FUS 
came an article of luxury. The more re- 
filled nations of ancient times never used 
them ; those alone who were stigmatized as 
barbarians were clothed in the skins of ani- 
mals. During Captain Cook’s last voyage 
to the Pacific Ocean, besides various ad- 
vantages derived from it as enlarging the 
boundaries of science, a new source of 
wealth was laid open in the exchange of 
European commodities for furrs of the 
most valuable and important kind on the 
north-west of America. Previously to this, 
a similar trade had been carried on, though 
on a much narrower scale, in Canada. It 
was begun by the French almost two cen- 
turies back, and in time Montreal was the 
grand mart of this species of commerce. 
The number of Indians who resorted thi- 
ther increased as the name of the Euro- 
peans was more known. Whenever the 
natives returned with a new supply of furrs, 
they usually brought with them a new and 
more distant tribe ; thus a kind of market 
or fair was opened, to which the several 
Indian nations of the new continent re- 
sorted. Our own countrymen were not 
long easy without sharing in this trade, and 
the colony at New York soon found means 
to divert the stream of this great circula- 
tion. The Hudson’s bay trade, carried on 
by a company designated as the Hudson’s 
Bay Company, was at one time almost 
the only trade in this article from Great 
Britain j there have, however, been other 
persons of late years engaged in it. About 
twenty years ago a commercial establish- 
ment of this kind, was formed under the ti- 
tle of the North-West Company. It was an 
association of about twenty persons, agree- 
ing among themselves to carry on the furr 
trade. Their capital was divided into twenty 
shares ; of these a certain proportion was 
held by the people who managed the busi- 
ness in Canada, who were stiled agents, 
and paid as such independently of the pro- 
fits of the trade. The articles manufac- 
tured here that are used in this traffic, are 
coarse woollen cloths of different kinds, 
blankets, arms, and ammunition, Manches- 
ter goods, all kinds of the coarser hardware, 
cotton, hats, and stockings. 
FURRS, in heraldry, a bearing which 
represents the skins of certain beasts, used 
as well in the doubling of the mantles be- 
longing to the coat-armour, as in the coat- 
armours themselves. See Ermin, Ermi- 
kois, &c. 
FUSANUS, in botany, a genus of the 
Polygamia Monoecia class and order. Na- 
tural order of Elaeagni, Jussieu. Essential 
FUT 
character : hermaphrodite ; calyx five-cleft’ 
corolla none ; stamins four ; germ inferior ; 
stignias four ; drupe : male, calyx, &c. of the 
former; fruit abortive. Only one species. 
FUSEE, in clock work, is that conical 
part drawn by the spring, and about which 
the chain or string is wound ; for tiie use of 
which see Clock and Watch. 
FUSIL, in heraldry, a bearing of a rhom- 
boidal figure, longer than the lozenge, and 
having its upper and lower angles more 
acute and sharp than the other two in the 
middle. It is called in Latin fusus, a spin- 
dle, from its shape, 
FUSILEERS, in military affairs, are sol- 
diers armed like the rest of the infantry, 
only with shorter and lighter muskets, than 
those of the battalion and grenadiers. They 
wear caps, which are somewhat less, in 
point of height, than common grenadier 
caps. There are three regiments in the 
English service. 
FUSION, in chemistry, the application 
of heat to produce the dense fluid state in 
bodies. See Caloric, Chemistry, Glass, 
Heat, Laboratory. 
FUSTIAN, in commerce, a kind of cot- 
ton stuff, which seems as it were whaled on 
one side. Right fustians should be altoge- 
ther made of cotton yarn, both woof and 
warp ; but a great many are'made, of which 
the warp is flax, or even hemp. There are 
fustians made of several kinds, wide, nar- * 
row, fine, coarse ; with shag or nap, and 
without it. 
FUSTICK, in the arts, is the wood of 
the morus tinctoria, a tree that grows to a 
considerable size in the West Indies. It is 
much used in dyeing yellow, and produces 
a large quantity of colouring matter. It is 
not very hard, and its colour is yellow with 
orange veins. From a decoction, acids 
throw down a slight greenish yellow preci- 
pitate, which is redissolved by alkalies. 
Alum throws down a scanty yellow precipi- 
tate; the sulphates of iron and copper 
throw down yellow and brown precipi- 
tates; acetate of lead, an orange precipi- 
tate, and muriate of tin, a very copious 
fine yellow precipitate. 
FUTTOCKS, in a ship,, the timbers 
raised over the keel, or the encompassing 
timbers that make her breadth. Of these 
there are the first, second , third, and fourth, 
denominated according to their distance 
from the keel, those next it being called 
first or ground futtocks, and the others up- 
per futtocks ; those timbers being put toge- 
ther, make a frame-bend. 
