FOX 



FRA 



practice has lately been introduced 

 ot' laying foundations on a bed of 

 what is called concrete, which is a mix- 

 ture of rough, small stones or large 

 gravel stones with sand and stone, 

 lime and water, with just enough of 

 the lime to act as a cementitious me- 

 dium with the best effect. See Cmi- 

 crete. 



FOUNTAIN. A jet of water or 

 fluid. The simplest way of forming 

 a fountain is to conduct water by a 

 small pipe from a higher elevation, 

 where a tank or other reservoir ex- 

 ists ; the open end of the tube below 

 being made fine, the fluid is driven 

 out with a pressure proportionate to 

 the height of the reservoir, and, 

 springing into the air, produces a 

 fountain. Groups of statuary are 

 beautifully displaved in fountains. 



FOVEATUS, FOVEATE. Hav- 

 ing a depression or pit : applied to the 

 nectary of flowers. 



FOVILLA. The yellow fluid con- 

 tained in pollen. 



FOWL. See Poultry. 

 FOX. Canis wipes, Lin. The de- 

 struction committed by this animal 

 and his great address in escaping have 

 tasked the farmer's wits to destroy 

 him. Good dogs are unquestionably 

 the best remedy ; but traps of all 

 kinds, baited with flesh, are also ex- 

 tensively employed. The fox is led 

 to these by trailing the entrails of a 

 sheep or hog from his retreats to the 

 trap. In the same way, the trail may 

 be made to a tree, and the garbage 

 left, the farmer ascending a tree in 

 the neighbourhood, and waiting with 

 a gun to shoot the fox. A large trap, 

 like the old rat trap, may be fixed in 

 the grass of a field, well hidden, and 

 baited with a fowl. 



FOX EVIL. A disease in which 

 the hair falls out. 



FOXGLOVE. Digitalis purpurea. 

 An exotic biennial plant, with hand- 

 some flowers, of great value in med- 

 icine as a sedative and diuretic. It i 

 is extremely poisonous, but is cuiti- I 

 vated with great care in drills eigh- 

 teen inches apart. The plants should ■ 

 be kept free from weeds, cultivated 

 in a dry soil, and freely exposed to j 



; the sun. The leaves are collected 

 when full grown, in the second year, 

 and just before flowering ; they should 

 be dried by exposure to the sun, and 

 put up in tinned vessels. The leaves 

 onlv are valuable. 



FOXTAIL GRASS. Grasses of 

 the genus Pennisetum, formerly -S'e- 

 traria. The mo5t common {P. glan- 

 cum) is the coarse grass that springs 

 up in stubble. None of them, except P. 

 Gcrmanicum, Bengal grass, is worth 

 cultivation, aiitl this is very inferior 

 to the ordmary plants. It is an an- 

 nual, sown in spring, and grows from 

 two to four feet high with the flower 

 stems. 



FOXY. Sour or harsh. 

 FRACTURE. In farriery, the 

 breakage of a bone in the body. Frac- 

 tures are called simple when the bone 

 is broken without tearing the mus- 

 cles and passing through the skin, and 

 compound in the latter case. The 

 treatment requires care and atten- 

 tion. The broken ends of the bones 

 are first to be nicely brought togeth- 

 er by the surgeon, and then bound by 

 splints. The splints are usually slabs 

 of wood of a proper length and width 

 to fit the limb, or stiff pasteboard 

 soaked until it bends freely, and ad- 

 justed to the limb ; the splint is bound 

 on by a long riband of cotton. Splints 

 should be sufficiently long to reach to 

 the joints above and below the frac- 

 ture, to restrain their motion. The 

 animal should be bled if feverish, and 

 kept low. It is sometimes necessa- 

 ry to suspend them in the stable, by 

 passing a stout cloth under the body, 

 and fastening its ends to the upper 

 frame-work of the stable. In from 

 three to five weeks the bones are usu- 

 ally reunited. 



FRACTURE. In mineralogy, the 

 appearance of a broken mineral which 

 is not crystalline. It is termed res- 

 inous, choncoidal, vitreous, earthy, 

 &c., according as it resembles that of 

 resin, a shell, glass, or earth. 



FRACTURES IN TREES. When 

 they occur in the smaller branches, 

 from excess of iruit, they readily unite 

 by propping up to the natural posi- 

 tion, if the accident occurs before the 



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