fiction 
(c) In a wide sense, not now current, any lit- 
erary product of the imagination, whether in 
prose or verse, or in a narrative or dramatic 
form, or such works collectively. 5. In law, 
the intentional assuming as a fact of what is 
not such (the truth of the matter not being 
considered), for the purpose of administering 
justice without contravening settled rules or 
making apparent exceptions ; a legal device for 
reforming or extending the application of the 
law without appearing to alter the law itself. 
Inasmuch as the courts cannot alter the law, but only de- 
clare it and apply it to facts ascertained by them, it was 
early discovered that the only way in which they could 
adapt the law to hard cases, or stretch it to new cases, was 
by pretending a state of facts to fit the rule of law it was 
thought just to apply. Thusitwasaruleof law that a deed 
takes effect from delivery, and the courts had no power to 
alter this rule ; but if a grantor fraudulently or negligently 
delayed delivering his deed at the time it bore date, and 
afterward sought to claim some unjust advantage, as hav- 
ing continued to be owner meanwhile, the courts, not be- 
ing able to change the rule of law, would by a fiction treat 
the delivery as relating back to the date. So, when legis- 
lation forbade transfers of land unless made publicly by 
record, the courts allowed an intending grantee to sue, 
alleging that the land belonged to him, and the intending 
grantor to suffer judgment to pass ; thus by a fiction cre- 
ating a mode of conveyance which, for all practical pur- 
poses, preserved the privacy of titles. Direct methods 
of improving the rules and forms of law have in recent 
times superseded the invention, and for the most part the 
use, of fictions. 
I employ the expression " Legal Fiction " to signify any 
assumption which conceals, or affects to conceal, the fact 
that a rule of law has undergone alteration, its letter re- 
maining unchanged, its operations being modified. 
Maine, Ancient Law, p. 26. 
= Syn. 3. Fabrication, figment, fable, untruth, falsehood. 
fictional (fik'shgn-al), a. [< fiction + -al.} Per- 
taining to or of the nature of fiction ; fictitious- 
ly created ; imaginary. 
Elements which are fictional rather than historical. 
Latham. 
What other cases are there of fictional personages hav- 
ing done the same '! N. and Q., 6th ser., IX. 467. 
They [American theater-managers] have not watched 
the tendencies of the sister arts, painting and fictional 
literature, towards a closer truth to nature. 
The Century, XXXI. 155. 
fictionist (fik'shon-ist), n. [< fiction + -ts.] A 
maker or writer of fiction. 
He will come out in time an ele 
gant fictionist. 
Lamb, To Wordsw 
orth. . 
There still seems room for wonder that in this world of 
facts the fictionist should be entitled to take so high and 
important a place. Contemporary Rev., LI. 58. 
fictioust (fik'shus), a. [< fiction + -ous.~\ Fic- 
titious. 
With fancy'd Rules ami arbitrary Laws 
Matter and Motion he [inanj restrains; 
And study'd Lines and fictions Circles draws. 
Prior, On Exodus iii. 14., st. 6. 
fictitious (fik-tish'us), a. [= Sp. Pg. ficticio, 
< L. ficticitts, improp. fictitius, artificial, coun- 
terfeit, fictitious, < fictus, pp. of fingere, form, 
feign: see fiction.'} 1. Pertaining to or con- 
sisting of fiction; imaginatively produced or 
set forth; created by the imagination: as, a 
fictitious hero; fictitious literature. 
Miss Burney was decidedly the most popular writer of 
fictitious narrative then living. 
Macaulay, Madame D'Arblay. 
A hundred little touches are employed to make the fic- 
titious world appear like the actual world. 
Macaulay, Leigh Hunt. 
2. Existing only in imagination; feigned; not 
true or real: as, a fictitious claim. 
In faithful mem'ry she records the crimes, 
Or real or fictitious, of the times. 
Cowper, Truth, 1. 164. 
He began his married life upon his fictitious, and not 
his actual income. A. Dobson, Int. to Steele, p. xxvi. 
