built town, whose chief distinction is its school of mines founded in 1853. Fresnillo has large amalgam works for the reduction of silver ores. Its silver mines, located in the neighbouring Proaño hill, were discovered in 1569, and were for a time among the most productive in Mexico. Since 1833, when their richest deposits were reached, the output has greatly decreased. There is a station near on the Mexican Central railway.
FRESNO, a city and the county-seat of Fresno county, California,
U.S.A., situated in the San Joaquin valley (altitude
about 300 ft.) near the geographical centre of the state. Pop.
(1880) 1112; (1890) 10,818; (1900) 12,470, of whom 3299 were
foreign-born and 1279 were Asiatics; (1910 census) 24,892.
The city is served by the Southern Pacific and the Atchison,
Topeka & Santa Fé railways. The county is mainly a vast
expanse of naturally arid plains and mountains. The valley is
the scene of an extensive irrigation system, water being brought
(first in 1872–1876) from King’s river, 20 m. distant; in 1905
500 sq. m. were irrigated. Fresno is in a rich farming country,
producing grains and fruit, and is the only place in America
where Smyrna figs have been grown with success; it is the centre
of the finest raisin country of the state, and has extensive vineyards
and wine-making establishments. The city’s principal
manufacture is preserved (dried) fruits, particularly raisins;
the value of the fruits thus preserved in 1905 was $6,942,440,
being 70.5% of the total value of the factory product in that year
($9,849,001). In 1900–1905 the factory product increased
257.9%, a ratio of increase greater than that of any other city
in the state. In the mountains, lumbering and mining are
important industries; lumber is carried from Shaver in the
mountains to Clovis on the plains by a V-shaped flume 42 m.
long, the waste water from which is ditched for irrigation. The
petroleum field of the county is one of the richest in California.
Fresno is the business and shipping centre of its county and of the
surrounding region. The county was organized in 1856. In
1872 the railway went through, and Fresno was laid out and
incorporated. It became the county-seat in 1874 and was
chartered as a city in 1885.
FRESNOY, CHARLES ALPHONSE DU (1611–1665), French
painter and writer on his art, was born in Paris, son of an apothecary.
He was destined for the medical profession, and well
educated in Latin and Greek; but, having a natural propensity
for the fine arts, he would not apply to his intended vocation,
and was allowed to learn the rudiments of design under Perrier
and Vouet. At the age of twenty-one he went off to Rome, with
no resources; he drew ruins and architectural subjects. After
two years thus spent he re-encountered his old fellow-student
Pierre Mignard, and by his aid obtained some amelioration of his
professional prospects. He studied Raphael and the antique,
went in 1633 to Venice, and in 1656 returned to France. During
two years he was now employed in painting altar-pieces in the
château of Raincy, landscapes, &c. His death was caused by
an attack of apoplexy followed by palsy; he expired at Villiers
le Bel, near Paris. He never married. His pictorial works are
few; they are correct in drawing, with something of the Caracci
in design, and of Titian in colouring, but wanting fire and expression,
and insufficient to keep his name in any eminent repute.
He is remembered now almost entirely as a writer rather than
painter. His Latin poem, De arte graphica, was written during
his Italian sojourn, and embodied his observations on the art
of painting; it may be termed a critical treatise on the practice
of the art, with general advice to students. The precepts are
sound according to the standard of his time; the poetical
merits slender enough. The Latin style is formed chiefly on
Lucretius and Horace. This poem was first published by
Mignard, and has been translated into several languages. In
1684 it was turned into French by Roger de Piles; Dryden
translated the work into English prose; and a rendering into
verse by Mason followed, to which Sir Joshua Reynolds added
some annotations.
FRET. (1) (From O. Eng. fretan, a word common in various
forms to Teutonic languages; cf. Ger. fressen, to eat greedily),
properly to devour, hence to gnaw, so used of the slow corroding
action of chemicals, water, &c., and hence, figuratively, to chafe
or irritate. Possibly connected with this word, in sense of rubbing,
is the use of “fret” for a bar on the fingerboard of a banjo,
guitar, or similar musical instruments to mark the fingering.
