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beneficio of the donor; and the tenants were bound to swear fealty to the lord, and to serve him in the wars. In after-times, as these tenures became perpetual and hereditary, they left their name of beneficia to the livings of the clergy; and retained to themselves the name of feuds.

BENEFICE, in an ecclesiastical sense, is a church endowed with a revenue for the performance of divine service; or the revenue itself assigned to an ecclesiastical person, by way of stipend, for the service he is to do that church. All church preferments, except bishoprics, are called benefices; and all benefices are, by the canonists, sometimes styled dignities: but we now ordinarily distinguish between benefice and dignity; applying dignity to bishoprics, deaneries, archdeaconries, and prebendaries; and benefice to patronages, vicarages, and donatives. Benefices are divided by the canonists into simple and sacerdotal. In the first there is no obligation but to read prayers, sing, &c.; such are canonries, chaplainships, chantries, &c.: the second are charged with the cure of souls, or the direction and guidance of consciences; such as vicarages, rectories, &c. The Romanists again distinguish benefices into regular and secular.

BENEFICE IN COMMENDAM is that, the direction and management of which, upon a vacancy, is given or recommended to an ecclesiastic, for a certain time, till he may be conveniently provided for.

BENEFICES, REGULAR, or titular, in the Romish church, are those held by a religious, or a regular who has made profession of some religious order; such are abbeys, priories, conventuals, &c.; or rather, a regular benefice is that which cannot be conferred on any but a religious, either by its foundation, by the institution of some superior, or by prescription; for prescription, forty years possession by a religious makes the benefice regular.

BENEFICES, SECULAR, are only such as are to be given to secular priests, i. e. to such as live in the world, and are not engaged in any monastic order. All benefices are reputed secular, till the contrary is made to appear. They are called secular benefices, because held by seculars; of which kind are almost all cures.

BENEFICES, VACATING OF. The canonists distinguish three manners of vacating a benefice, viz. 1. De jure, when the person enjoying it is guilty of certain crimes expressed in those laws, as heresy, simony, &c. 2. De facto, as well as de jure, by the natural death or the resignation of the incumbent; which resignation may be either express, or tacit, as when he engages in a state, &c., inconsistent with it, as, among the Romanists, by marrying, entering into a religious order, or the like. 3. By the sentence of a judge, by way of punishment for certain crimes, as concubinage, perjury, &c.

BENEFICIARII, in Roman antiquity, denoted, 1. Soldiers who attended the chief officers of the army, being exempted from other duty. 2. Soldiers discharged from the military service or duty, and provided with beneficia to subsist These were probably the same with the former, and both might be comprised in the

on.

same definition. They were old experienced soldiers, who having served out their legal time, or received a discharge as a particular mark of honor, were invited again to the service, where they were held in great esteem, exempted from all military drudgery, and appointed to guard the standard, &c. These, when thus recalled to service, were also denominated evocati; before their recal, emeriti. 3. Soldiers raised to a higher rank by the favor of the tribunes or other magistrates. Beneficiarius frequently occurs in the Roman inscriptions found in Britain, where consulis is always joined with it; but besides beneficiarius consulis, we find in Gruter beneficiarius tribuni, prætorii, legati, præfecti, proconsulis, &c.

BENEFICIARY, beneficiarius, is particularly used for a beneficed person, or one who receives and enjoys one or more benefices. A beneficiary is not the proprietor of the revenues of his church; he has only the administration of them, though unaccountable for the same to any but God.

BENEFICIARY is also used, in middle age writers, for a feudatory or vassal. The denomination was also given to the clerks or officers who kept the accounts of the beneficia, and made the writings necessary thereto.

BENEFICIO PRIMO ECCLESIASTICO HABENDO, a writ directed to the lord chancellor, &c. by the king, to bestow the benefice that shall first fall, in the king's gift, on this, or

that man.

BENEFICIUM, in military matters, among the Romans, denoted a promotion to a higher rank by the favor of some person in authority.

