Fatal Curiosity, by George Lillo. Young Wilmot, supposed to have perished at sea, goes to India, and having made his fortune, returns to England. He instantly visits Charlotte, whom he finds still faithful and devotedly attached to him, and then in disguise visits his parents, with whom he deposits a casket. Agnes Wilmot, out of curiosity, opens the casket, and when she discovers that it contains jewels, she and her husband resolve to murder the owner, and secure the contents of the casket. Scarcely have they committed the fatal deed, when Charlotte enters, and tells them it is their own son whom they have killed, whereupon old Wilmot first stabs his wife and then himself. Thus was the “curiosity” of Agnes fatal to herself, her husband, and her son (1736).

=Fatal Dowry= (The), a tragedy by Philip Massinger (1632). Rowe has borrowed much of his Fair Penitent from this drama.

=Fatal Marriage= (The), a tragedy by Thomas Southern (1659-1746). Isabella, a nun, marries Biron, the eldest son of Count Baldwin. The count disinherits his son for this marriage, and Biron, entering the army, is sent to the siege of Candy, where he is seen to fall, and is reported dead. Isabella, reduced to the utmost poverty, after seven years of “widowhood,” prays Count Baldwin to do something for her child, but he turns her out of doors. Villeroy (2 syl.) proposes marriage to her, and her acceptance of him was “the fatal marriage,” for the very next day Biron returns and is set upon by ruffians in the pay of his brother Carlos, who assassinate him. Carlos accuses Villeroy of the murder, but one of the ruffians confesses, and Carlos is apprehended. As for Isabella, she stabs herself and dies.

=Fat Boy= (Jo.). Obese page, or foot-boy of Mr. Wardell in Pickwick Papers.—Charles Dickens.

=Fates.= The three Fatal Sisters were Clo´tho, Lachesis [_Lak´.e.sis_]. and At´ropos. They dwelt in the deep abyss of Demogorgon, “with unwearied fingers drawing out the threads of life.” Clotho held the spindle or distaff; Lachesis drew out the thread; and Atropos cut it off.

Sad Clotho held the rock, the whiles the thread By grisly Lachesis was spun with pain, That cruel Atropos eftsoon undid, With cursëd knife cutting the twist in twain. Spenser, Faëry Queen, iv. 2. (1595).

=Father—Son.= It is a common observation that a father above the common rate of men has usually a son below it. Witness King John son of Henry II.; Edward II. son of Edward I.; Richard II. son of the Black Prince; Henry VI. son of Henry V.; Lord Chesterfield’s son, etc. So in French history: Louis VIII. was the son of Philippe Auguste; Charles the Idiot was the son of Charles le Sage; Henri II. of François I. Again, in German history: Heinrich VI. was the son of Barbarossa; Albrecht I. of Rudolf; and so on, in all directions. Heroum filii noxæ is a Latin proverb.

My trust, Like a good parent, did beget of him A falsehood, in its contrary as great As my trust was. Shakespeare, The Tempest, act i. sc. 2 (1609).

=Father Suckled by His own Daughter.= Euphrasia, called “The Grecian Daughter,” thus preserved the life of her father Evander in prison. (SEE EUPHRASIA.)

Xantippê thus preserved the life of her father Cimonos in prison.

=A Father’s Head Nursed by a Daughter after Death.= Margaret Roper “clasped in her last trance her murdered father’s head.” (SEE DAUGHTER.)

=Father of His Country.=

CICERO, who broke up the Catiline conspiracy (B.C. 106-43).

⁂ The Romans offered the same title to Marĭus after his annihilation of the Teutŏnês and Cimbri, but he would not accept it.

JULIUS CÆSAR, after he had quelled the Spanish insurrection (B.C. 100-44). AUGUSTUS, P (B.C. 63-31 to A.D. 14).

COSMO DE MEDICI (1389-1464).

ANDREA DOREA; called so on his statue at Genoa (1468-1560).

ANDRONI´CUS PALÆOL´OGUS assumed the title (1260-1332).

GEORGE WASHINGTON, “Defender and Paternal Counseller of the American States” (1732-1799).

=Father of the People=.

LOUIS XII. of France (1462, 1498-1515).

HENRI IV. of France, “The Father and Friend of the People” (1553, 1589-1610).

LOUIS XVIII. of France (1755, 1814-1824).

GABRIEL DU PINEAU, a French lawyer, (1573-1644).

CHRISTIAN III. of Denmark (1502, 1534-1559).

⁂ For other “Fathers,” see under the specific name or vocation, as BOTANY, LITERATURE, and so on.

=Fathers= (Last of the), St. Bernard (1091-1153).

