[1] The measurements given are from nose to root of tail of average
large sizes after the dressing process, which has a shrinking
tendency. The depths of fur quoted are the greatest, but there are
plenty of good useful skins possessing a lesser depth.
[2] Stout, old-fashioned boxcloth is almost the only cloth that
(after a soft, heavy lining has been added to it) affords even
two-thirds as much protection against cold as does fur. It weighs
4.273 oz. per sq. ft. more than the heaviest of coat-furs, and is so
rigid as to be uncomfortable, while the subtileness of fur makes it
"kind" to the body.
FURAZANES (_furo_--a.a'--_diazoles_), organic compounds obtained by
heating the glyoximes (dioximes of ortho-diketones) with alkalis or
ammonia. Dimethylfurazane is prepared by heating dimethylglyoxime with
excess of ammonia for six hours at 165 deg. C. (L. Wolff, _Ber._, 1895,
28, p. 70). It is a liquid (at ordinary temperature) which boils at 156
deg. C. (744 mm.). Potassium permanganate oxidizes it first to
methylfurazane-carboxylic acid and then to furazanedicarboxylic acid.
Methyl-ethylfurazane and diphenylfurazane are also known. By warming
oxyfurazane acetic acid with excess of potassium permanganate to 100
deg. C. oxyfurazanecarboxylic acid is obtained (A. Hantzsch and J.
Urbahn, _Ber._, 1895, 28, p. 764). It crystallizes in prisms, which melt
at 175 deg. C. Furazanecarboxylic acid is prepared by the action of a
large excess of potassium permanganate on a hot solution of
furazanepropionic acid. It melts at 107 deg. C, and dissolves in caustic
soda, with a deep yellow colour and formation of nitrosocyanacetic acid
(L. Wolff and P.F. Ganz, _Ber._, 1891, 24, p. 1167). Furoxane is an
oxide of furazane, considered by H. Wieland to be identical with
glyoxime peroxide; Kekules dibromnitroacetonitrile is dibromfuroxane.
The formulae of the compounds above mentioned are:
HC:N\ CH3.C:N\ HC:N\ HC--CH \
. O . O . O .. . O
HC:N/ CH3.C:N/ HO2C.C:N/ N.O.N /
Furazane. Dimethyl- Furazanecarboxylic Furoxane.
furazane. acid.
FURETIERE, ANTOINE (1619-1688), French scholar and miscellaneous writer,
was born in Paris on the 28th of December 1619. He first studied law,
and practised for a time as an advocate, but eventually took orders and
after various preferments became abbe of Chalivoy in the diocese of
Bourges in 1662. In his leisure moments he devoted himself to letters,
and in virtue of his satires--_Nouvelle Allegorique, ou histoire des
derniers troubles arrives au royaume d'eloquence_ (1658); _Voyage de
Mercure_ (1653)--he was admitted a member of the French Academy in 1662.
That learned body had long promised a complete dictionary of the French
tongue; and when they heard that Furetiere was on the point of issuing a
work of a similar nature, they interfered, alleging that he had
purloined from their stores, and that they possessed the exclusive
privilege of publishing such a book. After much bitter recrimination on
both sides the offender was expelled in 1685; but for this act of
injustice he took a severe revenge in his satire, _Couches de
l'academie_ (Amsterdam, 1687). His _Dictionnaire universel_ was
posthumously published in 1690 (Rotterdam, 2 vols.). It was afterwards
revised and improved by the Protestant jurist, Henri Basnage de Beauval
(1656-1710), who published his edition (3 vols.) in 1701; and it was
only superseded by the compilation known as the _Dictionnaire de
Trevoux_ (Paris, 3 vols., 1704; 7th ed., 8 vols., 1771), which was in
fact little more than a reimpression of Basnage's edition. Furetiere is
perhaps even better known as the author of _Le Roman bourgeois_ (1666).
It cast ridicule on the fashionable romances of Mlle de Scudery and of
La Calprenede, and is of interest as descriptive of the ~~ everyday
life of his times. There is no element of burlesque, as in Scarron's
_Roman comique_, but the author contents himself with stringing together
a number of episodes and portraits, obviously drawn from life, without
much attempt at sequence. The book was edited in 1854 by Edward Fournier
and Charles Asselineau and by P. Jannet.
The _Fureteriana_, which appeared in Paris eight years after
Furetiere's death, which took place on the 14th of May 1688, is a
collection of but little value.
FURFOOZ, a village some 10 m. from Dinant in the Ardennes, Belgium.
Three caves containing prehistoric remains were here excavated in 1872.
Of these the _Trou de Frontal_ is the most famous. In it were found
human skeletons with brachycephalic skulls, associated with animal
bones, those of the reindeer being particularly plentiful. Among the
skeletons was discovered an oval vase of pottery. The Furfooz type of
mankind is believed to date from the close of the Quaternary age. G. de
Mortillet dates the type in the Robenhausen epoch of the Neolithic
period. His theory is that the bones are those of men of that period
buried in what had been a cave-dwelling of the Madelenian epoch.
FURFURANE, or FURANE, C4H4O, a colourless liquid boiling at 32 deg. C.,
found in the distillation products of pine wood. It was first
synthetically prepared by H. Limpricht (_Ann._, 1873, 165, p. 281) by
distilling barium mucate with soda lime, pyromucic acid C4H3O.CO2H being
formed, which, on further loss of carbon dioxide, yielded furfurane. A.
Henniger (_Ann. chim. phys._, 1886 [2], 7, p. 220), by distilling
erthyrite with formic acid, obtained a dihydrofurfurane