Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 9.djvu/523

 F O U F O W 491 in this, ho was appointed professor of mathematics in the school in which he had been a pupil. This post he held for about four years (1789-1794), and during this time he was frequently called to lecture on other subjects, rhetoric, philosophy, and history. On the institution of the normal school at Paris he was sent to teach in it, arid was after wards attached to the polytechnic school. Fourier was one of the savants who accompanied Bonaparte to Egypt in 1798; and during this expedition he was called to discharge important political duties in addition to his scientific ones. He was for a time virtually governor of half Egypt, was for three years secretary of the institute of Cairo, and undertook to deliver the funeral orations for Kli&er and Desaix. On his return to France he was nominated prefect of Grenoble, and was created baron and chevalier of the Legion of Honour. Ho took an important part in the preparation of the famous Description de I Egypte, and wrote the historical introduction. He held his prefecture for 14 years; and it was during this period that he carried on his elaborate and fruitful investigations on the propagation of heat in solid bodies. His first memoir on the mathematical theory of heat was crowned by the Academy. On the return of Napoleon I. from Elba in 1815, Fourier published a royalist proclamation, and left Grenoble as Napoleon entered it. He was then deprived of his prefecture, and, although immediately named prefect of the Rhone, was soon after again deprived. He now settled at Paris, was elected to the Academy of Sciences in 1816, but in consequence of the opposition of Louis XVIII. was not admitted till the following year, and was afterwards made perpetual secretary in conjunction with Cuvier. In 1822 he published his most celebrated work, entitled La Tkeorie Analytique de la C/ialeur, which by its new methods and great results made an epoch in the history of mathematical and physical science. Of this work M. Cousin said that the grandeur of its results was no more to be questioned than their certainty, and that in the opinion of scientific Europe the novelty of the analysis on which they rest is as evident as its completeness. In 1827 Fourier was received at the French Academy, and the same year succeeded Laplace as president of the council of the polytechnic school. In 1828 he became a member of the Government commission established for the encouragement of literature. He died at Paris, May 1C, 1830. After his death appeared his remarkable work en titled Analyse des equations determines, which was written in his youth and left unfinished. It was completed and edited by M. Navier in 1831. In addition to the works above mentioned, Fourier wrote many memoirs on scien tific subjects, and eloges of distinguished men of science. FOURMONT, F.TIENNE (1683-1745), a French Orientalist, was born at Habelai, near Saint Denis, in 1683. He studied in Mazarin College, and afterwards in the seminary of Trente-trois. Here his attention was attracted to Oriental languages, and shortly after leaving the seminary he published a Traduction du Commentaire du Rabbin Abraham Aben Esra sur V Ecdesiaste. He sub sequently studied at Navarre, and in 1705 brought out Nou- velle Critique Sacree, which gained him the notice of the professors of the Sorbonne. In 1 7 1 1 Louis XIV. appointed Fourmont to assist a young Chinese, Hoan-ji, in compiling a Chinese grammar, and notwithstanding that Hoan-ji died in 1716, Fourmont persevered alone at the task assigned him, and published in 1737 Meditationes Sinicce, and in 1742 Grammatica Sinica. Besides numerous other works connected with Oriental literature, he is the author of Re flexions Critiques sur les Histoires des Anciem Peuples, Paris, 1735, and several dissertations printed in the Ale- moires of the Academy of Inscriptions. He became pro fessor of Arabic in the Royal College in 1715. In 1713 he was elected a member of the Academy of Inscriptions, in 1738 a member of the Royal Society of London, and in 1741 a member of that of Berlin. Ho died at Paris in December 1745. He must not be confounded with Michel Fourmont (1690-1740), his youngest brother, who also was a member of the Academy of Inscriptions, was pro fessor of the Syriac language in the Royal College, and was sent by the Government to copy inscriptions in Greece. FOURNIER, PIERRE SIMON (1712-1768), French engraver and typefounder, was born at Paris, September 15, 1712. He was the son of a printer, and was brought up to his father s business. After studying drawing under the painter Colson, ho practised for some time the art of wood-engraving, and ultimately turned his attention to the engraving and casting of types. He designed many new characters, and his foundry became celebrated not only in France but in foreign countries. Not content with his practical achievements, he sought to stimulate public inte rest in his art by the production of various works on the subject. In 1737 he published his Table des Propor tions qu il faut observer entre les Caracteres, which was followed by several other technical treatises. In 1758 he assailed the title of Guttenberg to the honour awarded him as inventor of printing, claiming it for SchofFer, in his Dissertation sur COrigine et les Progres de I Art de graver en Bois. This gave rise to a controversy in which Schopflin and Baer were his opponents. Fournier s contributions to this debate were collected and reprinted under the title of Traites historiques et critiques sur VOrigine de I lm- primerie. His principal work, however, was the Manuel Typogrcrphique, which appeared in 2 vols. 8vo in 1764, the first volume treating of engraving and type-founding, the second of printing, with examples of different alphabets. It was the author s design to complete the work in four volumes, but he did not live to execute it. He died at Paris, October 8, 1768. FOWL (Danish Fugl, German Vogel), originally used in the sense that Bird 1 now is, but, except in composition, as Sea-Fowl, Wild-Fowl, and the like, practically almost confined 2 at present to designate the otherwise nameless species which struts on our dunghills, gathers round our barn-doors, or stocks our poultry yards the type of the genus Gallus of ornithologists, of which four well-marked species are known. The/rs^ of these is the Red Jungle- Fowl of the greater part of India, G. fernigineus, called by many writers G. bankiva, which is undoubtedly the parent stock of all the domestic races (cf. Darwin, Animals and Plants under Domestication, i. pp. 233-246). It inhabits Northern India from Sindh to Burmah and Cochin China, as well as the Malay Peninsula and many of the islands as far as Timor, besides the Philippines. It occurs on the Himalayas up to the height of 4000 feet, and its southern limits in the west of India proper are, according to Jerdon, found on the Raj-peepla hills to the south of the Nerbudda, and in the- east near the left bank of the Godavery, or perhaps even further, as he had heard of its being killed at Cummum. This species greatly resembles in plumage what is commonly known among poultry-fanciers as the &quot; Black -breasted Game&quot; breed, and this is said to be especially the case with examples from the Malay countries, between which and examples from India some differences are observable the latter having the plumage less red, the ear-lappets almost invariably white, and slate- coloured legs, while in the former the ear-lappets are crimson, like the comb and wattles, and the legs yellowish. 1 Bird (cognate with breed and brood) was originally the young of any animal, and an early Act of the Scottish parliament speaks of &quot; Wolf-birdis,&quot; i.e., Wolf-cubs. 2 Like Deer (Danish Dyr, German Tkicr). Beast, too, with some men has almost attained as much specialization.