X .20-7. National Library of Scotland *6000525012* EKAL (/ j v , , , picturesque uses of poetry, without making it unintelli- The vigour of Burns s understanding, and the keenness gible. The imagery and the sentiments were at once na- of his wit, as displayed more particularly at masonic tural, impressive, and interesting. Those topics of satire meetings and debating clubs, of which he formed one at and scandal in which the rustic delights; that humorous Mauchline, began to spread his fame as a man of uncom- imitation of character, and that witty association of ideas mon endowments. He now could number as his acquaint- familiar and striking, yet not naturally allied to one ano- ance several clergymen, and also some gentlemen of sub- ther, which has force to shake his sides with laughter • stance ; amongst whom was Mr Gavin Hamilton, writer those fancies of superstition, at which one still wonders and in Mauchline, one of his earliest patrons. One circum- trembles; those affecting sentiments and images of true stance moie than any other contributed to increase his religion, which are at once dear and awful to^the heart- “ Polemical divinity,” says he to Dr Moore were all represented by Burns with the magical power of in 1 /87, “ about this time was putting the country half true poetry. Old and young, high and low, grave and gay, mad; and I, ambitious of shining in conversation-parties learned and ignorant, all were alike surprised and trans- on Sundays, at funerals, &c. used to puzzle Calvinism with ported. so much heat and indiscretion, that I raised a hue-and- In the mean time, a few copies of these fascinating cry of heresy against me, which has not ceased to this poems found their way to Edinburgh, and having been 2,our* ^ 16 farm which he possessed belonged to the read to Dr Blacklock, obtained his warmest approbation; t\t ~?udon, but the brothers held it in sub-lease and he advised the author to repair to Edinburgh. Burns hom Mr Hamilton.. This gentleman was at open feud lost no time in complying with this request; and accord- w!th one of the ministers of Mauchline, who was a rigid ingly, towards the end of the year 1786, he set out for the Calvinist. Mr Hamilton maintained opposite tenets; and capital, where he was received by Dr Blacklock with the it is not matter of surprise that the young farmer should most flattering kindness, and introduced to every person have espoused his cause, and brought all the resources of of taste among that excellent man’s friends. Multitudes his genius to bear upon it. The result was Tfie Holy Fair, now vied with each other in patronising the rustic poet. 1 he Ordination, Holy Willies Prayer, and other satires, Those who possessed at once true taste and ardent phi- as much distinguished for their coarse severity and bitter- lanthropy were soon united in his praise ; those who were ness, as for their genius. _ disposed to favour any good thing belonging to Scotland, Ihe applause which greeted these pieces emboldened purely because it was Scottish, gladly joined the cry; while the poet, and encouraged him to proceed. In his life by those who had hearts and understandings to be charmed his brother Gilbert, a very interesting account is given of without knowing why, when they saw their native cus- the occasions which gave rise to the poems, and the chro- toms, manners, and language, made the subjects and the nological older in which they were produced. Ihe exqui- materials of poesy, could not suppress that impulse of feel- site pathos and humour, the strong manly sense, the mas- ing which struggled to declare itself in favour of Burns, teily command of felicitous language,^ the graphic power Thus did Burns, ere he had been many weeks in Edin- of delineating scenery, manners, and incidents, which ap- burgh, find himself the object of universal curiosity, fa- pear so conspicuously in his various poems, could not fail to vour, admiration, and fondness. He was sought after, call forth the admiration of those who were favoured with a courted with attentions the most respectful and assiduous, peiusal of them. But the clouds of misfortune were ga- feasted, flattered, caressed, and treated by all ranks as ther ing darkly above the head of him who was thus giving the great boast of his country, wdiom it was scarcely pos- delight to a large and widening circle of friends. The sible to honour and reward in a degree equal to his merits, farm of Mossgiel proved a losing concern; and an amour A new edition of his poems was called for; and the with Miss Jane Armour, afterwards Mrs Burns, had as- public mind was directed to the subject by Henry Mac- sumed so serious an aspect, that he at first resolved to kenzie, who dedicated a paper in the Lounger to a corn- fly from the scene of his disgrace and misery. One trait mendatory notice of the poet. This circumstance will of his character, however, must be mentioned. Before ever be remembered to the honour of that polished wri- taking any steps for his departure, he met Miss Armour ter, not only for the wrarmth of the eulogy he bestow- by appointment, and gave into her hands a written ac- ed, but because it was the first printed acknowledgment knowledgment of marriage, which, when produced by a which had been made to the genius of Burns. The copy- person in her situation, is, according to the Scots law, to right was sold to Creech for L.100; but the friends of the be accepted as legal evidence of an irregidar marriage poet advised him to forward a subscription. The patro- laving lea y taken place. I his the lady burned at the nage of the Caledonian Hunt, a very influential body, was persuasion of her father, who was adverse to a marriage; obtained. The list of subscribers rapidly rose to 1500 ; and Burns, thus wounded in the two most powerful feel- many gentlemen paying a great deal more than the price ings ot Ins mind, his love and pride, was driven almost to of the volume ; and it was supposed that the poet derived insanity. Jamaica was his destination; but as he did not from the subscription and the sale of his copy-right a possess the money necessary to defray the expense of his clear profit of at least L.700. passage out, he resolved to publish some of his best poems, The conversation of Burns, according to the testimony in 0Iter t° laise the requisite sum. These views were of all the eminent men who heard him, was even more won- warmly promoted by some of his more opulent friends; derful than his poetry. He affected no soft air nor grace- and a sufficiency of subscribers having been procured, one ful motions of politeness, which might have ill accorded BURNS. Burns. with the rustic plainness of his native manners. Con- *■'' scious superiority of mind taught him to associate with the great, the learned, and the gay, without being over¬ awed into any such bashfulness as might have rendered him confused in thought or hesitating in elocution. He possessed