BENZOLE-BEOWULF.

14

exposure to the sun and air. B. contains about 10 great power it possesses of dissolving caoutchouc, -14 per cent. of Benzoic Acid (q. v.); the remainder gutta-percha, wax, camphor, and fatty substances. of it is resin. B. is used in perfumery, in pastilles, It is thus of service in removing grease-stains from &c., being very fragrant and aromatic, and yielding woollen or silken articles of clothing. When heated, a pleasant odour when burned. It is therefore it also dissolves sulphur, phosphorus, and iodine. much used as incense in the Greek and Roman B., when acted upon by chlorine, nitric acid, &c., Catholic Churches. Its tincture is prepared by gives rise to a very numerous class of compounds. macerating B. in rectified spirit for seven to fourteen days, and subsequent straining, when the BENZOYLE, HYDRIDE OF, is the volatile or Compound Tincture of Benjamin, Wound Balsam, essential oil belonging to the benzoic series. It is Friar's Balsam, Balsam for Cuts, the Com-represented by the formula C,H,O,,H, and has mander's Balsam, or Jesuit's Drops, is obtained. been already considered under ALMONDS, VOLATILE It is frequently applied to wounds directly; or still OIL, or ESSENTIAL OIL OF (q. v.). better, when the edges of the wound are brought together, and bound with lint or plaster, the tincture of B. may be used as an exterior varnish. In the preparation of Court-plaster, sarcenet (generally coloured black) is brushed over with a solution of isinglass, then a coating of the alcoholic solution of benzoin. The tincture is likewise employed in making up a cosmetic styled Virgin's Milk, in the proportion of two drachms of the tincture to one pint of rose-water; and otherwise it is used in the preparation of soaps and washes, to the latter of which it imparts a milk-white colour, and a smell resembling that of vanilla. B. possesses stimulant properties, and is sometimes used in medicine, particularly in chronic pulmonary affections. It may be partaken of most pleasantly when beaten up with mucilage and sugar or yolk of egg. The name Asa dulcis (q. v.) has sometimes been given to it, although it is not the substance to which that name seems properly to have belonged.-The milky juice of Terminalia Benzoin, a tree of the natural order Combretacea, becomes, on drying, a fragrant resinous substance resembling B., which is used as incense in the churches of the Mauritius. It was at one time erroneously supposed that B. was the produce of Benzoin odoriferum, formerly Laurus Benzoin, a deciduous shrub, of the natural order Lauracea, a native of Virginia, about 10-12 feet high, with large, somewhat wedge-shaped, entire leaves, which still bears in America the name of Benzoin, or Benjamin Tree, and is also called Spicewood or Fever-bush. It has a highly aromatic bark, which is stimulant and tonic, and is much used in North America in intermittent fevers. The berries are also aromatic and stimulant, and are said to have been used in the United States during the war with Britain as a substitute for pimento or allspice. An infusion of the twigs acts as a vermifuge.

BENZOLE, BENZINE, or PHENE, is a compound of carbon and hydrogen (C,,H), formed during the destructive distillation of coal (see GAS; COAL), and found dissolved in the naphtha which is condensed from the vapours evolved from the gas retort. It may be prepared from coal-tar naphtha by subjecting the tar to a temperature of 32° F., when the B. solidifies, while the other naphtha constituents remain liquid. Two gallons of the naphtha yield a pint of pure rectified benzole. It can also be obtained (1) by subjecting oil-gas to a pressure of 30 atmospheres; (2), by the dry distillation of kinic acid (q.v.); and (3) by cautiously heating a mixture of one part of benzoic acid and three parts of quick-lime, when the material which distils over is impure benzole. At ordinary temperatures, B. is a thin, limpid, colourless liquid, evolving a characteristic and pleasant odour. 32 F., it crystallises in beautiful fern-like forms, which liquefy at 40°; and at 177°, it boils, evolving a gas which is very inflammable, burning with a smoky flame. It readily dissolves in alcohol, ether, turpentine, and wood-spirit, but is insoluble in water. It is valuable to the chemist from the

