members. It had ceased to exercise its municipal functions a few years previously. In 1316 the prior of Tywardreath, as lord of the manor, obtained the right to hold a Monday market and two fairs on the feasts of St Finbar and St Lucy, but by the charter of 1690 provision was made for a Saturday market and three fairs, on the 1st of May, 10th of September and Shrove Tuesday, and only these three continue to be held.
FOWL (Dan. Fugl, Ger. Vogel), a term originally used in the
sense that bird[1] now is, but, except in composition,—as sea-fowl,
wild-fowl and the like,—practically almost confined[2] at present
to designate the otherwise nameless species which struts on our
dunghills, gathers round our barn-doors, or stocks our poultry
yards—the type of the genus Gallus of ornithologists, of which
four well-marked species are known. The first of these is the
red jungle-fowl of the greater part of India, G. ferrugineus,—called
by many writers G. bankiva,—which is undoubtedly the
parent stock of all the domestic races (cf. Darwin, Animals and
Plants under Domestication, i. pp. 233-246). It inhabits northern
India from Sind to Burma and Cochin China, as well as the Malay
Peninsula and many of the islands as far as Timor, besides the
Philippines. It occurs on the Himalayas up to the height of
4000 ft., and its southern limits in the west of India proper are,
according to Jerdon, found on the Raj-peepla hills to the south
of the Nerbudda, and in the east near the left bank of the
Godavery, or perhaps even farther, as he had heard of its being
killed at Cummum. This species resembles in plumage what is
commonly known among poultry-fanciers as the “Black-breasted
game” breed, and this is said to be especially the case with
examples from the Malay countries, between which and examples
from India some differences are observable—the latter having
the plumage less red, the ear-lappets almost invariably white,
and slate-coloured legs, while in the former the ear-lappets are
crimson, like the comb and wattles, and the legs yellowish. If
the Malayan birds be considered distinct, it is to them that the
name G. bankiva properly applies. This species is said to be
found in lofty forests and in dense thickets, as well as in ordinary
bamboo-jungles, and when cultivated land is near its haunts,
it may be seen in the fields after the crops are cut in straggling
parties of from 10 to 20. The crow to which the cock gives
utterance morning and evening is just like that of a bantam,
never prolonged as in most domestic birds. The hen breeds
from January to July, according to the locality; and lays from
8 to 12 creamy-white eggs, occasionally scraping together a few
leaves or a little dry grass by way of a nest. The so-called G.
giganteus, formerly taken by some ornithologists for a distinct
species, is now regarded as a tame breed of G. ferrugineus or
bankiva. The second good species is the grey jungle-fowl, G.
sonnerati, whose range begins a little to the northward of the
limits of the preceding, and it occupies the southern part of the
Indian peninsula, without being found elsewhere. The cock
has the end of the shaft of the neck-hackles dilated, forming a
horny plate, like a drop of yellow sealing-wax. His call is very
peculiar, being a broken and imperfect kind of crow, quite unlike
that of G. ferrugineus and more like a cackle. The two species
where their respective ranges overlap, occasionally interbreed
in a wild state, and the present readily crosses in confinement
with domestic poultry, but the hybrids are nearly always sterile.
The third species is the Sinhalese jungle-fowl, G. stanleyi (the
G. lafayettii of some authors), peculiar to Ceylon. This also
greatly resembles in plumage some domestic birds, but the cock
is red beneath, and has a yellow comb with a red edge and
purplish-red cheeks and wattles. He has also a singularly
different voice, his crow being dissyllabic. This bird crosses
readily with tame hens, but the hybrids are believed to be infertile.
The fourth species, G. varius (the G. furcatus of some authors),
inhabits Java and the islands eastwards as far as Flores. This
differs remarkably from the others in not possessing hackles, and
in having a large unserrated comb of red and blue and only a
single chin wattle. The predominance of green in its plumage
is another easy mark of distinction. Hybrids between this
species and domestic birds are often produced, but they are most
commonly sterile. Some of them have been mistaken for distinct
species, as those which have received the names of G. aeneus
and G. temmincki.
Several circumstances seem to render it likely that fowls were first domesticated in Burma or the countries adjacent thereto, and it is the tradition of the Chinese that they received their poultry from the West about the year 1400 B.C. By the Institutes of Manu, the tame fowl is forbidden, though the wild is allowed to be eaten—showing that its domestication was accomplished when they were written. The bird is not mentioned in the Old Testament nor by Homer, though he has Ἀλέκτωρ (cock) as the name of a man, nor is it figured on ancient Egyptian monuments. Pindar mentions it, and Aristophanes calls it the Persian bird, thus indicating it to have been introduced to Greece through Persia, and it is figured on Babylonian cylinders between the 6th and 7th centuries B.C. It is sculptured on the Lycian marbles in the British Museum (c. 600 B.C.), and E. Blyth remarks (Ibis, 1867, p. 157) that it is there represented with the appearance of a true jungle-fowl, for none of the wild Galli have the upright bearing of the tame breed, but carry their tail in a drooping position. For further particulars of these breeds see Poultry. (A. N.)
FOWLER, CHARLES (1792–1867), English architect, was
born at Cullompton, Devon, on the 17th of May 1792. After
serving an apprenticeship of five years at Exeter, he went to
London in 1814, and entered the office of David Laing, where
he remained till he commenced practice for himself. His first
work of importance was the court of bankruptcy in Basinghall
Street, finished in 1821. In the following year he gained the
first premium for a design for the new London bridge, which,
however, was ultimately built according to the design of another
architect. Fowler’s other designs for bridges include one constructed
across the Dart at Totnes. He was also the architect
for the markets of Covent Garden and Hungerford, the new
market at Gravesend, and Exeter lower market, and besides
several churches he designed Devon lunatic asylum (1845),
the London fever hospital (1849), and the hall of the Wax
Chandlers’ Company, Gresham Street (1853). For some years
he was honorary secretary of the institute of British architects,
and he was afterwards created vice-president. He retired from
his profession in 1853, and died at Great Marlow, Bucks, on the 26th of September 1867.
FOWLER, EDWARD (1632–1714), English divine, was born
in 1632 at Westerleigh, Gloucestershire, and was educated at
Corpus Christi College, Oxford, afterwards migrating to Trinity
College, Cambridge. He was successively rector of Norhill,
Bedfordshire (1656) and of All Hallows, Bread Street, London
(1673), and in 1676 was elected a canon of Gloucester, his friend
Henry More, the Cambridge Platonist, resigning in his favour.
In 1681 he became vicar of St Giles, Cripplegate, but after four
years was suspended for Whiggism. When the Declaration
of Indulgence was published in 1687 he successfully influenced
the London clergy against reading it. In 1691 he was consecrated
bishop of Gloucester and held the see until his death on the
26th of August 1714. Fowler was suspected of Pelagian tendencies,
and his earliest book was a Free Discourse in defence of
The Practices of Certain Moderate Divines called Latitudinarians
(1670). The Design of Christianity, published by him in the
following year, in which he laid stress on the moral design of
revelation, was criticized by Baxter in his How far Holiness
is the Design of Christianity (1671) and by Bunyan in his Defence
of the Doctrine of Justification by Faith (1672), the latter describing
the Design as “a mixture of Popery, Socinianism and Quakerism,”
a horrid accusation to which Fowler replied in a scurrilous
pamphlet entitled Dirt Wip’d Off. He also published, in 1693,
Twenty-Eight Propositions, by which the Doctrine of the Trinity
is endeavoured to be explained, challenging with some success the
Socinian position.