withal an extraordinary share of plain common sense or mother-wit, which prevented him from obtruding upon persons, of whatever rank, with wdiom he was ad^ mitted to converse, any of those effusions of vanity, envy, 01 self-conceit, in which authors who have lived remote fi om the general practice of life, and whose minds have been almost exclusively confined to contemplate their own studies and their own works, are but too prone to indulge. In conversation he displayed a sort of intuitive quickness and rectitude of judgment upon every subject that arose. The sensibility of his heart, and the vivacity of his fancy, gave a lich colouring to whatever opinions he was dis¬ posed to advance; and his language was thus not less happy in conversation than in his writings. Hence those who had met and conversed with him once, were pleased to meet and to converse with him again and again. For some time he associated only with the virtuous, the learned, and the wise, and the purity of his morals remained uncontaminated. But unfortunately he fell, as others have fallen in similar circumstances. He suffered himself to be surrounded by persons who were proud to tell that they had been in company with Burns, and had seen Burns as loose and as foolish as themselves. He now also began to con¬ tract something of arrogance in conversation. Accustom¬ ed to be among his associates what is vulgarly but expres¬ sively called “ the cock of the company,” he could scarcely refrain from indulging in a similar freedom and dictatorial decision of talk, even in the presence of persons who could less patiently endure presumption. After remaining some months in the Scottish metropo¬ lis, basking in the noontide sun of a popularity which, as Hugald Stewart well remarks, would have turned any head but his own, he formed a resolution of returning to the shades whence he had emerged, but not before he had perambulated the southern border. On the 6th of May 1787 he set out on his journey, and, visiting all that ap¬ peared interesting on the north of the Tweed, proceeded to Newcastle and other places on the English side. He returned in about two months to his family at Mauchline; but in a short period he again set out on an excursion to the north, where he was most flatteringly received by all the great families. On his return to Mossgiel he complet¬ ed his marriage with Miss Armour. He then concluded a bargain with Mr Miller of Dalswinton, for a lease of the farm of Elliesland, on advantageous terms. ^Burns entered on possession of this farm at Whitsunday 1788. He had formerly applied with success for an ex¬ cise commission, and during six weeks of the summer of this year he had to attend to the business of that pro¬ fession at Ayr. His life for some time was thus wander- ing and unsettled; and Hr Currie mentions this as one of his chief misfortunes. Mrs Burns came home to him to¬ wards the end of the year, and the poet was accustomed to say that the happiest period of his life was the first winter he spent in Elliesland. The neighbouring farmers and gentlemen, pleased to obtain for a neighbour the poet by whose works they had been delighted, kindly sought his company, and invited him to their houses. Burns, how¬ ever, found an inexpressible charm in sitting down beside his wife, at his own fireside; in wandering over his own grounds; in once more putting his hand to the spade and the plough ; in forming his inclosures, and managing his cattle. For some months he felt almost all that felicity which fancy had taught him to expect in his new situa¬ tion. Fie had been for a time idle; but his muscles were 19 not yet unbraced for rural toil. He now seemed to find Burn* a joy in being the husband of the mistress of his affections, and in seeing himself the father of children such as pro¬ mised to attach him for ever to that modest, humble, and domestic life, in which alone he could hope to be perma¬ nently happy. Even his engagements in the service of the excise did not, at first, threaten either to contaminate the poet or to ruin the farmer. From various causes, the farming speculation did not suc¬ ceed. Indeed, from the time he obtained a situation un¬ der government, he gradually began to sink the farmer in the exciseman. Occasionally he assisted in the rustic occupations of Elliesland, but for the most part he was engaged in very different pursuits. In his professional perambulations over the moors of Dumfriesshire he had to encounter temptations which a mind and temperament like his found it difficult to resist. His immortal works had made him universally known and enthusiastically admired; and accordingly he was a welcome guest at every house, from the most princely mansion to the lowest countiy inn. In the latter he was too frequently to be found as the pre¬ siding genius, and master of the orgies. However, he still continued at intervals to cultivate the muse ; and, besides a variety of other pieces, he produced at this period the inimitable poem of Tam o’Shanter. Johnson’s Miscellany was also indebted to him for the finest of its lyrics. One pleasing trait of his character must not be overlooked. He superintended the formation of a subscription library in the parish, and took the whole management of it upon himself. Ihese institutions, though common now, were not so at the period of which we write; and it should never be forgotten that Burns was amongst the first, if not the very first, of their founders in the rural districts of southern Scotland. Towards the close of 1791 he finally abandoned his farm ; and obtaining an appointment to the Dumfries division of excise, he repaired to that town on a salary of L.70 per annum. All his principal biographers concur in stating that after settling in Dumfries his moral career was down¬ wards. Heron, who had some acquaintance with the mat¬ ter, says, “ His dissipation became still more deeply ha¬ bitual ; he was here more exposed than in the country to be solicited to share the revels of the dissolute and the idle; foolish young men flocked eagerly about him, and from time to time pressed him to drink with them, that they might enjoy his wit. The Caledonian Club, too, and the Dumfriesshire and Galloway Flunt, had occasional meetings in Dumfries after Burns went to reside there; and the poet was of course invited to share their convivi¬ ality, and hesitated not to accept the invitation. In the intervals between his different fits of intemperance he suf¬ fered the keenest anguish of remorse, and horribly afflic¬ tive foresight. His Jane behaved with a degree of con¬ jugal and maternal tenderness and prudence, which made him feel more bitterly the evil of his misconduct, although they could not reclaim him.” This is a dark picture, perhaps too dark. The Rev. Mi- Gray, who, as the teacher of his son, was intimately ac¬ quainted with Burns, and had frequent opportunities of judging of his general character and deportment, gives a more amiable portrait of the bard. Being an eye-witness, the testimony of this gentleman must be allowed to have some weight. “ The truth is,” says he, “ Burns was sel¬ dom intoxicated. I he drunkard soon becomes besotted and is shunned even by the convivial. Had he been so,* he could not have long continued the idol of every party.” This is strong reasoning ; and he goes on to mention other circumstances which seem to confirm the truth of his po¬ sition. In balancing these two statements, a juster esti¬ mate of the moral deportment of Burns may be formed. 