At

BEOWULF, an Anglo-Saxon epic poem, which is one of the greatest literary and philological curiosities, and one of the most remarkable historical monuments in existence. The date of the events described is probably about the middle of the 5th c.; and as the legends refer to the Teutonic races which afterwards peopled England, it is believed that the poem, in its original shape, was brought by the Anglo-Saxons from their original seats on the continent. Only one MS. of the poem is known to exist; that, namely, in the Cottonian Library, which was seriously injured by the fire of 1731. This MS. consists of two portions, written at different times and by different hands, and is manifestly a copy, executed perhaps about the beginning of the 8th c., from an older and far completer version of the poem. But, even in the form in which it came from the hands of its last recaster, B. is the oldest monument of considerable size of German national poetry, and notwithstanding the Christian allusions which fix the existing text at a period subsequent to 597 A. D., a general heathen character pervades it, which leaves little doubt as to the authentic nature of the pictures which it presents of Teutonic life in ante-Christian times. Much learned labour has been bestowed on this strange relic, chiefly by Mr Kemble, of whose beautiful edition, published by Pickering in 1833, and dedicated to James Grimm, the celebrated Teutonic scholar, as also of his subsequent translation and second preface, we shall avail ourselves in the following sketch.

At first Mr Kemble was disposed to regard B. as an historical epic, but his view of it latterly came to be, that though to some extent historical, it must be regarded, in so far as the legends are concerned, as mainly mythological; and this remark he conceived to apply to the hero not less than to the incidents related. But Beowulf, the god, if such he was, occupies only a small space in the poem, and seems to be introduced chiefly for the purpose of connecting Hrothgar, king of Denmark, whom Beowulf, the hero, comes to deliver from the attacks of the monster Grendel, with Scef or Sceaf, one of the ancestors of Woden, and the common father of the whole mythical gods and heroes of the north. Sceaf is traditionally reported to have been set afloat as a child on the waters, in a small boat or ark, having a sheaf (Ang.-Sax. sceaf) of corn under his head; whence his name. The child was carried to the shores of Sleswig, and being regarded as a prodigy, was educated and brought up as king. Between Sceaf and Beowulf, Scyld intervened, according to the opening canto of the poem; but when compared with kindred traditions, the whole genealogy becomes involved in extreme obscurity, and Scyld seems sometimes to be identified with Sceaf, and sometimes with Woden. But the view of the connection between Beowulf and Sceaf is strengthened by the following considerations. The old Saxons, and most likely the other conterminal tribes, called their harvest month (probably part of August and September) by the name Beo or Bewod, in all probability

BEOWULF-BEQUEATH.

BEQUEST-BERBERA.

B. can only apply to personal estate. Real estate, indeed, according to the existing regulations of that system, cannot be left or conveyed by will or testament; a testamentary disposition or settlement, expressed in certain technical terms of present conveyance, being necessary for the purpose. See WILL; TESTAMENT; LEGACY; DISPOSITION (Mortis Causa); SETTLEMENT; REAL ESTATE; PERSONAL ESTATE. BEQUEST, a legacy of personal property left by will. See BEQUEATH and its references.

