Flagellants

FLAC CUS, GAIUS VALERIUS, a Roman poet, who flourished in the 1st c., and is supposed to have died 88 A.D. Absolutely nothing is known regarding his life. He is the author of an epic poem on the Argonautic expedition, which in its extant form is incomplete. Some modern critics, Wagner among others, praise it extravagantly, and place the author next to Virgil; but the more general opinion of sound scholars is, that the work is rather a specimen of learned mediocrity than of genuine inspiration. The editio princeps of the Argonautica appeared in 1472. Of modern editions, may be mentioned those of Wagner (Gött. 1805) and Lemaire (Paris, 1824). An English metrical translation was published by one Nicholas Whyte as early as 1565. Similar translations exist in French, Italian, and German.

FLACCUS, VERRIUS, a grammarian and teacher in Rome in the time of Augustus; a freedman, who was honored by having the emperor's grandsons among his pupils. He was the author of a number of works, from which extracts were collected by Lindemann in his Corpus Grammat. Latinorum.

FLACIUS, MATTHIAS, 1520-75; a German theologian, one of the converts of Luther and Melanchthon. He was the head of a party of extreme Lutherans at Magdeburg; was professor of the university founded at Jena in 1558, and afterwards preached in several German cities. He was one of the authors of the Centuries of Magdeburg, and sole author of a number of vigorous polemical works.

FLACOURTIA CEÆ, a natural order of exogenous plants, allied to passion-flowers, consisting of shrubs and small trees, almost exclusively confined to the warmest parts of the globe. Many of the species, particularly of the genus flacourtia, produce pleas ant, sweet, or subacid fruits. Flacourtia inermis is much esteemed and cultivated in the Moluccas. Arnotto (q.v.) is produced by a tree of this order.

FLAG, a popular name for many endogenous plants with sword-shaped leaves, mostly growing in moist situations. It is sometimes particularly appropriated to the species of iris (q.v.), or flower-de-luce; but is given also very indiscriminately to other plants of similar foliage, as the acorus calamus (see ACORUS), which is called sweet flag. FLAG (common to the Teutonic languages, and derived from a root signifying to fly), a cloth of light material, capable of being extended by the wind, and designed to make known some fact or want to spectators. In the army, a F. is the ensign carried as its distinguishing mark by each regiment; and also a small banner, with which the ground to be occupied is marked out. In the navy, the F. is of more importance, often constituting the only means vessels have of communicating with each other, or with the shore.

The United States ensign is briefly noticed under heading AMERICAN FLAG. but a more extended account of its history, and that of other flags, is required, Naturally, the regular English flag was used by the colonies in their early days, and that was commonly the cross of St. George. The Puritan spirit was shown when Endicott, the governor of Massachusetts, cut the cross from the flag because it was a Romanist emblem. The colonial flags varied in color, it being sufficient if ground and cross differed. Now and then a pine-tree was figured in the upper left-hand quarter of the cross, and one flag had only the tree for a symbol. When Sir Edmund Andros was governor he established a special flag for New England, a white field with a St. George cross, and in the centro "J. R."-Jacobus Rex (James, King)-surmounted by a crown. The revolution brought in all manner of devices for flags and banners, the larger portion bearing mottoes more or less defiant of the foreign government. Soon after the fight at Lexington the volunteers from Connecticut put on their flags the arms of the colony with the legend, Qui transtulit sustinet (He who brought us over will sustain us). The colonial flag of New Amsterdam (substantially the present arms of New York city) was carried by armed vessels sailing out of New York-a beaver being the principal figure, indicative of both the industry of the Dutch people and the wealth of the fur trade. The day after the battle of Bunker Hill, Putnam displayed a flag with a red ground, having on one side the Connecticut motto, and on the other the words "An Appeal to Heaven." The earliest vessels sailing under Washington's authority displayed the pinetree flag. An early flag in the southern states was designed by Colonel Moultrie and displayed at Charleston, in Sept., 1775. It was blue, with a white crescent in the upper 'corner next the staff; afterwards the word “ Liberty" was added. At Cambridge, Mass., Jan. 2, 1776, Washington displayed the original of the present United States flag, 'consisting of 13 stripes of red and white, with a St. Andrew cross in place of the stars. The rattlesnake flag was used to some extent in two forms; in one the snake was intact, and under the figure the words "Don't tread on me ;" in the other form the snake was in 13 pieces, and the legend was "Join or Die" and in some cases the snake had 13 rattles. Ten days after the declaration of independence, congress directed the style of the flag of the United States, as heretofore described, with its later modifications. By the war and navy departments the stars in the union are usually placed in the most symmetrical manner possible, one star being in the field for each state of the union. The union jack is a blue ground, without stripes, having the stars in white. In the body of the flag there are seven red and six white stripes, alternating, the union occupying the upper corner next the staff, and having a depth of seven stripes.

During the war of the secession the seceding states had a number of distinct flags