20 BUR BUR Burns. In the year 1792 party politics ran to a great height in He lingered until the 21st of July 1796, when he expired. Burnt- w-'y-w' Scotland, and the liberal and independent spirit of Burns The interest which the death of Burns excited was in- island, did certainly betray him into some indiscretions. A gene- tense. All differences were forgotten ; his genius only ral opinion prevails, that he so far lost the good graces of was thought of. On the 26th of the same month he was his superiors by his conduct, as to consider all prospects conveyed to the grave, followed by about ten thousand of future promotion as hopeless. But this appears not to individuals of all ranks, many of whom had come from have been the case; and the fact that he acted as super- distant parts of the country to witness the solemnity. He visor before his death is a strong proof to the contrary, was interred with military honours by the Dumfries vo- Of his political verses few have as yet been published, lunteers, to which body he had belonged. But in these he warmly espoused the cause of the Whigs, Thus, at the age of thirty-seven, an age when the men- which kept up the spleen of the other party, already suffi- tal powers of man have scarcely reached their climax, ciently provoked; and this may in some measure account died Robert Burns, one of the greatest poets whom his for the bitterness with which his own character was at- country has produced. It is unnecessary to enter into tacked. any lengthened analysis of his poetry or character. His Whatever opinion may be formed of the extent of his works are universally known and admired, and criticism dissipation in Dumfries, one fact is unquestionable, that has been drawn to the dregs upon the subject; and that, his powers remained unimpaired to the last; it was there too, by the greatest masters who have appeared since his he produced his finest lyrics, and they are the finest, as death,—no mean test of the great merits of his writings, well as the purest, that ever delighted mankind. Besides He excels equally in touching the heart by the exquisite- Johnson’s Museum, in which he took an interest to the ness of his pathos, and exciting the risible faculties by the last, and contributed most extensively, he formed a con- breadth of his humour. His lyre had many strings, and nection with Mr George Thomson of Edinburgh. This he had equal command over them all; striking each, and gentleman had conceived the laudable design of collecting frequently in chords, with the skill and power of a master, the national melodies of Scotland, with accompaniments That his satire sometimes degenerates into coarse invec- by the most eminent composers, and poetry by the most tive, cannot be denied; but where personality is not per- eminent writers, in addition to those words which were mitted to interfere, his poems of this description may take originally attached to them. From the multitude of songs their place beside any thing of the kind which has ever been which Burns wrote from the year 1792 till the commence- produced, without being disgraced by the comparison. It ment of his illness, it is evident that few days could have is unnecessary to re-echo the praises of his best pieces, as passed without his producing some stanzas for the work, there is no epithet of admiration which has not been bestow- The following passage from his correspondence, which was ed upon them. I hose who had best opportunities of judg- also most extensive, proves that his songs were not bur- ing, are of opinion that his works, stamped as they are with riedly got up, but composed with the utmost care and at- the impress of sovereign genius, fall short of the powers he tention. “ Until I am complete master of a tune in my possessed. It is therefore to be lamented that he undertook own singing, such as it is,” says he, “ I can never com- no great work of fiction or invention. Had circumstances pose for it. My way is this. I consider the poetic senti- permitted, he would probably have done so ; but his excise ment correspondent to my idea of the musical expression,— duties, and without doubt his own follies, prevented him. then choose my theme,—compose one stanza. When that His passions were strong, and his capacity of enjoyment is composed, which is generally the most difficult part of corresponded with them. These continually precipitated the business, I walk out,—sit down now and then,—look him into the vortex of pleasure, where alone they could be out for objects in nature round me that are in unison or gratified; and the re-action consequent upon such indul- harmony with the cogitations of my fancy, and workings of gences (for he possessed the finest discrimination between my bosom,—humming every now and then the air, with right and wrong) threw him into low spirits, to which he the verses I have framed. When I feel my muse begin- was also constitutionally liable. His mind, being thus never ning to jade, I retire to the solitary fireside of my study, for any length of time in an equable tone, could scarcely and there commit my effusions to paper ; swinging at inter- pursue with steady regularity a work of any length. His vals on the hind legs of my elbow-chair, by way of calling moral aberrations, as detailed by some of his biographers, forth my own critical strictures, as my pen goes. Seriously, have been exaggerated, as already noticed. This has this, at home, is almost invariably my way.” This is not been proved by the testimony of many witnesses, from only interesting for the light which it throws upon his whose authority there can be no appeal; for they had the method of composition, but it proves that conviviality had best opportunities of judging. In fine, it may be doubted not as yet greater charms for him than the muse. whether he has not, by his writings, exercised a greater From his youth Burns had exhibited ominous symptoms power over the minds of men, and the general system of of a radical disorder in his constitution. A palpitation of life, than has been exercised by any other modern poet, the heart, and a derangement of the digestive organs, A complete edition of his works, in four vols. 8vo, with a were conspicuous. These were, doubtless, increased by life, was published by Dr Currie of Liverpool, for the bene- his indulgences, which became more frequent as he drew fit of his family, to whom it realized a handsome sum. Edi- towards the close of his career. In the autumn of 1795 tions have been since multiplied beyond number; and seve- he lost an only daughter, which was a severe blow to him. ral excellent biographies of the poet have been published, Soon afterwards he was seized with a rheumatic fever; particularly that by Mr Lockhart. (j. f. s.) and “ long the die spun doubtful,” says he, in a letter to BURNTISLAND, a small seaport town, and a royal his faithful friend Mrs Dunlop, “ until, after many weeks and parliamentary burgh in the district of Kirkcaldy, in af a sick bed, it seems to have turned up life, and I am the county of Fife, on the opposite shore of the Frith of beginning to crawl across my room.” The cloud behind Forth from Leith, from which it is about six miles distant, which his sun was destined to be eclipsed at noon had in Lat. 56. 