power, were anxious to bestow, he retired to live in
privacy at Passy. In 1833, he published a fifth
collection of songs, when he took a formal leave of
the public; and from that time until the day of his
death, twenty-four years after, he remained silent.
In 1848, B. was elected a member of the Assemblée
Constituante by more than 200,000 votes; but after
taking his seat, to shew his appreciation of the
honour conferred on him, he almost immediately
resigned. He consistently rejected all the offered
favours of the present Emperor, as well as a grace-
ful overture on the part of the Empress, which he
owned it cost him much to refuse. B. died at Paris,
July 17, 1857. The cost of his funeral was defrayed
by the French government, and his remains were
attended to the grave by the most distinguished men
in all departments of literature. B. was as empha-
tically the poet of the French people as Burns was
the bard of the Scottish peasantry.
stanch and fearless independence, genuine manli-
ness, sound common sense, and contempt for every-
thing mean and hypocritical, characterised both
men; and as poets, they differ in excellence only as
the sentiments of the French and Scottish people
differ in their capacity to be turned into song.
Neither friend nor enemy has as yet disclosed to
us any speck on the heart, the honour, the genius,
or the good sense of Béranger.' Since his death, his
Last Songs, written between 1834 and 1851, have
been published, and also My Biography (Paris, M.
Perrotin; London, Jeffs). See My Biography; and
Memoirs of Béranger, by M. Lapointe (Paris, 1857).

The same

BÉRANGER, JEAN-PIERRE DE, a celebrated French poet, was born in Paris, 19th August 1780, in the house of his grandfather, a tailor in the Rue Montorgueil, to whose care he was left entirely by his father, a scheming and not over-scrupulous financier. After living some time with an aunt at Péronne, to whom he appears to have been indebted for those republican principles which afterwards made him so obnoxious to successive French governments, B., at the age of fourteen, was apprenticed to a printer in that place, where he remained three years, devoting all his leisure hours to the acquirement of knowledge. He now returned to Paris, where his father, a zealous royalist, was engaged in some questionable schemes of money-getting, which were mixed up with conspiracy. B. assisted him in his money affairs, so far as he honourably could, and kept his political secrets; but he did not disguise his contempt for the royalist cause, nor fail to express his opposite sympathies. The business, however, was not one to the taste of B., who was throughout the whole of his life a man of the most sensitive honour, and he soon left it. He had ere this begun to write, but his poems were not successful; and reduced almost to destitution, he, in 1804, enclosed some of his verses to M. Lucien Bonaparte, with a letter explaining his circumstances, and with a request for assistance the one solitary instance of solicitation during a long life of independence, marked by the refusal of numerous offers of lucrative patronage. The appeal was not made to a deaf ear. M. Bonaparte obtained employment for the poet, first as editor of the Annales du Musée, and afterwards as a subordinate secretary in the University; a post which he held for twelve years, when the government, provoked at his satire, and alarmed at his popularity, dismissed him. During the 'Hundred Days, Napoleon offered B. the remunerative post of censor-a singular office for such a man. He refused it. But though he scorned to accept favour from, or to flatter Napoleon, at a time when it was alike fashionable and profitable to do so, he was of much too noble a nature to join in the sneers and reproaches which greeted the hero on his fall. Above the fear of power, he was incapable of taking advantage of misfortune. In 1815, B. published his first collection of songs, which soon attained a very wide popularity. In 1821, he published another collection, which was followed shortly after by some fugitive pieces, which subjected him to a govern: ment prosecution, a sentence of three months' imprisonment, and a fine of 500 francs. In 1825, a third collection, and in 1828, a fourth appeared, still more withering in its sarcasm on those in power; and the penalty of B.'s outspokenness was a fine of 10,000 francs, and nine months' confinement in BE'RBERA, a seaport station of Somauli, Eastern La Force. The fine was soon paid by the poet's Africa, with a good harbour, on a bay of the friends, and his prison became the resort of the Gulf of Aden. Lat. 10° 26' N., long. 45° 8' E. It most eminent men in the kingdom, and a very is celebrated as the scene of a large annual fair, armoury in which he forged those keen-piercing which brings nearly 20,000 people together from all bolts which galled so terribly, and contributed so quarters in the East. Coffee, grains, ghee, goldmuch to the overthrow of the Bourbons. But B. dust, ivory, gums, cattle, ostrich-feathers, slaves, &c., refused to profit by the new state of things he had are brought down to this place from the interior on been instrumental in bringing about. Rejecting the strings of camels, sometimes numbering as many as emoluments and honour which his friends, now in | 2000, and exchanged for cotton, rice, iron, Indian

