considered verse-making as an amusement, and was now to devote himself to what he regarded as the more serious and appropriate business of life. Ferry had a noble appearance and a fine voice, and he had the reputation of being the most eloquent man of the province in which he lived. He had the honour of being appointed to deliver the funeral orations at the death of Louis XIII. and of the queen-mother, Anne of Austria, and on both occasions the discourses were published. In 1616 Ferry published a work, entitled "Scholastici Orthodoxi Specimen," in which he showed that the doctrines of grace, instead of being novelties of the Reformation, as had been often said, were contained in the writings of several of the schoolmen. This book was replied to in 1619 by Leonard Perinus, a learned jesuit, in a work called "Thrasonica Pauli Ferrii Calvinistæ;" and Ferry, in 1630, published an elaborate defence of his views, in a book entitled "Vindiciæ pro Scholastico Orthodoxo." Besides these works, Ferry was the author of various other controversial treatises, of which may be named "Le dernier Desespoir de la Tradition," and "General Catechisme de la Reformation," the latter of which was replied to by the illustrious Bossuet. Ferry deplored the divisions that existed among protestants, and corresponded on this subject with Dury. He died on the 27th of December, 1669.—J. B. J.
FERSEN, Axel von, a Swedish officer of rank and member of various diets. He was the descendant of a long military line, which was said to have originally emigrated from Scotland. He was born in Stockholm on the 12th of June, 1715. At the age of twenty-two he entered the military service, and soon after, by the royal consent, joined the French army, in which he served till 1750, when he again entered the Swedish army as major-general. His talents, wealth, and family connections raised him also high in political rank, and in 1755 he was elected president of the ridderhus or house of nobles. In 1757 he became lieutenant-general, and as such served in the Seven Years' war, 1770. He was made field-marshal when he retired to his estate. Again, however, he entered political life, sat in various diets, and in 1789, as leader of the opposition against Gustavus III., was imprisoned by royal command. He died in Stockholm., 24th April, 1794.—M. H.
FERSEN, Hans Axel von, son of the foregoing, was born at Stockholm, 4th September, 1755. He completed his education at the military academy of Turin, and on his return to Sweden at the age of twenty was appointed captain of the royal life dragoons. In 1779 he made his second visit to France. As son of the leader of the French party in Sweden, he was now, as he had been already, received with great kindness at the court of Versailles, more especially by Marie Antoinette; his accomplishments, fine person, and chivalric manners, having, it was said, awakened a tender sentiment in the heart of the queen. Be this as it may, he soon afterwards went with the French army to North America, where he distinguished himself on various occasions. On his return to France in 1783, he was appointed colonel and commander of the royal Swedes, but he left the French service to attend Gustavus III. on his journey to Italy. On the breaking out of the French revolution, he was employed on secret diplomatic missions to the courts of Versailles and Vienna. He was in Paris in 1791 when the unfortunate Louis XVI. and his queen resolved to fly from France, and he it was, who dressed as coachman, drove them on their way to Varennes. In 1797 he was sent as Swedish ambassador to the congress at Rastadt, at which, however, he was not received; after which he remained almost entirely at home. On the sudden death of the Crown Prince Carl August in 1810, which was generally attributed to poison, Fersen, whose devotion to the house of Gottorpe was well-known, was suspected in connection with his sister, the Countess Piper, of being concerned in this crime. In spite of the warnings which he received to the contrary, he determined to attend the funeral of the prince in quality of his rank as riks-marshal, to which he had been appointed in 1801, when he was attacked by the populace and barbarously murdered, on the 20th of June, 1810. He died unmarried, and his brother and his two nephews having also since died, the male line of his race is now extinct.—M. H.