4. N. Long. 3. 13. W. The town is pleasantly begun to darken above him. Before he had completely situated on the sea-coast, and is clean and well built. Hie recovered, he had the imprudence to join a festive circle; beach is sandy and admirably adapted for bathing, and the and, on his return from it, he caught a cold, which brought town is on this account much frequented by the people of back his trouble upon him with redoubled severity. Sea- Edinburgh and other parts of Scotland during the summer bathing was had recourse to, but with no ultimate success, months. A large proportion of the inhabitants are engaged BUR BUR 21 Burrow in the herring and whale fisheries; and there is a consider- II able though decreasing trade in ship-building. The quantity Burslem. 0p Spirit3 manufactured at the distilleries is very large. The general aspect of the town has greatly improved since the completion of the Edinburgh and Northern railway, which connects Burntisland with Edinburgh on the one side, and the more important towns of the north of Scotland on the other. Steamers pass and repass between Burntisland and the opposite shore every hour. There are no public buildings of any importance in the town except the town-hall, the church, a dissenting chapel, and the school-house. The town is go¬ verned by a municipal council, consisting of a provost and twenty-one councillors, and its revenue amounts to L.1022. It is in the presbytery of Kirkcaldy; and the living, which is worth L.180 per annum, is in the patronage of the crown. There is a lighthouse at the end of the pier, erected in 1845, which is seen at the distance of eight miles. Pop. (1851) 2329. BURROW, Sir James, master of the Crown-office, was born in 1701. He was elected a fellow of the Royal So¬ ciety and of the Society of Arts in 1751: and on the death of Mr West in 1772, he filled the president’s chair at the Royal Society till the anniversary election, when he re¬ signed it to Sir John Pringle. In 1773, when the society presented an address to His Majesty, he received the honour of knighthood. He published two volumes of valuable law reports in 1766 ; two others in 1771 and 1776; and a vo¬ lume of decisions of the court of king’s bench upon settle¬ ment cases from 1732 to 1772, to which was subjoined an Essay of Punctuation, in three parts, 4to, 1768, 1772, 1776. The Essay was also printed separately in 4to, 1773. He published, without his name, A few Anecdotes and Obser¬ vations relating to Oliver Cromwell and his family, serving to rectify several errors concerning him, published by Nicol. Comm. Papadopoli, in his Hisloria Gymnasii Patavini, 1763, 4to. Sir James died in 1782. BURSAR, or Burser (Bursarius, from bursa a purse), is used by the middle-age writers for the treasurer or cash- keeper of a college or monastery. Bursar also denotes one who receives a small sum out of a burse or fund appropriated for that purpose; as the ex¬ hibitioners in the Scottish universities. BURSE (French bourse), a public edifice in certain con¬ tinental cities, for the meeting of merchants to negotiate bills, and to confer on matters of trade and money. In England and in America, such building is called an ex¬ change. The first place of this kind to which the name burse was given was at Bruges. From this city the name was afterwards transferred to the like places in others, as in Antwerp, Amsterdam, Bergen in Norway, and London. This last, anciently known by the name of the common burse of merchants, had the denomination of the royal exchange given it by Queen Elizabeth. In the time of the Romans there were public places for the meeting of merchants in most of the trading cities in the empire. .That built at Rome b.c. 495, in the consulate of Appius Claudius and Publius Servilius, was denominated the college of merchants. Some remains of it are still to be seen, and are known by the modern Romans under the name loggia. The Hans towns, after the example of the Romans, gave to their burses the name of colleges. BURSLEM, a market-town of Staffordshire, in the hun¬ dred of Pirehill and parish of Burslem, 17 miles south of Manchester, and 150 miles from London. It stands on a gentle eminence near the Trent and Mersey canal, and is the principal town in the “ Potteries’ district.” It has numerous neat and commodious dwellings for the working-classes, large manufactories, and some handsome villas. The chief public buildings are the chapel with an ancient tower, the market-house, the town-hall, newsroom, mechanics’ institute, &c. Pop. (1851) 15,954, principally engaged in the pot¬ teries. Josiah Wedgewood, whose name is so intimately associated with earthenware manufactures, was born here in 1730. BURTON, John, D.D., a learned divine, born in 1696, at Wembworth in Devonshire, of which parish his father was rector. He was educated at Corpus Christ! College, Ox¬ ford. In 1725, being then pro-proctor and master of the schools, he spoke before the determining bachelor a Latin oration, entitled “ Heli, or an Instance of a Magistrate’s erring through unseasonable Lenity; ” and he afterwards treated the same subject still more fully in four Latin ser¬ mons before the university, and published them with ap¬ pendices. He also introduced into the schools Locke and other eminent modern philosophers, as suitable companions to Aristotle, and printed a double series of philosophical questions for the use of the younger students. When the settling of Georgia was in agitation, Dr Bray, Dr Stephen Hales, Dr Berriman, and other learned divines, entreated Mr Burton’s pious assistance in that undertaking. This he readily gave, by preaching before the society in 1732, and publishing his sermon, with an appendix on the state of that colony. About the same time, on the death of Dr Edward Littleton, whose widow he subsequently married, he was presented by Eton College to the vicarage of Maple-Der- ham, in Oxfordshire. In 1760 he exchanged his vicarage of Maple-Derham for the rectory of Worplesdon in Surrey. He collected