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FEBRUARY FEDCHENKO 107 manufacture of feather flowers, and the utility of the do vriy arctic skins as articles of dress in the regions of perpetual snow. FEBRUARY (Lat. Februarim, from februare, to purify ; so called from februa, the festival of expiation and lustration, which was held on the 15th of this month), the second month in our present calendar, containing 28 days ordi- narily, and 29 days in leap year. It was not in the calendar of Romulus. Numa added two months to the year, January at the beginning and February at the end. It was first placed after January by the decemvirs about 450 B. 0. FECAMP (formerly Fescan or Fescamp ; Lat, Fiscamum or Fiscamnum}, a seaport town of France, in the department of Seine-Inferieure, 22 m. N. N. E. of Havre, on a branch railway from Rouen, and at the entrance of the river Fecamp into the channel ; pop. in 1866, 12,- 832. The town has two remarkable churches, a hydrographical school, a library, a theatre, a commercial court, a chamber of commerce, and extensive sea-bathing establishments. The chief occupations of the inhabitants are fishing, ship building, and commerce, but its manufac- tures are also becoming important. The town is believed to owe its origin to a celebrated female convent which was founded about 662. It lias repeatedly been destroyed in times of war. As early as the 13th century it was famous for its herring fisheries. FECHNER, Gnstay Theodor, a German natural- ist, born at Gross-Sahrchen, Lusatia, April 19, 1801. He studied at the university of Leipsic, and was professor of physics there from 1834 to 1839, when a disease of the eyes disabled him from teaching, and he devoted himself especially to anthropology and natural phi- losophy. He had early attracted attention by researches in galvanism, by translations of French scientific works, by papers relating to chemistry and pharmacy, and by humorous writings, Stapelia mixta, which ie published in 1824 under the name of Dr. Mises. In his Beweis, dass der Mond aus Jodine lestehe (2d ed., 1832) he deals with scientific problems in a humorous vein. His BilcJilein vom Leben nacJi dem Tode (1836), Gediclite (1842), and Raih- selbilchlein (3d ed., 1865) contain admirable spe- cimens of poetry. His other principal works are : Nanna, oder uberdasSeelenlebender Pflan- zen (1848) ; Zend-Avesta, oder iiber die Dinge den Himmels und des Jenseits (3 vols., 1851) ; Elemente der PsycTiophysilc, his most im- portant scientific work (2 vols., 1860); and PhysikaliscJie und philosophische Atomenlehre (2d ed., 1864). FECHTER, Charles Albert, a French actor, born in London, Oct. 23, 1824. The son of a German father and a French mother, he was reared principally in England and France, and after a good education he began in Paris the study of sculpture. Manifesting a strong in- clination for the stage, he made his first ap- pearance while still very young at the Salle Moliere in Le mari de la veuve. After some weeks at the conservatory, he joined a com- pany of French comedians for a year's tour through Italy. Returning- to Paris, he again applied himself to sculpture, at the same time playing minor characters in the Theatre Fran- cais. His first great success was in 1846 in the French theatre at Berlin, where he ap- peared as the original Duval in La dame aux camelias of Dumas the younger. In 1847 he played for a few weeks with a French company in London, and afterward till 1853 at different times he was prominent on the boards of the theatres Ambigu, Varietes, Historique, Porte Saint-Martin, and Vaudeville in Paris. From March, 1857, to the end of 1858, he was joint manager with M. de la Rounat of the OdSon. Two years afterward he was induced to un- dertake characters in English on the London stage, and on Oct. 27, 1860, he opened at the Princess's theatre as Ruy Bias in his own ver- sion of Victor Hugo's play. On March 19, 1861, he appeared as Hamlet, playing the part in a flaxen wig and making other marked in- novations upon the costume and conventionali- ties of the character. He played the part 70 successive nights, and excited an animated dis- cussion among the London critics. He followed with Othello, lago, Macbeth, Coriolanus, the "Corsican Brothers," Claude Melnotte, and other characters, in nearly all of which he achieved a remarkable success, in spite of his disregard of the traditions and conventionalities of the English stage. He leased the Lyceum, Jan. 1, 1863, opening as Legadere in "The Duke's Motto," and continued his manage- ment of that theatre for some years. He made his first appearence in America as Ruy Bias, in Niblo's theatre in New York, Jan. 10, 1870. In October following he opened the Globe theatre in Boston as manager, but soon returned to New York, and after a brief en- gagement at the French theatre, where he played several characters in English, he went back to London. Returning to New York in 1872, he leased the French theatre, and re- modelled it; but failing to secure possession of the property, he made his first reappearance in New York, April 28, 1873, at the Grand Opera House, as Edmond Dantes in his own version of "Monte Cristo." FEDCHENKO, Alexei, a Russian naturalist, born about 1830, died near the summit of the Col du Geant, Switzerland, Aug. 14, 1873. He resided at Moscow, and was a high authority on the geography of central Asia. He went to Switzerland to compare the glaciers of Mont Blanc and the Col du Geant with those which he had discovered in the mountains of Khokan. He left Montreux on foot for Chamouni Aug. 12, and on the 14th proceeded to the Col du Geant with two guides. He had gone within about two hours' walk of the summit when a violent storm and avalanches of snow forced him to retrace his steps, and he fell from exhaustion and perished. He left unfinished an important work, which his wife, who ac-