BERA'R, a valley situated locally in the Nizam's territories, but annexed politically to British India, for the maintenance of what is called the Nizam's Contingent. It is bounded on the N. by a detached portion of Scindia's dominions and the Nerbudda provinces; on the E., by Nagpoor; on the W., by Candeish; and on the S., by two of the Nizam's remaining districts-Maiker Bassim and Mahur. It lies between 20° 15′ and 21° 40′ N. lat., and between 76° and 78° 2′ E. long., having an area of about 9000 square miles. It is traversed in its length by the Poornah-itself a tributary of the Taptee-which, with its numerous affluents, affords an ample supply of water to the valley, and, on other grounds, is peculiarly suitable to the culti vation of cotton. The recent transfer from the Nizam to the British promises likewise to be favourable to this staple production. Not only have the oppressive transit-duties been removed, but a railway is about to connect the cotton district with Bombay. Though Ellichpore is officially the chief town, yet it is inferior in real importance to Comrawattee, the dépôt for the raw cotton.

BERA'T, a town of Albania, European Turkey, the Tuberathi or Ergent, about 30 miles north-east in the pashalic of Avlona, situated on the banks of of the seaport of the same name. tion of from 8000 to 10,000, two-thirds of whom are It has a populaGreeks; the remainder, Turks. The valley in which B. stands is very fertile, producing large quantities of grain, oil, and wine. B. has a citadel, and traces Greek archbishop. of ancient Greek buildings, and gives title to a

BERBERIDEÆ-BERCHTA.

piece-goods, &c. As soon as the fair-which usually extends from November to April-is over, the huts are carefully taken down, and packed up, and nothing remains to mark the site of the town but the bones of animals slaughtered for food during the continuance of the fair.

BERBERI'DEÆ, or BERBERIDA'CEÆ, a natural order of exogenous plants, of which the different species of Barberry (q. v.) afford the best known examples. Many of the plants of this order are spiny shrubs; some are perennial herbaceous plants. Their leaves are alternate, their flowers sometimes solitary, sometimes in racemes or panicles. The calyx consists of 3, 4, or 6 deciduous sepals; the corolla, which arises from beneath the germen, consists of petals equal in number to the sepals, and opposite to them, or twice as many; the stamens are equal in number to the petals, and opposite to them; the anthers are 2-celled, each cell opening curiously by a valve which curves back from bottom to top; the carpel is solitary and 1-celled; the fruit is either a berry or a capsule. This order, which is nearly allied to Vitaceae (q. v.), (Vines, &c.), contains more than 100 known species, chiefly belonging to the temperate parts of the northern hemisphere, and of South America.

BERBERS, the general name usually given to the tribes inhabiting the mountainous regions of Barbary and the northern portions of the Great Desert. It is derived, according to Barth, either from the name of their supposed ancestor, Ber, which we recognise in the Lat. A-fer, an African (see letter B); or from the Greek and Roman term Barbari. The name by which they call themselves, and which was known to the Greeks and Romans, is Amazigh, or Mazigh, Mazys, Amoshagh, Imoshagh, &c., according to locality, and whether singular or plural. These tribes have a common origin, and are the descendants of the aboriginal inhabitants of Northern Africa. They appear to have been originally a branch of the Semitic stock; and although they have been conquered in succession by the Phoenicians, Romans, Vandals, and Arabs, and have become, in consequence, to some extent, a mixed race, they still retain, in great part, their distinctive peculiarities. Till the eleventh century, the B. seem to have formed the larger portion of the population inhabiting the southern coast of the Mediterranean, from Egypt to the Atlantic Ocean; but, on the great Arab immigrations which then took place, they were driven to the Atlas Mountains, and to the desert regions where they now live. In Tripoli, the allegiance they pay to the Turks is little more than nominal; in Algeria, where they usually are termed Kabyles, they are yet unconquered by the French; and in Marocco, where they are called 'Shellooh,' they are only in form subject to the emperor. The B. occupying the desert, who are called Tuaric, or Tawarek, by the Arabs, have become much mixed with the negro race. The number of the B. is estimated at between three and four millions. They are of middle stature, sparely but strongly built. The complexion varies from a red to a yellow brown, and the shape of the head and of the features has more of the European than the oriental type. The hair is, in general, dark, and the beard small. The eyes are dark and piercing. Their manners are austere, and in disposition they are cruel, suspicious, and implacable. They are usually at war either with their neighbours or among themselves; are impatient of restraint; and possessed of a rude, wild spirit of independence, which makes it impossible for them to unite for any common purpose, or to make the advances in civilisation which one might otherwise