and published, in one volume, all his scattered pieces, under the title of Opuscula Miscellanea; and soon after died, on the 11th of February 1771. Burton, Robert, known to the learned by the name of Democritus junior, was a younger brother of the William Burton who wrote the “ Antiquities of Leicestershire.” He was born of an ancient family at Lindley, in that county, on the 8th of February 1576. He received the rudiments of his education at the free school of Sutton Colefield, in Warwickshire; in the year 1593 he was sent to Brasen- nose College, Oxford, and in 1599 was elected student of Christ Church. In 1616 he was presented by the dean and canons of Christ Church to the vicarage of St Thomas, in the west suburb of Oxford, to the parishioners of which it is said that he always gave the sacrament in wafers; and this, with the rectory of Segrave in Leicestershire, given him some time afterwards by George Lord Berkeley, he held to the day of his death, which happened in January 1639. He was a man of great general learning, a distin¬ guished philosopher, an exact mathematician, and, what con¬ stitutes the peculiarity of his character, a very curious cal¬ culator of nativities. Though he was extremely studious, and of a melancholy disposition, he was an agreeable com¬ panion, and possessed a large fund of humour. The Ana¬ tomy of Melancholy, by Democritus junior, as he calls him¬ self, shows that these different qualities were strangely mixed together in his composition. This book was printed first in quarto, afterwards in folio, in 1624, 1632, 1638, and 1652, to the great emolument of the bookseller, who, as Wood tells us, got an estate by it. Some circumstances at¬ tending his death occasioned strange suspicions. He died in his chamber at or very near the time which, it seems, he had some years before predicted from the calculation of his nativity; and this exactness made it whispered about, that for the glory of astrology and rather than that his cal¬ culation should fail, he became a felo de se. This, how¬ ever, wtis generally discredited. He was buried with due solemnity in the cathedral of Christ Church, and had a hand¬ some monument erected to his memory. He left behind him a very choice collection of books, many of which he bequeathed to the Bodleian Library, along with L.100 to Christ Church, the interest of which was to be laid out yearly in books for the library of that college. BURTON-UP.ON-TRENT, a market-town in the parish of the same name, hundred of North Offlow, and Burton Burton- upon- Tx-ent. 22 B U 11 Burtscheid county of Stafford, is situated on the Trent, 11 miles S.W. II of Derby. Pop. (1851) 7934. An abbey was founded Ed 7 ^ here by one of the earls of Mercia as early as 1004, of v mun sl which some remains are still to be seen. 4 he river is here v crossed by an ancient bridge erected before the Conquest, measuring 1545 feet in length, and having 37 arches. There are two churches and numerous dissenting places of worship, a grammar-school, town-hall, assembly-rooms, savings- bank, subscription library, and several charities. Market- day Thursday. The river is navigable for barges up to the town. It was formerly noted for its alabaster works, but is now chiefly celebrated for the ale to which it gives name. The Grand Trunk canal uniting the Mersey with the Trent passes the town. BURTSCHEID, or Borcette, a town of Prussia, in the province of the Rhine and government of Aix-la-Chapelle, immediately S.E. of the town of that name. It has consider¬ able manufactures of woollen-cloth cassimeres, Prussian blue, &c., and several hot sulphurous springs. Pop. (1849) 5657. BURY, a parliamentary borough, and manufacturing town of England, in the county of Lancaster, on the Irwell, 8 miles N.N.W. of Manchester. The general appearance of the town has latterly been much improved by the widening of the streets and the erection of many handsome edifices. The parliamentary borough, comprising the townships of Bury and Elton, in 1851, had 31,262 inhabitants. Regis¬ tered electors (1851-52) 959. It has returned one member to parliament since the passing of the Reform bill; and is governed by 3 constables appointed by the Earl of Derby, lord of the manor. It has 3 churches, 6 chapels, and nu¬ merous dissenting places of worship, Kay’s free grammar- school, with two exhibitions of L.25 each at either university, a newsroom, mechanics’ institute, several public libraries, a savings-bank, and a dispensary. Its manufactures are very extensive and flourishing, consisting principally of cotton and woollen goods, with print and bleaching works, which received a great impulse from Kay’s invention of the fly- shuttle and dross-box, and the establishment of extensive print-works by the father of the late Sir Robert Peel. That illustrious statesman was born at Chamber Hall in the vicinity. It is connected by railways, as well as by canals, with Manchester, Bolton, &c. In the vicinity are extensive coal mines. Bury, Richard de, see Aungervyle. BURY ST EDMUNDS, a municipal and parliamentary borough and market-town of England, in the county of Suf¬ folk, on the Larke, 23 miles N.W. of Ipswich, and 71 miles from London. It is governed by a mayor, 6 aldermen, and 18 councillors, and returns two members to parliament. Pop. (1851) 15,900. Registered electors (1851-52) 741. The town is pleasantly situated on a gentle eminence, in a fertile and richly cultivated district, and is clean and well built. It is supposed to be the Villa Fasestina of the Ro¬ mans, and numerous Roman remains have been dug up here. It was the Beodericsworth of the Saxons, and by them made a royal town of East Anglia. Its present name is derived from St Edmund, the king and martyr who was taken prisoner and put to death by the Danes in 780. In 1010 a monastery was founded there by Canute, which for magnificence and splendour surpassed every other esta¬ blishment of the kind in Britain, with the exception of that of Glastonbury. It was 505 feet long and 212 wide, and contained 12 chapels. The abbot had a seat in parliament, with the power to inflict capital punishment, and judge in all civil causes within the liberty. The privilege of coining was granted to the abbot by Edward the Confessor, and both Edward I. and Edward II. had mints here. The “ church” gate, one of the finest specimens of Saxon archi¬ tecture in the kingdom, and the western gate, erected about the middle of the fourteenth century, with a small portion BUS of the walls, are all that now remain of that magnificent Burying structure. St Mary’s church, a fine Gothic edifice, with a II beautifully carved roof, was erected in the earlier part of v^'ljocb the fifteenth century, and contains the tomb of Mary Tudor, Queen of France. St James’s church is also a very fine building, containing several handsome monuments. The free grammar-school, founded by Edward VI., has two scholar¬ ships at Cambridge, and six