BENEFIELD (Sebastian), an eminent divine of the seventeenth century, born in 1559, at Prestonbury in Gloucestershire, and educated at Oxford. In 1608 he took the degree of D. D. and five years after was chosen Margaret professor in that university. He had been presented several years before to the rectory of MeyseyHampton, in Gloucestershire. He published commentaries on the first, second, and third chapters of Amos; a considerable number of sermons, and some Latin treatises. He died in 1630.

BENEFIT, v. n. See BENEFICENCE. A kindness; a favor conferred; an act of love. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. Psalms. The creature abateth his strength for the benefit of Wisdom. such as put their trust in thee?

When noble benefits shall prove
They turn to vicious forms.
Not well disposed, the mind grown once corrupt,

Shakspeare.

Id.

What course I mean to hold, Shall nothing benefit your knowledge.

Offer'd life

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BENENAIM, BENENATH, BENENASCH, or BENENAT, in astronomy, the outermost star of the second magnitude, in the tail of ursa major. It is also called allioth.

BENEPLACITO, in music-books, signifies, if you please; or if you will.

BENERTH, a feudal service formerly rendered by the tenant to his lord, with his plough and cart.

BENESOEUF, a town of Egypt, seated on the western shore of the Nile, and remarkable for its hemp and flax.

To BENET, v. a., from net; to ensnare; to surround as with toils.

Being thus benetted round with villains, Ere I could mark the prologue, to my bane They had begun the play.

Shakspeare. BENEVENTO, a duchy of Italy, in the kingdom of Naples, with an archbishop's see; it is situated near the confluence of the rivers Sabato and Calore, in a fertile valley called the strait of Benevento. It was once a more considerable territory, but now consists only of the city of Benevento, and a small surrounding district of about eleven square miles; comprising that city and seven villages and hamlets, with a population of about 24,000 individuals. It is a fertile tract, producing excellent wine and fruit, besides feeding numbers of cattle, and yielding some corn; it has also many excellent springs. This district was first erected into a duchy by the Lombards in 571. The successor of its first prince, Zotto, conquered a great part of the country, which now constitutes the kingdom of Naples after this it passed into the hands of the Saracens and Normans. The modern duchy of Benevento, however, long maintained its independence, and was, in the eleventh century, granted to the Holy See by the emperor Henry II. in exchange for some jurisdictions he possessed at Bamberg. From that time it may be said to have remained in possession of the church; for though there has scarcely been a sovereign of Naples who has not seized it in the course of his reign, it has always returned to the original possessor. Buonaparte availed himself of the disputes between the Neapolitan and Papal powers, to seize upon this duchy, which he conferred on his minister Talleyrand, whom he created duke of Benevento. The Beneventine duchy acknowledged this new master for about ten years; when its annual revenue was about 14,000 ducats, or £2300.

BENEVENTO, the capital of the above duchy, is situated on a steep declivity, at the point of a hill, between two narrow valleys; the one watered by the Sabato, and the other by the Calore, which unite into one stream below the town. This city in general is well built; but several of the most populous streets are narrow, and some of them so steep as to be impassable for carriages. It contains about 18,000 inhabitants. Few places except Rome can boast of more antiquities. Its origin seems to be hid in obscurity; but there is no doubt that it was one of the principal towns of the Samnites. See BENEVENTUM.

The arch of Trajan, now called the Porta Aurea, forms one of the entrances to the city.

