things fixed thereto may not be taken in distress for rent or in execution, &c. No man shall be disseised of his freehold by statute Magna Charta, cap. 29, but by judgment of his peers, or according to the laws of the land: nor shall any distrain freeholders to answer for their freehold in any thing concerning the same without the king's writ. Freehold estates, of certain value, are required by statutes to qualify jurors, electors of the knights of the shire in Lat. parliament, &c. We must not vouch any man for an exact master in the rules of our modern policy, but such a one as has brought himself so far to hate and despise the absurdity of being kind upon freecost, as not so much as to tell a friend what it is o'clock for nothing. FREEDMAN, n. s. Freed and man. libertus. A slave manumitted. South. FREEFO'OTED, adj. Free and foot. restrained in the march. We will fetters put upon this fear, FREEHOLD, in geography, a town of New Jersey, in Monmouth county, fifteen miles west of Shrewsbury, twenty south-east by south of New Brunswick, and forty-four north-east of Not battle was fought here between the British under Philadelphia. It has an academy. A bloody Sir H. Clinton, and the Americans under general Washington, on the 28th June, 1778. Shakspeare. Hamlet. FREE HEARTED, adj. Free and heart. Liberal; unrestrained. Love must freehearted be, and voluntary; And not inchanted, or by fate constrained. Davies. FREEHOLD, n. s. Free and hold. That land or tenement which a man holdeth in fee, fee-tail, or for term of life. Freehold in deed is the real possession of lands or tenements in fee, fee-tail, or for life. Freehold in law is the right that a man has to such land or tenements before his entry or seizure. Freehold is sometimes taken in opposition to villenage. Land, in the time of the Saxons, was called either bockland, that is holden by book or writing, or foreland, that is holden without writing. The former was held by far better conditions, and by the better sort of tenants, as noblemen and gentlemen, being such as we now call freehold. The latter was commonly in the possession of clowns, being that which we now call at the will of the lord. FREEHOLD is extended to offices, which a man holds either in fee, or during life; and, in the register of writs, it is said, that he who holds land upon an execution of a statute-merchant until he is satisfied, the debt holds as freehold to him and his assigns, and the same of a tenant by elegit; but such tenants are not in fact freeholders, only as freeholders for their time, till they have received the profits of the land to the value of their debt. Reg. Judic. 68. 73. FREEHOLDERS, in the ancient laws of Scotland, are called milites, knights. In Reg. Judicia, it is expressed, that he who holds lands upon an execution of a statute merchant, until he hath satisfied the debt, tenet ut liberum tenementum sibi et assignatis suis; and the same of a tenant per elegit; the meaning of which seems to be, not that such tenants are freeholders, but as freeholders for the time, till they have received profits to the value of their debt. FREEMAN, n. s. Free and man. One not a slave; not a vassal; one partaking of rights, privileges or immunities. Had you rather Cæsar were living, and die all slaves, than that Cæsar were dead, to live all freeShakspeare. men? He made us freemen of the continent, What nature did like captives treat before. Dryden. If to break loose from the conduct of reason, and to want that restraint of examination and judgment which keeps us from chusing or doing the worst, be liberty, true liberty, madmen and fools are the only ing in this manner in an hour, as an equal number of our people do in a day or two. Though this stone is as soft as dry clay when first taken up, it is found to harden so considerably in the air, that it becomes more than equal to our ordinary freestone. The Portland stone of the finest kind, which is white, and of a close grit, is very fit for hewing and carving; but it will neither resist water nor fire; while the free-stone of Kent, which is less beautiful to the eye, and is of a grayish color, and considerably close, though of a larger grain, resists the air and water very well. The freestone of Derbyshire, on the other hand, FREEMINDED, adj. Free and mind. Un- is so brittle as to be unfit for any fine working; perplexed; without load of care. freemen. Locke. What this union was is expressed in the preceding verse, by their both having been made freemen on the same day. Addison. To be freeminded, and cheerfully disposed at hours of meat, sleep, and exercise, is one of the best precepts of long lasting. Bacon. FREESCHO'OL, n. s. Free and school. A school in which learning is given without pay. To give a civil education to the youth of this land in the time to come, provision was made by another law, that there should be one freeschool at least erected in every diocese. Davies. Two clergymen stood candidates for a small free school; a gentleman who happened to have a better understanding than his neighbours, procured the place for him who was the better scholar. Swift. FREESPOKEN, adj. Free and spoken. Accustomed to speak without reserve. Nerva one night supped privately with some six or seven; amongst whom there was one that was a dangerous man, and began to take the like courses as Marcellas and Regulus had done: the emperor fell into discourse of the injustice and tyranny of the former time, and, by name, of the two accusers; and said, What should we do with them, if we had them now? One of them that was at supper, and was a freespoken senator, said, Marry, they should sup with Bacon. us. FREESTONE is a whitish stone, dug up in many parts of Britain, that works like alabaster, but is more hard and durable; being of great use in building, &c. It is a species of the grit stone, but finer grained, and smoother. The qualities of the several kinds of freestones used in the different parts of Europe vary much. They all agree in this general property indeed, that they are softer while in the quarry, than when they have been some time exposed to the air: but even this general property differs greatly in degree. They have a sort of gray freestone in use in Paris (of which we have not yet met with any in this country), which has the above mentioned quality in so great a degree, that the expense of working it is in a great measure saved. This stone lies every where on the south side of the river Seine, and is of a coarse and large grit. It is so soft, when newly taken out of the strata, that they fashion it very conveniently with a sort of broad axe, and form as many stones for build and so coarse and open in its texture, that it lets water through; yet it bears the fire extremely well, and is fit for ovens, hearths, &c. FREETHINKER, n. s. Free and think. A libertine; a contemner of religion. Atheist is an old-fashioned word; I'm a freethinker, child. Addison. Of what use is freedom of thought, if it will not produce freedom of action, which is the sole end, how remote soever in appearance, of all objections against it as an edifice, wherein all the parts have such a Christianity? And therefore the freethinkers consider mutual dependence on each other, that if you pull out one single nail, the whole fabrick must fall to the ground. Swift. FREETHINKER. See DEISM and DEIST. FREEWI'LL, n. s. Free and will. The power of directing our own actions without restraint by necessity or fate; voluntariness; spontaneity. I make a decree, that all they of the people of Israel in my realm, which are minded of their own freewill to go up to Jerusalem, go with thee. Ezra vii. 13. We have a power to suspend the prosecution of this or that desire; this seems to me the source of all liberty; in this seems to consist that which is improperly called freewill. Locke. FREEWILL ISLANDS, three small and low islands in the east of the Indian Ocean, disthem Pegan, Onata, and Onella. They are covered by Carteret in 1767. The natives called almost entirely surrounded by a reef, except towards the east, where there is a narrow passage through which a canoe can pass. Onata and Onella lie nearly in a direction east and west, and Pegan is about two miles to the north of them. The inhabitants are friendly, and readily exchanged with captain Carteret some cocoanuts for small pieces of iron, which they much value. They set a high value on iron, so that for some iron tools captain Carteret thought that they might have purchased every thing upon the island. They are tall copper Indians, with long black hair, and small beards, which they pluck by the roots from their chin and upperlip. Their features are pleasing, and their teeth good. They are remarkably agile and vigorous in their movements. On their waist they wear a fine matting covering. Their canoes are well constructed, and planked at the sides; with a sail of matting, an outrigger, and ropes and netting. One of the inhabitants insisting on remaining with the ship's crew, was named Joseph Freewill; from whom they learned that there were other islands northward, whose inhabitants |