⁂ The “Fathers of the Church” were followed by “the Schoolmen.”

=Fatherless=. Merlin never had a father; his mother was a nun, the daughter of the king of Dimetia.

=Fathom= (Ferdinand Count), a villain who robs his benefactors, pillages any one, and finally dies in misery and despair.—T. Smollett, The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom (1754).

(The gang being absent, an old beldame conveys the count to a rude apartment to sleep in. Here he found the dead body of a man lately stabbed and concealed in some straw; and the account of his sensations during the night, the horrid device by which he saved his life (by lifting the corpse into his own bed), and his escape, guided by the hag, is terrifically tragic).

=Fatima=, daughter of Mahomet, and one of the four perfect women. The other three are Khadîjah, the prophet’s first wife; Mary, daughter of Imrân; and Asia, wife of that Pharaoh who was drowned in the Red Sea.

Fat´ima, a holy woman of China, who lived a hermit’s life. There was “no one affected with headache whom she did not cure by simply laying her hands on them.” An African magician induced this devotee to lend him her clothes and stick, and to make him the fac-simile of herself. He then murdered her, and got introduced into the palace of Aladdin. Aladdin, being informed of the trick, pretended to have a bad headache, and when the false Fatima approached, under the pretence of curing it, he plunged a dagger into the heart of the magician and killed him.—Arabian Nights (“Aladdin or the Wonderful Lamp”).

Fat´ima, the mother of Prince Camaral´zaman. Her husband was Schah´zaman, Sultan of the “Isle of the Children of Khal´edan, some twenty days’ sail from the coast of Persia, in the open sea.”—Arabian Nights (“Camaralzaman and Badoura”).

Fat´ima, the last of Bluebeard´s wives. She was saved from death by the timely arrival of her brothers with a party of friends.—C. Perrault, Contes de Fées (1697).

=Fat´imite= (3 syl.). The Third Fatimite, the Caliph Hakem B’amr-ellah, who professed to be incarnate deity, and the last prophet who had communication between God and man. He was the founder of the Druses (q.v.).

What say you does this wizard style himself— Hakeem Biamrallah, the Third Fatimite? Robt. Browning, The Return of the Druses, v.

=Fatme=. Beautiful sultana, who, looking down from her lattice into the courtyard wept to see a lamb slaughtered, yet turned from the window to ask in eager hope if the poison administered to her rival had produced the desired effect.—Heine.

=Faulconbridge= (Philip), called “the Bastard,” natural son of King Richard I. and Lady Robert Faulconbridge. An admirable admixture of greatness and levity, daring and recklessness. He was generous and open-hearted, but hated foreigners like a true-born islander.—Shakespeare, King John (1596).

=Faulkland=, the over-anxious lover of Julia [_Melville_], always fretting and tormenting himself about her whims, spirit, health, life. Every feature in the sky, every shift of the wind was a source of anxiety to him. If she was gay, he fretted that she should care so little for his absence; if she was low-spirited, he feared she was going to die; if she danced with another, he was jealous; if she didn´t, she was out of sorts.—Sheridan, The Rivals (1775).

=Faultless Painter= (The), Andrea del Sarto (1488-1630).—R. Browning, Andrea del Sarto.

=Fauntleroy= (Little Lord). The story of Cedric Errol, heir to his grandfather, Lord Fauntleroy, by Frances Hodgson Burnett, has been dramatized, Elsie Leslie, a child of rare promise, taking the part of Cedric, and Kathryn Kidder that of his mother. (See ERROL).

=Faun=. Tennyson uses this sylvan deity of the classics as the symbol of a drunkard.

Arise and fly The reeling Faun, the sensual feast. In Memoriam, cxviii

=Faust=, a famous magician of the sixteenth century, a native of Suabia. A rich uncle having left him a fortune, Faust ran to every excess, and when his fortune was exhausted, made a pact with the devil (who assumed the name of Mephistoph´elês, and the appearance of a little grey monk) that if he might indulge his propensities freely for twenty-four years, he would at the end of that period consign to the devil both body and soul. The compact terminated in 1550, when Faust disappeared. His sweetheart was Margheri´ta [_Margaret_], whom he seduced, and his faithful servant was Wagner.

Goethê has a noble tragedy entitled Faust (1798); Gounod an opera called Faust e Margherita (1859) (See FAUSTUS.)

=Faustus= (Dr.), the same as Faust; but Marlowe, in his admirable tragedy, makes the doctor sell himself to Lucifer and Mephistophilis.

=Favor= (Anna). Young Anna Favor, married to Ezra Dalton, conceives the insane idea that her baby is a changeling, and asks her husband to rake open the coals that she may lay it upon them, and the witch shall have her own.