exhibitions to either university. It has a shire-hall where assizes for the county and liberty are held, a guildhall, public library, news and assembly rooms, mechanics’ institute, theatre, savings-bank, botanic gardens, county jail, bridewell, a general hospital, and about 100 alms-houses. Market-days Wednesday and Saturday. About a mile below the town the river becomes navigable for barges to Lynn, whence coals and other commodities are brought. In the vicinity is Ickworth, the magnificent seat of the Marquis of Bristol. Sir Nicholas Bacon and Bishop Gardner were born here. It gives the title of Vis¬ count to the Keppel family. BURYING Alive, in ancient Rome, was the punishment of a vestal who violated her vow of chastity. The unhappy priestess was scourged, was attired like a corpse, and then let down into a vault containing some bread, water, milk, oil, a burning lamp, and a couch. Earth was then cast upon her till the pit was filled up. Her paramour was scourged to death in the Forum. Some middle-age writers seem to make burying alive the punishment of a female thief. Burying Place. The ancients buried out of cities and towns; a usage which we find equally among Jews, Greeks, and Romans. Amongst the last, burying within the walls was expressly prohibited by a law of the twelve tables. The usual places of interment were in the suburbs and fields, but especially by the way sides. We have instances, however, of persons buried in tjie city; but it was a favour allowed only to a few of singular merit in the commonwealth. Plutarch says, those who had triumphed were indulged in it. Val. Publicola, and C. Fabricius, are said to have had tombs in the Forum ; and Cicero adds Tubertus to the num¬ ber. Lycurgus allowed the Lacedaemonians to bury their dead within the city and round their temples, that the youth, being inured to such spectacles, might be the less terrified with the apprehension of death. Two reasons are alleged why the ancients buried out of cities ; the first, an opinion that the sight, touch, or even neighbourhood of a corpse, defiled a man, especially a priest; whence that rule in A. Gellius, that the Jlamen dialis might not on any account enter a place where there was a grave: the second, to pre¬ vent the air from being corrupted by the effluvia of putrified bodies, and the buildings from being endangered by the fre¬ quency of funeral fires. Burying in churches was not allowed for the first three centuries after Christ; and the same was severely prohibited by the Christian emperors for many ages afterwards. The first step towards it appears to have been the practice of erecting churches over the graves of some martyrs in the country, and translating the relics of others into churches in the city; the next was, allowing kings and emperors to be buried in the atrium or church-porch. In the sixth century, the people began to be admitted into the churchyards ; and some princes, founders, and bishops, into the church. From that time the matter seems to have been left to the discre¬ tion of the bishop. BUS AGO, a convent of Portugal, in the province of Beira, on the ridge called the Serra-de-Busaco, 20 miles N.N.E. of Coimbra. Here, on the 27th Sept. 1810, a French force of 65,000 men under Massena was repulsed with great loss in an attack on the position occupied by the English and Portuguese army, amounting to about 40,000, under the Duke of Wellington. BUSBECQ, Augier, Ghislen de, a distinguished am¬ bassador and scholar, was born at Commines in 1522, and Busby II Buschim BUS educated at the universities of Louvain, Paris, Venice, Bo¬ logna, and Padua. He was engaged in several highly im- ^ , Portant employments and negotiations, and in particular was twice sent ambassador by the king of the Romans to the court of Solyman II. He made a collection of curious in¬ scriptions and manuscripts; and in his second journey to Constantinople he carried with him an artist to make draw¬ ings of the rarest plants and animals. In 1562 he was ap¬ pointed tutor to the sons of Maximilian, then king of the Romans. Busbecq died at St Germain, near Rouen, Oct. 28, 1592. He wrote a Discourse of the State of the Otto¬ man Empire, and a Relation ot his Two Journeys to Tur¬ key, which were much esteemed. BUSBY, Richard, D.C.L., headmaster of Westminster school, was born at Lutton in Lincolnshire in 1606. He was educated at the school which he afterwards superintended for so long a period, and first signalized himself by gaining a king s scholarship. From Westminster he removed to urooSt College, Oxford, where he graduated in 1628. In his thirty-third year he had already become re¬ nowned fbi the obstinate zeal with which he supported the falling dynasty of the Stuarts, and was rewarded for his services with the prebend and rectory of Cudworth, with the chapel of Knowle annexed in the Church of Wells. Next year he became head master of Westminster school'. His reputation as a teacher soon became so great that many of the noblest families intrusted their children to his care. He himself once boasted that sixteen of the bishops who then occupied the bench had been birched with his “ little lod. No school in England has on the whole produced so many eminent men as Westminster did under the regime of Busby. Among the more illustrious of his pupils may be mentioned South, Dryden, Locke, Prior, and Bishop Atterbury. Busby wrote and edited many works for the use of his scholars. His original treatises (the best of which are Ins Greek and Latin grammars), as well as those which be edited, have, however, long since fallen into disuse. usby died in 1695, in his 90th year, and was buried in V\ estmmster Abbey, where his effigy is still to be seen. USCA, a town of Piedmont, on an affluent of the Po nine miles N.N.W. of Cuneo. It is situated in a fertile district, and produces good wine. Pop. 8000. BUSCHING, Anthony Frederick, an eminent geo- grapher, born at Stadthagen in Westphalia, Sept. 27, 1724. In his youth he laboured under peculiar disadvantages, till fortunately a clergyman of the name of Hauber, pleased with the promising talents of the young man, undertook to give him gratuitous instruction, and afterwards supplied him with the means of continuing his studies at Halle. 