(2) (Of doubtful origin; possibly from the O. Eng. frætive, ornaments,
but its use is paralleled by the Fr. frette, trellis or lattice),
network, a term used in heraldry for an interlaced figure, but
best known as applied to the decoration used by the Greeks
in their temples and vases: the Greek fret consists of a series
of narrow bands of different lengths, placed at right angles to
one another, and of great variety of design. It is an ornament
which owes its origin to woven fabrics, and is found on the
ceilings of the Egyptian tombs at Benihasan, Siout and elsewhere.
In Greek work it was painted on the abacus of the Doric capital
and probably on the architraves of their temples; when employed
by the Romans it was generally carved; the Propylaea of the
temple at Damascus and the temple at Atil being examples of
the 2nd century. It was carved in large dimensions on some
of the Mexican temples, as for instance on the palace at Mitla
with other decorative bands, all of which would seem to have
been reproductions of woven patterns, and had therefore an
independent origin. It is found in China and Japan, and in the
latter country when painted on lacquer is employed as a fret-diaper,
the bands not being at right angles to one another but
forming acute and obtuse angles. In old English writers a wider
signification was given to it, as it was applied to raised patterns
in plaster on roofs or ceilings, which were not confined to the
geometrical fret but extended to the modelling of flowers,
leaves and fruit; in such cases the decoration was known as
fret-work. In France the fret is better known as the “meander.”
FREUDENSTADT, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of
Württemberg, on the right bank of the Murg, 40 m. S.W. from
Stuttgart, on the railway to Hochdorf. Pop. 7000. It has a
Protestant and a Roman Catholic church, some small manufactures
of cloth, furniture, knives, nails and glass, and is
frequented as a climatic health resort. It was founded in 1599
by Protestant refugees from Salzburg.
FREUND, WILHELM (1806–1894), German philologist and
lexicographer, was born at Kempen in the grand duchy of Posen
on the 27th of January 1806. He studied at Berlin, Breslau and
Halle, and was for twenty years chiefly engaged in private
tuition. From 1855–1870 he was director of the Jewish school
at Gleiwitz in Silesia, and subsequently retired to Breslau, where
he died on the 4th of June 1894. Although chiefly known
for his philological labours, Freund took an important part in
the movement for the emancipation of his Prussian co-religionists,
and the Judengesetz of 1847 was in great measure the result
of his efforts. The work by which he is best known is his Wörterbuch
der lateinischen Sprache (1834–1845), practically the basis
of all Latin-English dictionaries. His Wie studiert man klassische
Philologie ? (6th ed., 1903) and Triennium philologicum (2nd ed.,
1878–1885) are valuable aids to the classical student.
FREWEN, ACCEPTED (1588–1664), archbishop of York, was born at Northiam, in Sussex, and educated at Magdalen College, Oxford, where in 1612 he became a fellow. In 1617 and 1621 the college allowed him to act as chaplain to Sir John Digby, ambassador in Spain. At Madrid he preached a sermon which pleased Prince Charles, afterwards Charles I., and the latter on his accession appointed Frewen one of his chaplains. In 1625 he became canon of Canterbury and vice-president of Magdalen College, and in the following year he was elected president. He was vice-chancellor of the university in 1628 and 1629, and again in 1638 and 1639. It was mainly by his instrumentality that the university plate was sent to the king at York in 1642. Two years later he was consecrated bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, and resigned his presidentship. Parliament declared his estates forfeited for treason in 1652, and Cromwell afterwards set a price on his head. The proclamations, however, designated him Stephen Frewen, and he was consequently able to escape into France. At the Restoration he reappeared in public, and in 1660 he was consecrated archbishop of York. In 1661 he acted as chairman of the Savoy conference.
