196 



FINGAL'S CAVE FINLAND. 



tions are celebrated in the two remaining poems of 

 Ossian, Fingal, and Temora. In the lattf r, the hero 

 appears with his grandson Oscar, the son of Ossian. 

 Ossian sings his death, without giving the particular 

 circumstances. Fingal's character, as sketched by 

 Ossian's poem, is that of a noble hero, the father of 

 Ins people ; he spares the weak, and protects the 

 poor. Fingal was also a poet. 



FINGAL'S CAVE ; s cavern supported by basal- 

 tic columns, in the island of Stafta, one of the He- 

 brides. It is one of the most remarkable natural 

 curiosities; is 227 feet long, 166 feet high, and 40 

 feet wide. Thje floor is formed by the waters of the 

 sea, which never ebbs entirely out, and is deep 

 enough for boats. On all sides rise regular columns 

 of basalt, some entire, some broken,the bases of which 

 compose and support the vault. The water, trickling 

 down in the interior of the cave from, the rocks, 

 produces harmonious sounds. 



FINGER-BOARD; that thin, black covering of 

 wood, laid over the neck of a violin, violoncello, &c., 

 and on which, in performance, the strings are pressed 

 by the fingers of the left hand, while the right mana- 

 ges the bow. 



FINGERING ; disposing of the fingers in a con- 

 venient, natural, and apt manner in the performance 

 of any instrument, but more especially the organ and 

 piano-forte. Good fingering is one of the first things 

 to which a judicious master attends. It is, indeed, 

 to this that the pupil must look as the means for 

 acquiring a facile and graceful execution, and the 

 power of giving passages with articulation, accent, 

 and expression. Easy passages may be rendered 

 difficult, and difficult ones impracticable, by bad 

 fingering ; and though there are many arrangements 

 of notes which admit of various fingering, still, even 

 in these, there is always one best way of disposing of 

 the hand, either with regard to the notes themselves, 

 or those which precede or follow them. But there 

 are an infinite number of possible dispositions of notes, 

 which can only be fingered in one particular way 

 and every attempt at any other is but endangering 

 the establishment of some awkwardness, which the 

 practitioner will have to unlearn before he can hope 

 to attain the true fingering. Hence it is obvious, 

 that no qualification requisite to good performance is 

 of more importance to the learner than that of just 

 fingering, and that, whatever talents, and assiduity 

 may be able to achieve, independent of instruction, in 

 this great particular, the directions of a skilful master 

 are indispensable. 



F1NIGUERRA, TOMMASO (by contraction, Maso) ; 

 a celebrated sculptor and goldsmith, to whom is 

 ascribed the invention of copper-plate printing. He 

 lived at Florence, about the middle of the fifteenth 

 century. The year of his birth and that of his death 

 are unknown. His family had flourished in that 

 city since 1213. He was a scholar of Lorenzo Ghi- 

 berti, who sculptured the famous bronze doors of the 

 baptistery of St John the Baptist, at Florence. He 

 seems to have been himself engaged in the second, 

 which was begun in 1425, and completed in 1445. 

 He was distinguished in the art called niello. This 

 art, which ceased to be cultivated in the time of Leo 

 X. consisted in enchasing dark metallic substances, 

 called in Latin nigeilum, into cavities worked on gold 

 or silver, and fixing them by fusion. Many have 

 regarded the German painter Martin Schon as the 

 inventor of copperplate printing ; but this painter 

 made no impressions till after 1 460. Peace, executed 

 in niello, by Finiguerra, in 1452, and the Crowning 

 of the Virgin, are still to be seen in the church of St 

 John at Florence. The drawing of the latter is 

 natural and correct, and not destitute of elevation. 

 He also executed a great part of the bassreliefs in 



silver, on an altar, which is still used on great festi- 

 vals in the church just named. Of his works in 

 niello, Finiguerra is not known with certainty to have 

 made impressions except in sulphur. Zani, however,, 

 found an impression of the plate of the Coronation in 

 St John's church, preserved in the cabinet national at 

 Paris, and this is the only reason for attributing to 

 him the invention of copperplate printing. (Some 

 account of Finiguerra's invention is given in the 

 work of the abbot Zani, Materiali per scrvire alia 

 Storia dell' Origins e de 1 Progres& delta Incisione in 

 Rome ed in Legno, Parma, 1802 ; also Bartsch's 

 Peintre-Graveur, 13th vol.) Designs by Finiguerra 

 in aquarell are also preserved in the Florentine gal- 

 lery. 



FINISTERE, or FINISTERRE ; a department of 

 France ; part of Lower Brittany. See Department. 



FINISTERRE, cape ; the most western cape of 

 Spain, on the coast of Galicia, 42 54' N. lat. ; 13 

 50' 38" W. Ion. The highest peak of the mountain, 

 of which the cape forms a part, is 1917 feet above 

 the sea ; it may be seen seventeen leagues out at sea. 

 The Romans called it Finis Terr en ; also Artalrum, 

 from the Artabri, the tribe which they found there. 



FINLAND; a Russian grand principality, contain- 

 ing 135,600 square miles, and 1,378,500 inhabitants, 

 and divided into twelve circles. It consists of three 

 parts; I. that part of Finland ceded by Sweden to 

 Russia by the peace of Abo in 1743. and by the 

 peace of Nystadt, in 1721 ; 2. that part which was 

 ceded by Sweden at the peace of Fredericksham, in 

 1809, including all the rest of Swedish Finland ; and, 

 3. that part of East Bothnia and Lapland, ceded by 

 the same peace. The grand principality of Finland 

 was constituted August 6, 1809. The administra- 

 tion is entirely different from that of the other Russian 

 provinces. A governor-general, with fourteen coun- 

 sellors, all Finns, is at the head of the government. 

 Since 1826, the affairs of Finland have been managed 

 at St Petersburg, by a separate department of state. 

 The capital is Helsingfors, to which the highest 

 authority, the senate and council, was transferred 

 from Abo, October 1, 1819. It lias 8000 inhabitants, 

 and considerable commerce, and is defended by the 

 fortress of Sweaborg. The country, in some parts, 

 is mountainous and rocky, being traversed by the 

 continuations of the Scandinavian mountains, and, in 

 others, is sandy, marshy, and abounding in Takes. 

 The Kymmene is the most important river. Though 

 so great a portion of the soil is unfit for agriculture, 

 some parts are fertile in grain, potatoes, and flax, and 

 good for grazing. The woods abound in bears and 

 wolves, and the lakes are full offish. Hunting and 

 fishing are the chief occupations of many of the 

 Finns. 



The* following cut represents the costume of Fin- 

 land boors : 