3. Counterfeit ; false ; not genuine. 
The poets began to substitute fictitious names, under 
which they exhibited particular characters. 
Goldsmith, Origin of Poetry. 
Two treaties were drawn up, one on white paper, the 
other on red : the former real, the latter fictitious. 
Macaulay, Lord Clive. 
The woodcock, stiffening to fictitious mud, 
Cheats the young sportsman thirsting for his blood. 
0. W. Holmes, The Mind's Diet. 
4. Assumed as real ; taking the place of some- 
thing real ; regarded as genuine. 
I cannot doubt that the growing popularity of Adoption, 
as a method of obtaining & fictitious son, was due to moral 
dislike of the other modes of affiliation which was steadily 
rising among the Brahman teachers in the law-schools. 
Maine, Early Law and Custom, p. 101. 
Fictitious ens. See en. = Syn. Artificial, unreal, invent- 
ed, spurious, supposititious. See factitious. 
fictitiously (fik-tish'us-li), adv. In a fictitious 
manner; by fiction; falsely; counterfeitly. 
2200 
Beside these pieces fictitiously set down, and having no 
copy in nature, they had many unquestionably drawn, of 
inconsequent signification, nor naturally verifying their 
intention. Sir T. Browne, Vulg. Err., v. 20. 
fictitiousness (fik-tish'us-nes), n. The quality 
of being fictitious; feigned representation. 
Thus, some make Comedy a representation of mean, and 
others of bad men ; some think that its essence consists in 
the unimportance, others in the fictitiousness of the trans- 
action. Johnson, Rambler, No. 125. 
fictive (fik'tiv), a. [= F. fictif, < L. as if 'fic- 
tiftiit, < fictus, pp. of fingere, form, feign : see fic- 
tion.] 1. Formed by the imagination; not real- 
ly existing; supposititious; fictitious. [Rare.] 
And therefore to those things whose grounds were very 
true, 
Though naked yet and bare (not having to content 
The wayward curious ear), gave fictice ornament. 
Drayton, Polyolbion, vi. 286. 
The action of a magnet on an external point is equiva- 
lent to that of Afictioe layer of a total mass equal to zero, 
distributed along the surface according to a certain law. 
Atkinson, tr. of Mascart and Joubert, I. 300. 
2. Resulting from imagination ; belonging to or 
consisting of fiction ; imaginative. [Rare.] 
Those 
Who, dabbling in the fount of fictive tears, 
And nursed by mealy-mouth'd philanthropies, 
Divorce the Feeling from her mate the Deed. 
Tennyton, The Brook. 
The remaining flve-sixthsof the book ("The Merry Men") 
deserve to stand by "Henry Esmond" as a fictive autobi- 
ography in archaic form. 
H. James, Jr., The Century, XXXV. 878. 
fictively (fik'tiv-li), adv. In a fictive manner. 
fictor (fik'tor), n. [< L. fictor, one who makes 
images of clay, wax, stone, etc., a baker of of- 
fering-cakes, a maker, a feigner, < fictus, pp. of 
fingere, form, fashion, feign: see fiction. J An 
artist who works in wax, clay, or other plastic 
material, as distinguished from one who works 
in bronze, marble, ivory, or other solid sub- 
stance. 
Ficula (fik'u-la), n. [NL., dim. of L. ficus, a fig: 
see fig 2 . ] A genus of gastropods, of the family 
Pyrulida;; the fig-shells or pear-shells: so named 
from their shape. The genus includes tropi- 
cal and subtropical active carnivorous species. 
Also called Pyrula. See cut under fig-shell. 
Ficulidae (fi-ku'li-de), n. pi. [NL., < Ficula + 
A family of gastropods, typified by the 
genus Ficula : same as Pyrulida:. 
Ficus (fi'kus), . [L., a fig-tree, a fig: see ./iff 2 .] 