This arch, though it appears to great disadvan tage from the walls and houses that enclose it on both sides, is in tolerable preservation, and one of the most magnificent remains of Roman grandeur. The architecture and sculpture are both singularly beautiful. This elegant monument was erected A. D. 114, about the commencement of the Parthian war, and after the submission of Decebalus had entitled Trajan to the surname of Dacicus. The order is Composite, the materials white marble, the height sixty palms, length thirty-seven and a half, and depth twenty-four. It consists of a single arch, the span of which is twenty palms, the height thirtyfive. On each side of it, two fluted columns, upon a joint pedestal, support an entablement and an attic. The intercolumniations and frieze are covered with basso-relievos, representing the battles and triumph of the Dacian war. In the attic is the inscription. As the sixth year of Trajan's consulate, marked on this arch, is also to be seen on all the military columns he erected along his new road to Brundusium, it is probable that the arch was built to commemorate so beneficial an undertaking. The whole upper division, representing the apotheosis of the emperor, nearly approaches to the perfection of the finest Grecian bas reliefs. Benevento also possesses the remains of several other excellent pieces of sculpture, and those of a Roman amphitheatre. Scarce a wall is built of any thing but altars, tombs, columns, and remains of Roman architecture. The cathedral is a Saracenic edifice, dedicated to the Virgin Mary. It was built in the sixth century, enlarged in the eleventh, and altered considerably in the thirteenth, when archbishop Roger adorned it with a new front. To obtain a sufficient quantity of marble for this purpose, he spared neither sarcophagus, altar, nor inscription; but fixed them promiscuously and irregularly in the walls of his barbarous structure. Three doors (a type of the trinity, according to the rules established by the mystical Vitruvii of those ages), open into this façade. That in the centre is of bronze, embossed with the life of Christ, and the effigies of the Beneventine Metropolitan, with all his suffragan bishops. Near one of the town gates an ancient monastery presents a good specimen of the style which prevailed during the early period of the lower Greek empire. The castle is said to have been built in the year 1323. This town has often suffered greatly by earthquakes. In 1688 it was almost destroyed by one; and the archbishop, afterwards pope Benedict XIII., was dug alive out of the ruins, having been preserved by an incurvated beam that fell over him. On his promotion to the papal chair he rebuilt the city. It was afterwards greatly damaged by another earthquake in 1703. It has given birth to three popes.

BENEVENTUM, a town of the Samnites, formerly called Maleventum from the unwholesomeness of the wind, and under that appellation mentioned by Livy; but after a Roman colony was led thither, A. U.C. 485, it came to have the name of Beneventum, as a more auspicious title. It is mentioned by Horace as an ancient city, said to have been built by Diomedes, before. `

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BENGAL, a large province of Hindostan, lying between the twenty-first and twentyseventh degrees of north latitude. It is bounded on the north by Nepaul and Bootan; on the south by the bay of Bengal; on the east by the Burmese territories; and on the west by Bahar. Its length may be estimated at 350 miles, and its average breadth at 300. The northern frontier is guarded by a broad belt of low land, covered by impenetrable woods; beyond this rise the bold mountains of Hindostan. On the south, it is protected by the forests and shallows of the coast, the outlets of the Ganges, and the difficult access to its only port; while on the west, where alone an enemy is to be apprehended, the natural frontier is strong, and the contiguous region sterile and thinly inhabited. The river Ganges flows along Bengal in a south-easterly direction, separating the whole country into two territorial divisions, of which, in case of invasion, the eastern tract would present an asylum to the inhabitants.

Abul Fazel in 1582 describes the province as follows: The soubah of Bengal is situated in the second climate. From Chittagong to Kurhee is 400 coss difference of longitude; and from the northern range of mountains to the southern extremity of Sircar Madarun (Birbhoom) comprehends 200 coss of latitude. When Orissa was added to Bengal, the additional length was computed to be forty-three coss, and the breadth twenty coss. Bengal was originally called Beng. The soubah of Bengal consists of twenty-four sircars, and 787 mahals. The revenue is 1,49,61,482 sicca rupees; and the zemindars, who are mostly koits, furnish 23,330 cavalry, 801,158 infantry, 170 elephants, 4260 cannon, and 4400 boats."

At the period when the institutes of Acber were compiled, the government of Bengal extended to Cuttack, and along the Mahanuddy River, Orissa not being then formed into a distinct soubah, as appears from the arrangement of the twenty-four sircars immediately following, of which the last five are in Orissa.

'1. Oudumbher, or Tandeh; 2. Jennetabad;

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3. Futtehabad; 4. Mahmoodabad; 5. Khalifetabad; 6. Bokla; 7. Purmeah; 8. Taugepoor; 9. Ghoraghaut; 10. Pinjerah; 11. Barbuckabad; 12. Bazooha; 13. Soonargong; 14. Silhet; 15. Chatgong; 16. Shereefabad; 17. Solimabad; 18. Satgong; 19. Madarun; 20. Jellasir; 21. Buddruck; 22. Cuttak; 23. Kullangdunpaut; 24. Raje Mahindra.'

