FINSEN 



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FIR 



old home-rule privileges. These, however, were 

 very decidedly lessened by a law of 1910 which 

 gives into the hands of the Russian Duma all 

 matters which affect Russia and Finland to- 

 gether. 



In 1918, after the Russian bolsheviki govern- 

 ment announced the policy of "self determina- 

 tion of peoples," Finland demanded inde- 

 pendence, to which the Russian government 

 acceded without protest. Thereupon Germany 

 and Finland signed a peace treaty, making it 

 almost a vassal state to the German Empire, 

 with prospects of a German prince on the throne 

 as king; but the defeat of Germany disrupted 

 this plan and a republic rose on the ruins of 

 German hopes. 



Gulf of Finland. This is a great eastward- 

 stretching arm of the Baltic which juts into 

 the western borders of Russia, having Finland 

 on the north and the Russian governments of 

 Petrograd and Esthonia on the east and south. 

 It has a length of more than 250 miles, and a 

 breadth that varies from ten to eighty miles, 

 the central portion being the widest. Into it 

 empty the waters from lakes Ladoga and. 

 Onega, but so steady is the outward flow that 

 the gulf is only slightly salt. Comparatively 

 shallow, dotted, especially along its northern 

 shores, with rocky islands, and in the winter 

 choked with ice, it offers difficulties to naviga- 

 tion, yet there are several ports on its coasts, 

 of which the most important are Helsingfors, 

 Viborg and Kronstadt. E.D.F. 



FINSEN, NIELS RYBERG (1861-1904), a Dan- 

 ish physician and scientist, the discoverer of 

 the method of curing deep-seated skin diseases, 

 like lupus, with rays of light. He was born in 

 Stromo, in the Faroe Islands, studied medicine 

 at Reykjavik and Copenhagen, and became 

 demonstrator of anatomy in the university in 

 the latter city. His experiments began in an 

 attic room of the surgical academy in Copen- 

 hagen. In 1893 he published an article on 

 The Influence of Light on the Skin which at- 

 tracted immediate attention. After patient 

 research he asserted that smallpox victims 

 could be cured without scars by filtering the 

 light of the room through red glass. 



To develop the positive element of the 

 light cure he employed either the light of the 

 sun or that of an electric arc lamp of 40,000 

 candle power, known as a high-power Finsen 

 lamp. Financial support was given him by the 

 Danish government to establish a Medical 

 Light Institute at Rosenvaenget, near Copen- 

 hagen, and there many cases have been cured 

 137 



which were considered hopeless. Professor Fin- 

 sen received the Nobel medical prize in 1903. 

 When he died nearly every European ruler was 

 represented at his funeral, and leading scien- 

 tists paid him high honors. His system of 

 treatment is used by physicians for the cure 

 of eczema, acne, tuberculous glands and. kin- 

 dred ailments. 



FIORD, or FJORD, fyord, a long, narrow, 

 irregularly-shaped inlet of the sea. The term 

 is of Scandinavian origin, and applies especially 

 to the remarkable indentations on the coast 

 of Norway. They seem to have been made 



FIORDS IN TWO CONTINENTS 

 Only in Scandinavia is the name fiord applied 

 to these indentations of shore lines. 



by glaciers long, long ago. Norway's fiords are 

 a source of joy and wonder to tourists, bor- 

 dered as they are with steep, rocky walls, with 

 here a thickly-wooded spot, there a foaming 

 cascade tumbling down, and perhaps down 

 below, edging it all, a stretch of fine, fertile 

 country. 



Similar inlets of the sea are found in Maine, 

 British Columbia and Southern Alaska. Such 

 inlets on the coast of the British Isles are 

 known as sea locks and firths. The scenery of 

 the fiords of the southwest coast of the South 

 Islands of New Zealand is very imposing. 



FIR, a handsome, cone-bearing evergreen 

 tree, closely related to the pine and resembling 

 the spruce. The fir tree is cone-shaped, and in 

 young specimens the lowest branches touch 

 the ground. The leaves, or needles, are flat, 

 dark green above and light green below, grow- 

 ing in rows on opposite sides of the branches. 



There are a number of species of fir found 

 in cold climates and in many high altitudes 

 throughout the eastern and western hemi- 

 spheres. In America, from Hudson Bay to 

 Virginia and westward to the Great Lakes and 

 Minnesota, the short-lived balsam fir, growing 

 to a height of about thirty feet, is common. 

 The branches furnish a favorite bedding for 

 campers. Its bark furnishes oil used in med- 

 icine to heal and soothe, and specially prepared 

 Canada balsam (which see) is used for mount- 

 ing microscopic specimens. The fresh, fra- 