1 . In bot. , a very large genus of tropical and sub- 
tropical trees or shrubs, of the urticaceous tribe 
Artocarpeas, characterized by bearing their mi- 
nute unisexual flowers within a nearly closed 
globose or pear-shaped receptacle. The genus is 
remarkable for the peculiar arrangement by which cross- 
fertilization is effected through the agency of insects. 
There are always three forms of flowers, the staminate, 
the pistillate, and a third, the gall-flower, which resembles 
the pistillate but is incapable of fertilization, and is usually 
occupied by the pupa of a species of Blastophaga or other 
hymenopterous insect. In a large group of species the three 
forms are found within the same receptacle ; but in much 
the larger number, as in the common fig, the female flowers 
are in one receptacle and the male and gall flowers toge- 
ther in another. The perfect insect is formed synchro- 
nously with the maturity of the pollen of the male flowers, 
through which it makes its way and escapes by a perfora- 
tion made at the apex of the receptacle. In what way it 
conveys the pollen to the pistillate flowers in the closed 
female receptacle is not understood, but it is believed that 
it is done, and that by this means only the female flowers 
are fertilized. Generally the barren and fertile receptacles 
are upon the same tree and are similar in appearance, but 
in the common flg they are upon separate trees, and differ 
so much in form that the sterile, known as the wild flg or 
caprifig, has been considered by many botanists as a spe- 
cies distinct from the other. There are about 600 species, 
the greater number belonging to the islands of the Indian 
and Pacific oceans, though there are many in tropical Amer- 
ica. Three or four species are found in Florida. The ge- 
nus includes the common flg (F. Cariea), the banian (F. 
Bengalensis), the india-rubber tree (F. elastica), etc. The 
wood is generally soft and valueless. See fitfi, and cut 
under banian. 
2. In zool., an old genus of mollusks: same as 
Pyrula. Klein, 1753. 3. [?. c.] In surg., a 
fleshy excrescence, often soft and reddish, 
sometimes hard, hanging by a peduncle or 
formed like a fig. It occurs on the eyelids, 
chin, tongue, anus, or reproductive organs. 
Also called /ff-wart.-Ficus unguium (flcusof the 
nails), a chronic paronychia iu which the posterior wall 
of the nail becomes thickened and everted. 
fid (fid), . [Also written fidd; origin obscure. 
D. fid, fed, a skein, appears to be a different word. 
See fetlock.} 1. A small thick lump. [Prov. 
Eng.] 2. A piece or plug of tobacco. [Colloq.] 
3. A bar of wood or metal used to support 
or steady anything. 4. Naut. : (a) A square 
bar of wood or iron, with a shoulder at one end, 
used to support a topmast or topgallantmast 
when swayed up into place. The fid passes 
=< = 
fiddle 
through a square hole in the heel of its mast, 
and its ends rest on the trestletrees. (&) A 
conical piu of hard wood, from 
12 to 24 inches long, and from 
1 to 3 inches in diameter at the 
butt, used to open the strands 
of rope in 
splicing. 
Blubber-fid, a 
large wooden 
pin to which a 
rope-lashing is 
made fast at one 
end, formerly 
extensively em- 
ployed, and still 
used by many 
whaling - craft, 
for toggling on 
to a blanket- 
piece when the 
old rope-strap- 
ped blocks are used in boarding. Also called toggle. When 
the iron-strapped cutting-blocks are used, the fld is dis- 
carded, the tail of the chain-strap being moused in the 
sister-hooks. Setting-fid, a large cone of hard wood or 
iron, used by riggers and sailraakers to stretch eyes of rig- 
ging, cringles, etc. Splicing-fld. See def. 4 ((>). 
fid (fld), v. t. ; pret. and pp. fidded, ppr. fidding. 
[(fid, M.] Saut., to sway into place and se- 
cure (a topmast or topgallantmast) by its fid. 
Also field. 
Various plans have been devised for Jidding and nnfld- 
ding topmasts without going aloft. 