Anterior to the cessions made by the Nabob of Oude, in 1801, the regions immediately governed by the Calcutta presidency, comprehended the entire soubahs of Bengal and Bahar, part of the soubahs of Allahabad, Orissa, and Berar, and some tracts of country which had maintained their independence during the most flourishing period of the Mogul empire, consisting of part of the Morung, Cooch Bahar, and other districts, which have become tributary since the English became possessors of Bengal.

The greater part of the country forms one vast alluvial plain, descending imperceptibly to the sea, and annually covered by the inundations of the Ganges. Beng, the ancient name of this level region, is supposed to have been the origin of the present name of the province, while the higher lands, above the limit of the inundation, were called Varendra, or Barendra. Cháti-gang, or Chittagong, Silhet, and Bérb'hum, are the only parts of the province which can be called mountainous, and they scarcely deserve the name.

The rivers, besides those gigantic streams, the Ganges, the Brahma-putra, and Megna, are the Rúp-naráïn, Dámódà, Téstà, Cúram, Corotoyà, Mánas, Cósí, and Cónkí. The J'hils, called lakes, are rather morasses, or inundated valleys, than lakes; but are generally navigable for boats in the wet seasons. To check as much as possible the force of the inundation, embankments are indispensable, and the sum allowed by government for their maintenance, amounted in 1815 to 247,457 rupees, or £30,932. 2s. 6d. sterling.

The periodical winds prevalent in the Bay of Bengal, extend their influence over the entire level, until diverted by chains of mountains.

Those that prevail over that part of the country facing the head of the bay, are north and south; the former of which blows during the cold season, the latter during the hot. The period of their change, however, seems earlier on the eastern side of the Delta, than on the western; and, in this respect, corresponds with a difference observed in the periodical winds on the respective shores of the bay. In Bahar and Assam, the most common winds are east and west, also corresponding with the changes of seasons. In the month of April, and in the south-east quarter rather earlier, there are frequent storms of thunder and lightning, attended by heavy squalls from the northwest, which happen at the close of the day; and during this period great caution is necessary in navigating the large rivers. In the beginning of June, the periodical rains commence, and com monly last till the middle of September, when they are succeeded by an excessive heat, which, however, gradually diminishes as the year adIf the rains break up early in September, the heat becomes almost intolerable, and is attended with a great sickness and mortality, especially among Europeans.

vances.

Although, properly speaking, there are but three seasons in the year, viz. the cold, hot, and rainy, the inhabitants commonly assign six, each continuing two months. The spring and dry seasons occupy four months, during which the heat progressively increases, till it becomes almost insupportable, even to the natives; the sun's beams are too powerful for the eyes at noon-day, and the large stars, as Venus and Jupiter, shine with surprising lustre. Mild showers in the east districts, and the thunder-storms called north-westers in the middle, nevertheless, cool and refresh the atmosphere, and the scorched inhabitants are at length relieved by the rainy season, during the first two months of which the rains are heavy and almost unremitting; an interval of many successive days is rare. In the two subsequent months, the intervals are more frequent, and of longer duration, and the climate becomes more sultry. The rivers, and especially the Ganges, which begins to rise before the commencement of the rainy season, in the third month reach their greatest height, and the Delta becomes overflowed. A striking scene now presents itself: large sheets of water, with ears of rice floating on the surface, stupendous mounds and dykes, at intervals checking the progress of the inundation, and navigation over fields submerged to a considerable depth, and peasants embarked on rafts, with their families and cattle, repairing to market, or to the higher grounds, present an association of objects, which are novel and interesting in the highest degree to a stranger.

