Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume VII.djvu/493

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FRENCH HORN FRENCH HORX. See HORN. FRMEAU, Philip, an American poet, born in New York, Jan. 13, 1752, died near Freehold, N. J., Dec. 18, 1832. He was educated at Nassau Hall, Princeton, N. J., where James Madison was his room mate, and where he wrote his "Poetical History of the Prophet Jonah." He intended to study law, but finally followed a seafaring life. During the revolu- tion his political burlesques in verse and prose were very popular with the patriots. While on a voyage to the West Indies in 1780 he was captured by the British and confined for a long time in the Scorpion prison ship at New York, which he commemorated in his poem "The British Prison Ship." When Jefferson was secretary of state Freneau became French translator under him, and at the same time editor of the "National Gazette," a paper hostile to Washington's administration. It was discontinued in October, 1793, and in 1795 he began a newspaper near Middletown Point, N. J., which he continued for a year, and pub- lished there an edition of his poems. He next edited for a year in New York "The Time Piece," a tri- weekly, after which he again be- came master of a merchant vessel. During the second war with Great Britain he recorded in stirring verse the triumphs of the American arms. The close of his life was spent in retire- ment. Many of his smaller poems possess great elegance of diction, and Scott and Campbell borrowed whole lines from him. Several edi- tions of his poems were published during his life, and E. A. Duyckinck has edited his " Po- ems of the Revolution" (New York, 1865). FRERE. I. Charles Theodore, a French painter, born in Paris in 1815. He studied with Ro- queplan, and exhibited but little talent until he visited the East. He has since won some rep- utation as a delineator of eastern subjects. Among his recent works are "The Island of Philoe," " The Cafe of Galata," " The Evening Prayer," " Arabic Wedding at Cairo," "The Caravan of Mecca," "Ruins of Palmyra," and " The Simoom." II. Pierre Edouard, a French painter, brother of the preceding, born in Paris, Jan. 10, 1819. He studied with Paul Delaroche, devoted himself to genre painting and to small pictures, and exhibited his first work in 1843. He has since acquired dis- tinction, and many of his works have been photographed and lithographed. Some pf his later pictures are : " The Workshop at Ecouen, " " Palm Sunday," and " The Benedicite," ex- hibited in 1866; "The First Steps," "The Prayer," " The Library," " The Little Wood- cutters," "The Stove," and an "Interior at Royat," in 1867; and "Boys leaving School" and "Girls leaving School," in 1869. FRERE, John Hookham, an English poet and diplomatist, born in London, May 21, 1769, died in Malta, Jan. 7, 1846. He was educated at Eton and Cambridge, and while a school boy translated the remarkable war song upon the victory of Athelstan at Brunnenburg from the FRERON 481 Anglo-Saxon of the 10th century into the An- glo-Norman of the ] 4th. It is found in the first volume of Ellis's " Specimens of the Early Eng- lish Poets." When at Eton, in connection with Canning and Robert Smith, he started and car- ried on to 40 numbers a weekly paper called the " Microcosm." On leaving Cambridge, in 1795, he entered the foreign office under Lord Gren- ville, and in the following year he was returned to parliament. He succeeded Canning as under- secretary for foreign affairs in 1799, and subse- quently served in various diplomatic missions. During his leisure he made exquisite translations from the Greek and Spanish. In 1817 he pub- lished an extravaganza of the Pulci and Casti school, under the title of " Whistlecraft's Pro- spectus and Specimen of an Intended National Poem" (also called "The Monks and the Giants"), which treated in a light and satirical way the adventures of King Arthur. Its pecu- liar stanza and sarcastic pleasantry formed the immediate exemplar of Byron's " Beppo " and "Don Juan." Frere was a contributor to the " Anti- Jacobin," and was one of the found- ers of the London "Quarterly Review." For many years before his death he resided in Malta, receiving from the government a liberal diplo- matic pension. See his " Works in Verse and Prose," with memoir by his nephews (2 vols., London, 1872). His nephew, Sir HENRY BAR- TLE EDWARD, born in 1815, was governor of Bombay from 1862 to 1867, and subsequently became vice president of the royal geographical society. 'In 1873 he negotiated a treaty with the sultan of Zanzibar for the suppression of the slave trade. FRERET, Nicolas, a French scholar, born in Paris, Feb. 15, 1688, died there, March 8, 1749. Admitted in 1714 to the academy of inscrip- tions and belles-lettres, of which he was after- ward perpetual secretary, he was imprisoned for his first memoir, which discussed the origin of the French. On recovering his liberty in 1715, he began to produce the long series of memoirs which gave him distinction as an anti- quary, philosopher, and philologist. The an- nals of the Assyrians, Chaldeans, Egyptians, and Hindoos, the principal ancient and orien- tal cosmogonies and theogonies, and numerous questions of history and geography are among the objects of his research. He wrote on chronology against Newton. An incomplete collection of his works was made by Leclerc de Septchenes (20 vols., Paris, l796-'9). A more complete one was undertaken by Cham- pollion-Figeac, but only the first volume was issued (Paris, 1825). FRERON. I. Elie Catherine, a French journal- ist, born in Quimper in 1719, died in Pans, March 10, 1776. He studied under the Jesuits in the college of Louis-le-Grand at Pans, 11 which he was for a short time professor. At the age of 20 he joined Desfontaines m con- ducting his journal of criticism, and m 174b, after the death of the latter, commenced a similar periodical, entitled Lettres d Madame U