FERUS, Johann, a learned Franciscan, was born at Metz in 1494, and died in 1554. His German name was Wild, which according to the fashion of his times he latinized into Ferus. Like many of his order, he was endowed with the gift of eloquence, and preached with great reputation and success in his native city for the long period of twenty-four years. He was besides a learned and industrious divine. He wrote commentaries on the Pentateuch, Job, Ecclesiastes, the Lamentations, and Jonah; on the gospels of Matthew and John, and on the Epistle to the Romans, &c. These commentaries, which are not mere dry notes, have been highly praised by Dupin and others. He was, however, accused of teaching Lutheranism by the famous Spanish Jacobin, Dominic de Soto, but did not live to make his defence. His works are included in the index-expurgatorius.—R. M., A.
FERUSSAC, André Etienne, son of J. B. Ferussac, was born in 1784; died in 1836. He chose the military profession, and served in Spain, where his military duties did not interrupt his love for natural history; and during the privations of a campaign, he found leisure to study the natural productions of the country. A severe wound rendered him unfit for further service, and he returned to France. His writings had attracted the notice of Bonaparte, and he obtained employment in the civil service. When the allies entered France, he tendered a willing allegiance to the Bourbons, and was subsequently promoted to various situations. From 1823 till 1830 he conducted a useful scientific journal, the Bulletin Universel des Sciences, &c. His most important work was his "Natural History of land and freshwater mollusca." This was an extension of the posthumous work of his father, and is of great value to the naturalist, from the number of species described and figured.—J. S.
FERUSSAC, Jean Baptiste Louis, born in 1745 in the south of France; died in 1815. He entered the navy, and when the Revolution broke out attained the rank of captain. Like other royalists he emigrated, and did not return to his native country until 1801. The remainder of his life was devoted to literary and scientific pursuits. His best performance was his work on land and fresh-water mollusca.—J. S.
FESCA, Friedrich Ernst, a musician, was born at Magdeburg on the 17th of February, 1789, and died at Carlsruhe on the 24th of May, 1826. His talent for his art was proved in infancy. His first instructor was Lohse, under whose tuition, and when but eleven years old, he played a violin concerto in public. In 1804 he went to Leipzig, where he became the pupil of August Eberhard Müller. His first appointment was that of solo violinist at the opera in Cassel, which he obtained in 1807, while Reichardt was kapell-meister there. In this city he produced his first symphonies and violin quartets. He went to Vienna in 1814, where he published three volumes of quartets. In 1815 he was engaged as intendant of the court theatre, and concert-master at Carlsruhe, in the discharge of which offices he wrote his operas of "Cantemira" and "Ceïla." A collection of his quartets and quintets for string-instruments was published at Paris.—His son, Alexander Fesca, was born at Carlsruhe in 1820, and died at Brunswick in 1849. He also was a composer of considerable merit, and his pianoforte trios and many of his songs have been very popular.—G. A. M.
FESCH, Joseph, Cardinal, born at Ajaccio in Corsica in 1763; died at Rome in 1839. His father was a French officer, whose second wife was Angela Maria, mother of Letitia Bonaparte. The future cardinal was educated at the college of Aix in Provence, and entered into holy orders. In 1793 he took part against Paoli and the English. He was banished from Corsica, and followed the Bonapartes to Toulon. During the period in which religion was suppressed in France, he found employment and support in the commissariat of the French armies. On the re-establishment of religion in France, Fesch resumed the ecclesiastical habit, and was an active party in the negotiations which ended in the concordat of 1801. He was appointed archbishop of Lyons, and a few months after received his cardinal's hat. In 1804 he was ambassador from France at the court of Rome. Chateaubriand was in his suite. Between Chateaubriand and the cardinal there were from the first serious misunderstandings. Chateaubriand had recently published his "Genie du Christianisme," and, with a Frenchman's vanity, seemed absolutely to believe that he was the great restorer of religion, which, but for him and his book, would for ever pass away. To him St. Peter owed, he thought, a debt of gratitude which all the favours that they could bestow would do but little to repay; and this, too, was very much the feeling in Rome. Fesch was mortified at being comparatively neglected. All attentions of every kind were lavished on the fortunate author, whom the cardinal thought