At the approach of winter the rivers decrease, the showers cease to fall, and the inundation drains off; after which, as the cold season comes on, fogs and heavy dews produce an almost continued dampness, which, combined with the effects of a tropical sun, is injurious to the health of Europeans, and annually carries off great numbers of our fellow-countrymen. Frost and extreme cold are experienced in the higher latitudes, and even in the flat country ice is obtained

by the simple process of assisting evaporation in porous vessels, although the atmosphere is much warmer than the freezing temperature.

The original soil of Bengal appears to be clay mixed with a considerable portion of silicious sand, fertilised by various salts, together with decayed vegetable and animal substances. These form a compost highly productive, which, combined with moisture, and the heat of the climate, accounts for a luxuriance and rapidity of vegetation almost unparalleled. In the flat country sand alone forms the general basis of the succeeding strata of superincumbent earth and a period of thirty years is scarcely sufficient for covering it with soil sufficient to reward the labors of the husbandman. Beneath the annual inundations however fertilisation is extremely rapid, owing to the rich deposits, and the dissolution of the clay.

The assemblage of peasants in their villages, their small farms, and their want of enclosures, present an insurmountable barrier to all great improvements in husbandry; but in a country subject to the incursions of pirates and banditti, called Dacoits, together with the ferocious ravages of tigers, and other wild beasts, solitary dwellings would be insecure.

In Bengal and Bahar, not more than one-third of the land is tilled, exclusive of lays and fallows; being little more than one acre of cultivated land to every inhabitant. Labor is, nevertheless, extremely cheap; in some districts not more than a penny or two-pence per day for a man; but fuel, herbs, and fruit cost nothing; the wife spins and weaves cotton, to clothe herself and husband; and the children run about naked. Near the sea, rice, further up wheat and barley, in the middle districts the mulberry, and in the northern and western divisions the poppy, are primary objects of cultivation. Rice is the species of grain most extensively cultivated, and is almost infinitely varied, from the periods and situations in which it is grown. The best is that gathered in at the beginning of the winter. The wild plant sows itself about that time, and vegetates with early moisture at the approach of the rains, during the continuance of which it ripens, and drops its seed as before. Wheat and barley are sown at the commencement of the cold season, and reaped in the spring. A great variety of pulse is sown or reaped in the winter. Maize is cultivated mostly in the western districts, where the soil is poor, and the surface hilly. Mustard, linseed, sesamum, and palma Christi, are extensively cultivated for the sake of the oils extracted from them, which, as well as that expressed from the cocoa-nut, have a vast consumption. Tobacco, cotton, indigo, together with the mulberry and poppy, require land peculiarly appropriated to them; and of indigo, newly cleaned ground produces the largest crops. The Bengalese plough is peculiarly defective: the share, having neither width nor depth to stir a new soil, can onry scratch the surface of what has often been turned before. This deficiency the natives endeavour to supply by ploughing the land several times over; a second ploughing crosses the first, and a third is sometimes given diagonally to the preceding. These, frequently repeated, and followed by a branch of a tree, or some other substitute

for a harrow, pulverise the soil, and sweeten it for the reception of the seed. The field, after it has been sown, must be watched for several days, to defend it from the depredations of numerous flocks of birds by day, and of large bats by night; the same care is also necessary with fields of maize and millet, when the harvest approaches maturity, particularly in regions that are much infested with wild boars, elephants, buffaloes, and deer. For this purpose a bamboo stage is erected, similar to those used in Arabia, and represented in Niebuhr's plates. On these watchmen are placed, to scare away the rapacious intruders. Every harvest in Bengal is reaped by the sickle, the scythe being unknown. The practice of stacking corn, to be preserved for seed, is unusual; the corn is trodden out by cattle, after which it is winnowed by the wind, and stored in jars of unbaked earth, or in baskets made of large twigs, which are deposited in circular huts, raised one or two feet above the surface of the ground. The rotation of crops, which engrosses so much attention among the enlightened cultivators of Europe, is not understood in India, and a course of husbandry, extending beyond the year, was never dreamed of by a Bengalee farmer. The tanks, or reservoirs, and embankments, for the management of forced rice by irrigation, are in so miserable a state of decay, as to become public nuisances, by the pestilential vapors which they exhale. Manure is never employed, except in the growth of mulberry, tobacco, poppy, sugar, and some other articles. The land, though permitted a lay, never lies fallow. In short, a worse system of management can scarcely be imagined than that employed by the natives of Bengal.

