based on Corporal Trim, in Sterne's Tristram Shandy.
FOSS, Cyrus David (1834—). An American clergyman of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He was born at Kingston, N. Y.; graduated at Wesleyan University in 1854, and entered the itinerant ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in the New York Conference, in 1857. From 1857 to 1859 he was a pastor at Chester, Orange County, N. Y.; from 1859 to 1865 in Brooklyn, N. Y., and from 1865 to 1875 in New York, N. Y. He was president of Wesleyan University from 1875 to 1880, and in the latter year was elected a bishop. In 1878 he was delegate to the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church South, held in Atlanta, Ga., and in 1886 to the British Wesleyan Conference, held in London, England. He made official tours of the missions of his Church in Europe (1886), in Mexico (1893), and in India and Malaysia (1897-98).
FOS′SA, or FOUS′SA (Malagasy). The largest carnivorous mammal of Madagascar, a slender, lithe creature, connecting the cats and civets and in structure partaking of both. It is about twice the size of a house cat, and has a very long, tapering tail, so that it measures fully five feet from tip of nose to end of tail. It is nearly uniformly pale brown in color, with the hair short and close and no spots. Each foot has five cat-like toes, the claws of which are sharp, curved, and retractile; but the soles of the hind feet are entirely naked, and rest upon the ground in walking. The dentition is a mixture of forms characterizing both the cats and the civets, the teeth numbering thirty-six in all. A separate family has been proposed for this strange carnivore by several zoologists; but it seems best to regard it as alone representing a group Cryptoproctinæ within the civet family (Viverridæ), under the name Cryptoprocta ferox. It seems to be confined to Madagascar, where it is not numerous; and although much dreaded by the natives, on account of its reputation for ferocity and ability to do harm, is rarely seen, since it is wholly nocturnal. It feeds upon small animals and birds, and occasionally invades poultry yards; but its general habits are little known.
FOS′SA MA′RIA′NA (Lat., trench of Marius). The canal made B.C. 102, by Marius, from the Rhône to the Gulf of Stomalimne, near the modern village of Foz (Fossæ Marinæ). It was constructed to avoid the difficult navigation at the mouths of the river, caused by the accumulations of sand by the several streams. It was about 16 miles long, and was later given to the inhabitants of Massilia (Marseilles), who derived large revenues from it.
FOSSANO, fō̇s-sä′nō̇. A city in North Italy, 1240 feet above the sea, on the left bank of the Stura, 40 miles south of Turin (Map: Italy, B 3). The name Fossano, derived from the Latin fons sana, indicates the presence of much-visited mineral springs. The city has promenades on the site of the old walls, a fourteenth-century cathedral, a seminary, a gymnasium, and an academy of science. It manufactures silk fabrics, gunpowder, leather, paper, and baskets. Fossano was purchased by the House of Savoy in 1340, was the residence in the sixteenth century of Philibert Emmanuel and several of his successors, and in 1796 and 1799 was the scene of battles between the French and the Austrians. Population, in 1881, of commune, 18,000; in 1901, 18,133.
FOSSANO, Ambrogio. See Borgognone.
FOSSIL (Fr. fossile, from Lat. fossilis, dug up, fossil, from fodere, to dig; connected with Corn. bedh, Welsh bedd, grave, OChurch Slav. bosti, Lith. badyti, to pierce). Any remains or trace of the form of animals or plants found buried by natural causes in deposits or rocks before the present era. The term was formerly applied to anything dug up out of the ground, and included minerals, prehistoric implements, etc. At the present day the word is used as an adjective in this latter sense, and also to designate anything pertaining to prehistoric times. Thus, we read of fossil salt, fossil rain-drops and mud-cracks, and fossil lakes, deserts, sea-beaches, and shores. The word petrifaction is often incorrectly employed as a synonym for fossil, although it properly designates only such organic remains as have been turned to stone, as described below. Fossils are the relics of the animals and plants that have lived upon the earth and in the waters of the earth during the long periods of its geological history, and study of their organization, occurrence, and relations to each other and to modern organisms constitutes the science of paleontology (q.v.). Fossils are naturally absent from all rocks of igneous and volcanic origin, and, on the other hand, they are present originally in nearly all rocks of sedimentary origin. From large masses of these latter they have been obliterated by chemical and physical changes, so that they are now seldom or sparingly found in metamorphic rocks. The processes by which organic remains have been preserved are grouped under the term fossilization. This includes entombment and the subsequent changes that have ensued. The place of entombment may be on land, in fresh water, or in the salt water of bays, seas, or oceans.
The degree of preservation of fossils varies greatly. In some few cases the flesh of animals has been preserved as if in an ice-box. Mammoth carcasses embedded in the frozen mud cliffs of Siberia for thousands of years had meat so fresh that it was eaten by the dogs of the exploring party. The most perfectly preserved fossils are undoubtedly those insects found in the Tertiary amber of the Baltic Provinces, where the form, structure, and colors are retained intact. Then we find shells preserved in the rocks with their original organic matter replaced by some mineral, usually silica, or perhaps barytes, pyrites, or even zinc blende. Such replacements rightly receive the name of ‘petrifactions.’ In other cases we find cavities in rocks, the sides of these retaining impressions of the outer and inner surfaces of shells which have been dissolved and destroyed by percolating waters. These ‘molds’ are sometimes filled with calcite, or quartz, or other mineral matter, and then we have ‘casts’ of the original organic forms. The study of these molds is puzzling to the beginner, because of the multiplication of forms so caused. A single shell like a limpet, if preserved in the rocks, may present four different aspects as a fossil—the outer and inner surfaces of the shell itself, and the molds of each of these. The mold of the outer surface may pull away such delicate spines