Qualtrouyh, Boat-Sailer's Manual, p. 208. 
fiddle (fid'l), w. [Early mod. E. also fid/e; < 
ME. fidel, fydyll, fedele, usually and prop, with 
th, fithel, fithele, < AS. *fithcle (not found, but 
the derivatives fithela, a fiddler, fithelere, a fid- 
dler, fithelestre, a female fiddler, occur) = D. 
vedel, veel = OHGK fidnla, MHG. videle, videl, 
G. fiedel = Icel. fidhla = OSw. fidhla = Dan. 
fiddel, a fiddle; appar. connected with ML. 
vitula, vidula, a fiddle, whence also the Rom. 
forms, OF. riole, viele, vielle, F. riole (> E. 
viol, and the modified Sw. Dan. fiol) = Pr. 
viula, viola = Sp. Pg. riola = It. viola (whence 
E. viola), dim. violino (whence E. violin, etc.). 
The ML. vitula, which was sometimes called 
vitula jocosa, the merry viol, is referred by 
Diez to L. yitulari, celebrate a festival, keep 
holiday (orig. perhaps 'sacrifice a calf,' < vi- 
tulus, a calf: see veal). It is possible that 
the ML. vitula is an accom. form of the Tent, 
word; cf. LL. harjia, It. arpa. F. harpe, etc., 
harp, of Tout, origin. Another derivation, < L. 
fidieula, commonly pi. fidicuhe, a small stringed 
instrument, a small lute or cithern (dim. of 
fides, a stringed instrument, a lute, lyre, cith- 
ern), hardly agrees with the Teut. and not 
at all with the Rom. forms.] 1. A musical 
stringed instrument of the viol class; a violin. 
See viol, violin, crowd'*. This is the proper English 
name, but among musicians it has been superseded by 
violin, the name fiddle, except in popular language, being 
used humorously or in slight contempt. 
Harpe and fethill bothe thay fande, 
Getterne, and als so the sawtrye. 
Thomas of Ersseldoune (Child's Ballads, I. 106). 
For hym was levere have at his beddes heed 
Twenty bookes, clad in black or reed, 
Of Aristotle and his philosophic, 
Thau robes riche or fithele or gay sautrie. 
Chaucer, Gen. Prol. to C. T., 1. 296. 
A French song, and a fiddle, has no fellow. 
Shak., Hen. VIII., i. 3. 
The ballad singers, who frequently accompany their 
ditties with instrumental music, especially the fiddle, vul- 
garly called a crowd, and the guitar. 
Strutt, Sports and Pastimes, p. 268. 
2. Naut., a contrivance to prevent things from 
rolling off the table in bad weather. It is made 
of small cords passed through wooden bridges 
and hauled very taut. Same as rack. 3. In 
wool-carding, an implement used in Yorkshire, 
England, for smoothing the points of card-cloth- 
ing and dislodging dirt from among the teeth. 
It consists of a piece of emery-covered cloth stretched 
between two end-pieces of wood connected by a curved 
handle. Fine as a fiddle. See fines. Scotch fiddle, 
the itch : so called from the action of the arm in scratch- 
ing, and the prevalence of the disease in Scotland. [Humor- 
ous.] To play first (or second) fiddle, (a) In an or- 
chestra, to take the part of the first (or second) violin- 
player. Hence (b) To take a leading (or subordinate) 
part in any project or undertaking. [Colloq.] 
To say that Tom had no idea of playing first fiddle in 
any social orchestra, but was always quite satisfied to be 
set down for the hundred and fiftieth violin in the band, 
or thereabouts, is to express his modesty in very inade- 
quate terms. Dickens, Martin Chnzzlewit, xii. 
It was evident that since John Marston's arrival he had 
been playing, with regard to Mary, second fiddle, if you 
can possibly be induced to pardon the extreme coarseness 
of the expression. //. Kingsley, Ravenshoe, Iviii. 
fiddle (fid'l), r. ; pret. and pp. fiddled, ppr. fid- 
dling. [Early mod. E. also fidle; < fiddle, .] 
