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rian. The earlier recognition of him was chiefly of the expounder of evolutionary philosophy, and his lucidity in popularizing Spencer was admired by Darwin. After 1879 he devoted himself chiefly to American history, though his Idea of God (1885), Origin of Evil and Through Nature to God gave his last answers to questions in philosophy and religion. His histories extend from the earliest discoveries to the beginnings of Federal government; cover almost every phase of American life; and have dramatic interest as well as great historical value. As a lecturer and writer on philosophy and history, he took high rank among American authors, while he did much to elucidate and popularize the doctrine of evolution. Among his works are The Destiny of Man; Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy; American Political Ideas; The Discovery of America; The Beginnings of New England; Civil Government in the United States; The American Revolution; Old Virginia and Her Neighbors; and The Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America. He died at Gloucester, Mass., July 4, 1901. Fiske, Minnie Maddern, born in New Orleans in 1865, is a well-known American actress of the realistic school. Like many other successful actresses, she spent even her childhood upon the stage. In 1890 she married Harrison Fiske. Some of her greatest successes have been made in Becky Sharp, in Ibsen's A Doll's House and in Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles. Fitch, John, inventor, was born in what is now South Windsor, Conn., in 1743, and is said to have committed suicide in the summer of 1798. In 1785 he completed his first model of a steamboat, which had wheels at the sides, replacing them in the following year with paddles. In the face of discouragement he built a vessel 45 feet long, which made a successful trial trip on the Delaware at Philadelphia, Aug. 22, 1787. A larger one was built in 1790, and attained a speed of eight miles an hour. Robert Fulton's steamboat was, in 1817, declared by a committee of the New York legislature to be “in substance the invention patented by John Fitch in 1791.” Fitch'burg, Mass., a city in Worcester County, Massachusetts, on Nookagee River. The city has grown a good deal during the last ten years. It has a well-equipped fire-department with over 75 telegraphic fire-alarm stations. In 1900 it had about a score of churches and some 30 school-buildings, the latter valued at over $300,000. There also is a public-library and art-gallery building costing $90,000, given to the city by one of its public-spirited citizens, and $450,000 have been donated by another for a public hospital. The library contains close upon 30,000 volumes. There are many manufactories, the chief being paper-mills, machine-shops, iron-foundries, pianoforte,

saw-factories, cotton, woolen and flour-mills, shoe and shirt-factories and bicycle, electrical apparatus and wood-turning establishments. Population 37,826. Fitchett, Rev. William Henry, was educated at Melbourne University, has been president of the general conference of the Methodist church of Australasia, is principal of the Methodist Ladies' College at Melbourne, was former editor of the Melbourne Daily Telegraph, and is now in charge of the editorial interests of The Southern Cross and Life. He is even better known for his stirring recitals of British fighting on land and sea, his published works including Deeds that Won the Empire, Fights for the Flag, How England Saved Europe, Wellington's Men, Nelson and His Captains and The Commander of the Hirondelle. These works are circulated and read throughout the English-speaking world. Fitzpatrick, Hon. Sir Charles, was born in the city of Quebec in 1853, and educated at Laval University. For six years (1890-6) a member of the Quebec Legislature, he was elected to the House of Commons in 1896. He was solicitor-general and, afterwards, minister of justice in the Laurier administration. He became chief-justice of the supreme court in 1906. Five Forks is a place in Dinwiddie County, Virginia, known to history as the site of a battle fought between the Union forces under Gen. Phil. Sheridan and the Confederate army under General Lee, on April 1, 1865. General Sheridan won the battle, the result of which was the evacuation of Petersburg on April 2, Richmond falling shortly afterward. Flag, a strip of some light cloth attached at one end to a staff, used as a local or corporate emblem by a nation or city for military and naval purposes; to express rejoicing, mourning and the like; or to make known some fact to spectators. Flags are supposed to have had their origin in the fixed standard of the Romans. One of the earliest known flags was the gonfalon, borne near the person of the commander-in-chief in battle. Besides this, there were three kinds used in the middle ages: the pennon, used by a knight who had followers to defend it; the banner, borne by a king, prince, duke or other noble, with the owner's coat of arms covering its entire surface; and the standard, used among persons of distinction in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries. In most countries, except republics, the sovereign has his own flag. The stars-and-stripes of the United States was adopted by Congress on June 14, 1777, nearly a year after the Declaration of Independence, and consisted of 13 stripes alternately red and white and a device of 13 white stars on a blue ground in the upper corner nearest the staff; the number