1 here, by his application to learning, and his irreproach¬ able conduct, he acquired numerous friends, and was ap¬ pointed tutor in the family of the Count de Lynars, who was then going as ambassador to St Petersburg. On this journey he became sensible of the defective state of geo¬ graphical science, and resolved to devote his life to its im¬ provement. He withdrew as soon as possible from the Counts family, and went to reside at Copenhagen, devoting himself entirely to this new pursuit. In 1752 he published a Description of the Counties of Sleswig and Holstein a work that was much approved. Lie soon after removed’to Gottingen, and married Christiana Dilthey, a young lady of great accomplishments, and the author of a' volume of poems. Here, on account of a work which appeared to dissent from some of the Lutheran tenets, he was excluded from the theological chair, for which he had become a candidate. The chagrin occasioned by this disappointment induced him to accept an invitation to the German cono-re- gation at St Petersburg. He was employed there, also, in organizing a school, which, under his auspices, soon became one of the most flourishing in the north. This school was superintended by Marshal Munich, who at first showed BUS great favour to Busching; but in consequence of the mar¬ shal s unieasonable exactions, Busching announced his in¬ tention of returning to Germany. The empress expressed much dissatisfaction at the conduct of Munich, and made high offers to Busching if he would remain ; but his reso¬ lution was made, and returning to Germany, he.went to reside at Altona. Next year, however, he wais called to superintend an extensive educational establishment, which had been formed at Berlin under the auspices of Frederick the Great. His writings and example gave a new impulse to education throughout Prussia. He superintended the progress of every pupil, and inspected the minutest details connected with the prosperity of the institution. He also gave lectures on the history of the arts and sciences. This labour did not interrupt the composition of his numerous works. He continued to prosecute his academical labours U a dropsy, under which he had long suffered, terminated his life on the 28th May 1793. Busching was twice mar- ned. By the first marriage he had two children, who sur¬ vived him; by the second he had six, who, except one, all died in infancy. Few authors, even in Germany, have produced a greater number of works than Busching. The entire number, as enumerated by Meusel in his Lexicon of German Authors amounts to more than a hundred. They may all be classed under the following heads: 1. Geography and History: Education ; 3. Religion; 4. Biography. The first class comprehends those upon which his fame chiefly rests. He possessed not, indeed, the geographical genius, if we may so speak, of D Anville ; but he may be regarded as the creator of modern Statistics. Devoid of the ornaments o styJe> 118 works, from their nature, are rather useful to consult than profitable to read. His great work is the MueLrdheschreibung, New Geographical Description of the Globe. The first four parts, which comprehend Europe were published in four successive volumes, from 1754 to 1 761, and have been translated into all the European lan¬ guages. ihey appeared in English with a preface by Mur- doch ,n six volumes 4to London, 1762. He published also, in 1 768, the fifth part, being the first volume upon Asia containing Asiatic Turkey and Arabia. It displays an im¬ mense extent of research, and is generally considered as bis masterpiece. ^ ^ Busching was also the editor of a valuable collection en- titled Magazine for the History and Geography of Modern Times 22 vols 4to, 1767-88; also of a Journal appro- priated to the JSlotice of Maps, Berlin, 1773-87. The elementary works on education published by Bus- ching are very numerous, and have long held a distinguished place, even in a country so eminent as Germany, in this branch of literature. His theological writings are not much esteemed. In biography he wrote a number of articles for the Historical Magazine; also A Collection of Bio- graphy, in six volumes, 1783-9, including a very elaborate life of Frederick the Great. , ,®USg> U®1’ the flrst, bish°l> of BristoI> born in 14J0. He became a student in the university of Oxford about 1513, and five years later took the degree of B A He afterwards became a brother of the order called bon- hommes; of which, after studying some time among the friars of St Austin, now Wadham College, he was elected provincial. In that station he had lived many years when on account of his great knowledge in divinity and physic he was appointed chaplain to Henry VIII., and in 1542 to the newly erected episcopal see of Bristol. In consequence of his marriage, he was, on the accession of Mary, deprived of his dignity, and spent the remainder of his life in a pri¬ vate station at Bristol, where he died in 1558. Wood savs that Bush, while a student at Oxford, was numbered among tnc celebrated poets of tliat university. He wrote, 1. An Exhortation to Margaret Burgess, wife to John 23 Bush. 24 BUS BUS Bushel Buss. Burgess, clothier, of King’s Wood, in the county of \\ ilts. London, printed in the reign of Edward VI. 8vo. 2. Notes on the Psalms. 3. Treatise in Praise of the Crosse. 4. Answer to certain Queries concerning the abuse of the Mass, Records, No. 25. 5. Dialogues be¬ tween Christ and the Virgin Mary. 6. Treat.se of Salves and Cur¬ ing Remedies. 7* A Little Treatise, called the Extirpation of Ignorancy. 8. Carmina diversa. BUSHEL. See Weights and Measures. BUSHIRE, Abuschehr, a town of Persia, in the pro¬ vince of Ears, situated in the Persian Gulf. The surround- ino- country is a parched and barren desert, consisting of brown sand or gray clay and rock, unenlivened by any kind of vegetation. The town, which is of a triangular form, oc¬ cupies the northern extremity of a peninsula eleven miles Ion"- and four broad, and is encircled by the sea on all sides except the south. It is fortified on the land side by a mud wall with round towers. The houses being mostly built of white stone gives the city when viewed from a distance a rather clean and handsome appearance, but on closer inspection the streets are found to be narrow, irregular, ill-paved, and filthy. Almost the only handsome build¬ ings are the sheik’s palace and the East India Company’s factory. Ships of 300 tons are obliged to lie in the roads six miles from the town. The water immediately east of the town is deep, but its navigation is impeded by a bar, which can only be passed by vessels drawing not more than eight or nine feet of water, except at spring-tides, when there is a rise of from eight to ten feet. It carries on a considerable trade, particularly with Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras. Its imports are indigo, sugar, rice, spices, steel, cotton and woollen goods, coffee, &c.; and its principal ex¬ ports are raw silk, Kerman wool, shawls, silk goods, carpets, horses, dried fruits, wine, grain, copper, turquoises, pearls, assafoetida, and gall-nuts. The climate is excessively hot, particularly in the months of June, July, and August. The water is very bad; that fit for drinking requires to be brought in goat skins a distance of 16 miles. Pop. variously esti- mafed at from 10,000 to 20,000. BUSIRIS, a town in Egypt, now called Busyr or Abousir. It is situated on the left bank of the Damietta branch of the Nile, and contains nothing remarkable except the ruins of an ancient temple of Isis. It derived its name from the mythical Busiris, of