Small commons, interspersed among the arable lands, and downs or forests in the hilly districts, furnish the cattle with provender. Grass is cut for them when in the stall, and their dung collected for fuel. The Indian, by means of almost unparalleled perseverance, obtains the object of his toil, notwithstanding the apparent inadequacy of the wretched implements he employs; and, as the want of capital prevents the subdivision of labor, he turns his hand from one branch of his trade to another, with an adroitness which is observed by Europeans with surprise. Every manufacturer, artist and laborer, working on his own account, conducts the whole process of his art himself, from the formation of his tools to the sale of his produce in the market. Wages are extremely low, and, as the usual hire of a plough is less than sixpence per day, ten ploughs may be employed for about thirty shillings per week. Rice is cleaned by persons who undertake that work on condition of returning five-eighths of the weight freed from the husk, and receiving the overplus for their labor. Five quarters per acre are accounted a large crop, and a return of fifteen for one on the seed. Although the laborers are commonly hired servants, in some districts slaves are employed, but they are humanely treated. A strong evidence of the improvement of agriculture in this province is afforded by the fact, that from 1790 to 1800, notwithstanding an increased export of grain, together with a very extensive growth of sugar, indigo, and other articles, rice

became more abundant and lower in price than had been known since Bengal was ceded to the English; nor has any thing like a famine been experienced since 1770.

The orchard in this province is what chiefly attaches the peasant to his native soil, owing to the superstitious veneration which he retains for the trees planted by his ancestors. Orchards of mangoes (mangifera Indica) adorn the plain in every part of Bengal; the palmira, or wild date (elate sylvestris) abounds in Bahar; the cocoanut thrives in those parts of the province within and near the tropic, and the date tree (phoenix dactylifera) over the whole region. Plantations of areca are found in the central parts of the province; the bassià thrives in the hilly districts, and on the poorest soils; its inflated corols are esculent and nutritious, yielding by distillation an intoxicating spirit; and from its seeds is expressed a grateful oil, which, in the mountainous districts, is used instead of butter. Numerous clumps of flourishing bamboos diversify the whole face of the country. So rapid is the growth of this plant, that it completes its greatest height within a single year; and in the year succeeding the wood acquires all that hardness and elasticity for which it is so highly valued. A single acre of bamboos yields more wood than ten of any other tree. Potatoes have been introduced by Europeans, and are said to be little inferior to any in our own country, although the watery insipidity of tropical plants is a circumstance commonly complained of by Europeans.

The staple productions of Bengal are sugar, tobacco, silk, cotton, indigo, and opium. The sugar-cane, the name of which was scarcely known to the ancient inhabitants of Europe, grew luxuriantly in every part of Bengal, and its adjacent territories, especially in the districts of Benares, Bahar, Birbhoom, Rungpoor, Midnapoor and Burdwan. This plant was introduced from India to Arabia, and thence to Europe and Africa. From Benares to Rungpoor, and from the borders of Assam to Cuttack, oilcake is frequently applied to it instead of manure; and so great is its fertility in Bengal, that there seems to be no other bounds to the possible production of sugar than the limits of the demand. The internal consumption is vast, and the manufacture so cheap, that raw sugar may be purchased in the Calcutta market under 18s. 6d. per maund, of about eighty pounds weight.

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Tobacco was unknown in India, as well as to Europe, before the discovery of America. cording to a proclamation made by Jehangire, and mentioned in his memoirs, it appears that it was introduced by Europeans, either in his own reign, early in the seventeenth century, or during that of his father Acber, and was too congenial with the habits of the Asiatics not to come very soon into general use, especially as the practise of inhaling the smoke of hemp leaves, and other intoxicating drugs, was both ancient and universal. The cultivation of it prevails mostly in the northern districts, over every part of Hindostan, requires a good soil, and including every charge for duties and agency, may be procured in the market of Calcutta at the low price of eight shillings per maund.

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