The

expect from their high physical organisation. They
live in clay-huts and tents; but, in their larger
villages, they have stone-houses. They have herds
of sheep and cattle, and practise agriculture, and
are especially fond of the cultivation of fruit-trees.
They possess water-mills and oil-presses.
mines of iron and lead in the Atlas are wrought by
them, and they manufacture rude agricultural
implements, as well as swords, guns, and gunpowder.
since the Arabs drove them from the fertile plains
They formerly professed the Christian religion; but
between the mountains and the sea, they appear to
have retrograded in every way, and they are now
among the most bigoted adherents of the religion of
Mohammed;
few traces, as in the names Mesi for God, and
although their, former creed has left a
observed among them. See Barth's Africa, vol. i.
angelus for angel, and many curious customs still

BERBI'CE, the east division of British Guiana, having its middle division, Demerara, on the W.; the Atlantic on the N.; Dutch Guiana or Surinam on the E.; and on the S., the basin of the Amazon, or rather, perhaps, the upper waters of the Surinam. From being a Dutch possession, this part of the coast, between the Amazon and the Orinoco, fell under the power of England in 1796. It was, however, soon restored to Holland at the peace of Amiens, but only to be recaptured in 1803. It stretches in long. between 57° and 58° W., and in lat. indefinitely southward, from about 6° 30′ N. B. is subdivided into six parishes. The population, in 1834, was returned at 21,589, of whom 570 were whites; and the principal products are sugar, coffee, and cotton. But details generally of trade and statistics, and of climate also, may be more easily and satisfactorily treated under the general head of BRITISH GUIANA, than under the separate divisions of B., Demerara, and Essequibo. New Amsterdam, standing on the right bank of the river near its mouth, is at once the chief town and the seaport of the district. The Berbice river, though by no means the largest in the colony, is navigable certainly to the greatest distance from the sea. While the vastly more considerable Essequibo is interrupted by rapids within 50 miles of the coast, the Berbice admits a draught of 12 feet for 100 miles, and one of 7 feet for 60 more, the influence of the tide reaching nearly the whole way; and even as far as lat. 3° 55′ N.-175 miles from its outlet by the crow's flight it was found to have still a width of 100 feet, with a depth of from 8 to 10.

BERCHE'MIA. See SUPPLE JACK.

BE'RCHTA (in Old German, Peracta, and the original form of the name Bertha, being from the same root as the English word bright, and meaning shining,' 'white') is, in German mythology, the name given in the south of Germany and in Switzerland to a spiritual being, who was apparently the same as the Hulda (gracious, benign) of Northern Germany. This being represented originally one of the kindly and benign aspects of the unseen powers; and so the traditions of Hulda (q. v.) in the north continued to represent her. But the B. of the south, in the course of time, became rather an object of terror, and a bugbear to frighten children; the difference probably arising from the circumstance, that the influence of Christianity in converting the pagan deities into demons was sooner felt in the south than in the north. Lady B. has the oversight of spinners. The last day of the year is sacred to her, and if she find any flax left on the distaff that day, she spoils it. Her festival is kept with a prescribed kind of meagre fare-oatmeal-gruel, or pottage, and fish. If she catches any persons eating other food on that day, she cuts them up, fills their

BERCHTESGADEN-BERENGARIUS OF TOURS.