FLORIDA STRAITS 



direction to Key West, a distance 

 of about 140 m. These low-lying 

 islands, principally coralline, are 

 traversed by the Florida Coast rly. 

 from Key West to Key Largo, where 

 it joins with the mainland. 



Florida Straits OR CHANNEL. 

 Coastal waters off Florida, U.S.A., 

 alternately known as the New 

 Bahama Channel. They separate 

 the S.E. extremity of Florida and 

 the Florida Keys" from Cuba and 

 the Bahama Islands. The channel 

 is some 300 m. long, has a mean 

 breadth of 80 m., and a greatest 

 depth of 6,000 ft. It is traversed 

 by the Gulf Stream. 



Florideae OR RHODOPHYCEAE. 

 Class of Algae or seaweeds. In 

 them the chlorophyll, or green 

 colouring matter, is masked by a 

 red pigment (phyco-erythrin). 

 They have no true roots, but are 

 attached to their supports by 

 suckers, the absorbent function of 

 roots being carried on by the sur- 

 face cells of the entire plant. 



Floridia. Town of Sicily, in the 

 prov. of Syracuse. It stands on the 

 river Ciani, 7| m. W. of Syracuse, in 

 a fertile district producing cereals, 

 vines, and olives, and trades in grain, 

 wine, and oil. Pop. 12,522. 



Florin. Name of several gold 

 and silver coins of various Euro- 

 pean currencies. A gold coin struck 



Florin. Gold coin of Edward II! ; 

 above, silver florin minted in 1918 



Aclual diameter of Edward III florin, l^ins.; 

 of George V florin, 1 J int. 



at Florence in 1252 bore, obverse, 

 the figure of S. John Baptist, re- 

 verse, the Florentine lily, whence 

 came the name florin (Ital. fiorino, 

 little flower). Similar pieces ap- 

 peared in various parts of Italy as 

 a result of its wide circulation. 

 Gold florins were also minted by 

 Charles I of Anjou, c. 1335, and by 

 John of Luxembourg c. 1340. The 

 English gold florin, of approximate 

 value six shillings, issued by 

 Edward III in 1343, was with- 

 drawn in 1344. 



The British silver <florin, value 

 two shillings, weighs 174*55 grains. 

 It was issued in 1849, and is still 



3212 



minted. It was at first dubbed the 

 " graceless florin," as the customary 

 D.G. (Dei Gratia) did not appear on 

 the issues between 1849-52. The 

 life of a florin in circulation is esti- 

 mated at about 45i years. A double 

 florin, or four-shilling piece, was 

 minted from 1887-90, but proved 

 inconvenient. The Australian florin 

 has the same value as the British. 

 but a different 

 design. Among 

 modern continental 

 florins, the Austrian 

 florin issued in 1857, 

 and the silver florin 

 struck by Louis 

 Napoleon, king of 

 Holland, 1807, are 

 notable, the latter 

 becoming the 

 Dutch gulden. 



Fiorina. Town 

 of Greece, in Mace- 

 donia, formerly in 

 Turkey- in - Europe. 

 It is about 15 m. 

 S.S.E. of Monastir, 

 and was one of the 

 towns in the tract 

 of territory acquired 

 by Greece as a result of the Balkan 

 wars, 1912-13. Pop. 10,155. It 

 came into prominence during the 

 Great War. Captured by the French 

 in April, 1916, it was retaken by the 

 Bulgarians, Aug. 20, 1916, and re- 

 taken by Franco-Russian troops, 

 Sept. 18, 1916. See Salonica, Ex- 

 pedition to ; Serbia, Conquest of. 



Florio, JOHN (c. 1553-1625). 

 Author and translator. Born in 

 London, his father was an Italian, 

 who, being a Protestant, had left 

 his own country for England, 

 where he became minister to 

 a congregation of Italians who 

 shared his religious opinions. The 

 son was educated 

 at Magdalen 

 College, Oxford, 

 became a teach- 

 er of French and 

 Italian in the 

 university, and 

 held various 

 offices at court, 

 including that of 



tutor to Prince f onn FJorio, trans- 

 Henry, son of lator of Mont aige 

 James I. In 1598 appeared his 

 Italian-English dictionary, A World 

 of Words, and in 1603 his famous 

 translation of Montaigne's Essays, 

 on which his reputation rests. He 

 compiled two collections of pro- 

 verbs, sayings, etc. Florio died 

 of the plague at Fulham. Ben 

 Jonson was one of his friends. 



Florist. Cultivator or vendor of 

 plants and flowers. The florist in 

 large towns deals largely in exotic 

 flowers raised under glass, and also 

 imports flowers from milder cli- 



FLOSCULARIA 



mates. The Scilly Islands and the 

 S. of Europe furnish many of the 

 flowers sold by London florists. 

 Floral Hall, in Covent Garden 

 market, is devoted to the sale of 

 flowers. See Flower Farming. 



Florizel. Character in Shake- 

 speare's A Winter's Tale. He is 

 the son of Polixenes, king of Bo- 

 hemia, and falls in love with Per- 



Florizel, in Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale, watches 

 Perdita offering flowers to her disguised enemies 



From the picture by C. R. Leslie, fi.A. 



dita, who, brought up by a Bohe- 

 mian shepherd, is the lost daughter 

 of Leontes, king of Sicily. The 

 name was applied to the Prince 

 Regent (George IV) on his amour 

 with the actress " Perdita " (Mary) 

 Robinson, whom he first saw play- 

 ing in A Winter's Tale. 



Florodora. Musical comedy 

 written by Owen Hall (James 

 Davis) and composed by Leslie 

 Stuart. It was produced Nov. 11, 

 1899, at the Lyric Theatre, London, 

 where it ran for 455 continuous 

 performances. 



Florus (2nd century A.D.). Ro- 

 man historian. Nothing is known 

 of him except that he lived during 

 the reign of Hadrian. His work, 

 called an Epitome, treats of the 

 military history of Rome from the 

 regal period down to the reign of 

 Augustus. It was written in a florid 

 and poetical style, a glorification of 

 Rome rather than a history, and 

 notwithstanding its inaccuracies, 

 was much used by later historians 

 and the chroniclers of the Middle 

 Ages. The title of the work and the 

 author's name are variously given. 

 By some he is identified with Pub- 

 lius Annius Florus, African by birth, 

 a poet and friend of Hadrian. An- 

 other Florus (Julius) was a friend 

 of Horace, who addressed two 

 epistles to him. 



Floscularia, OR FLOWER ANI- 

 MALCULE. Group of rotifers, com- 

 mon in most ponds. The body is 

 supported on a slender stalk con- 

 tained in a gelatinous tube, and 

 the wheel-disk is provided with 

 long, bristle-like processes which 