whom many conflicting ac¬ counts are given by ancient writers. The most notable incident in the life of this Busiris is recorded by Apollodo- rus. For nine consecutive years the Egyptians had suf¬ fered from a dearth of corn, which a Cyprian soothsayer, by name Phrasius, declared would cease if Busiris would sacri¬ fice every year a stranger to Jupiter. Ihe soothsayer him¬ self was the first victim of his own prophecy, which vyas an¬ nually obeyed till the arrival of Hercules. When this hero was led to the altar to be sacrificed, he burst his bonds and slew Busiris and his son. The story of Busiris was believed by Greeks and Egyptians to be a myth, and numerous at¬ tempts were made by writers of both nations to explain away the tradition. BUSKIN {cothurnus), an ancient kind of boot, which covered the foot, and half of the leg, or even more. Bus¬ kins were laced in front so as closely to embrace the leg, and were sometimes ornamented in a very elaborate style. They were chiefly worn by hunters, horsemen, and persons of rank. The cothurnus used in Athenian tragedy had a sole of great thickness for the purpose of increasing the ap¬ parent stature of the wearer. In classic authors the word is frequently used as synonymous with tragedy ; and it was likewise used to indicate an elevated style in poetry and in painting. See Cothurnus. BUSS, an old word signifying a kiss, and to kiss or salute with the lips. Buss, a small two-masted vessel, used in the herring fishery, commonly from fifty to seventy tons burden. It has a small shed or cabin at each end. BUSSORA, Bassora, Balsora, or Basra, a celebrated city of Asia, in the government of Baghdad, situated on the western bank of the Shat-el-Arab, about seventy miles from the mouth of this noble stream, which is navigable to the city for ships of 500 tons burden after passing the bar at its mouth, which however, they can only do at spring-tides. Bussora L surrounded by walls, which are kept in a tolerable state of repair. They have five gates, and are at the lowest compu¬ tation about seven miles in circuit. Two canals, cut from the river, surround the town on either side, and uniting be¬ yond it on the western side, form a complete ditch to the fortifications. The houses are meanly built, partly of sun- dried and partly of burnt bricks, with flat roofs surrounded by a parapet; and the bazaars, though stocked with the richest merchandise, are miserable structures, not arched as in Baghdad and the Persian towns, but covered with mats laid on rafters of date trees, which hardly afford protection from the scorching rays of the sun. The streets are irre¬ gular, narrow, and unpaved, and the town itself is disgust¬ ingly filthy. Of the vast area within the walls, the greater proportion is occupied with gardens and plantations of palm trees, intersected by a number of little canals, cleansed twice daily by the ebb and flow of the tide, which rises here about nine feet. The largest of these canals, which ap¬ proaches the English factory and the palace of the gover¬ nor situated about two miles from the river, is continually crowded with small vessels. The town has scarcely any public buildings that deserve notice. It has khans and coffee-houses without number, a wretched hummum, and upwards of forty mosques, of which one only is worthy of the name ; and this, with the palace of the governor, and the English factory, which are all contiguous to one another, are the only decent buildings in the place. The popula¬ tion is a heterogeneous mixture of all the nations in the East, and consists of Turks, Arabs, Indians, Persians, Armenians, Jacobites, and Jews. The Arabs constitute the principal class; and the Turks, though they are masters of the town, are almost the least numerous. Bussora is a great emporium of Indian commerce. Six or eight English ships arrive in the course of a year from India ; but the chief part of the traffic is carried on in Ara¬ bian bottoms ; and the merchants of Muscat possess some of the finest vessels that navigate the Indian seas. From various parts of Hindustan, Bussora receives silk, muslin, linen, white and blue cloths for the clothing of the Arabians, gold and silver stuffs, various metals, sandal-wood, and in¬ digo ; pearls from Bahrein, and coffee from Mocha ; shawls, fruit, and the precious metals from Persia; spices from Java; and European commodities, which are scarce and dear, from different parts. I he trade with the interior is con¬ ducted by means of caravans to Aleppo and Baghdad, whence the goods are conveyed to Constantinople. The returns are made in Indian goods, bullion, pearls, dates, copper, iawr silk, gall-nuts; and the horses, which are very stiong and beautiful, are exported in large numbers by the English. The situation of the town is unhealthy, owing to the in¬ undations of the river, from which noxious exhalations ai ise; and strangers are commonly attacked by fever after a short residence. The adjoining country is fertile, producing, be¬ sides rice, wheat, barley, and dates of different species, a variety of fruits and vegetables, such as apricots, apples, figs, olives, pomegranates, and grapes; and cabbages, bioc- coli, lettuce, onions, peas, beans,and truffles, in vast quantities. There are W'hole fields of roses, which the inhabitants cul¬ tivate for the purpose of making attar. Ihe liquorice plant also grows amidst the palm groves on the borders of the river. The city of Bussora was originally founded by Omar, a.d. 636, on a canal eight miles S.W. from its present site, where the town of Zobeir now stands ; and its situation was so favourable for commerce that in a few years it became a large and flourishing city. The canal, however, soon be- Bussora. B U T Bust came useless, and the city was abandoned. The present city II was conquered by the Turks in 1668, and since that period ®ute- has been the scene of many revolutions. It was taken in ta^rma^ 1777, after a siege of eight months, by the Persians under Sadick Khan. In about a year it fell again into the hands of the Turks ; who were again deprived of it by the scheik of the Montefik Arabs. The town was in October follow¬ ing recovered by Solyman Pasha, who encountered the scheik on the banks of the Euphrates, and put him to flight; and it has since remained in the hands of the Turks. The population is estimated at 60,000. Long. 47. 34. E. Lat. 30. 32. N. BUST (Italian busto), in Sculpture, the head, breast, and shoulders of the human figure. Felibien observes, that though in painting one may say a figure appears in busto, yet it is not properly called a bust, that word being confined to figures in relievo. The Italians use the word for the trunk of the body from the neck to the hips. BUSTARD. See Ornithology, Index. BUSTUARII, in Homan Antiquity, gladiators who fought about the bustum or funeral pile of a person of dis¬ tinction, in order that the blood which was spilt might pro¬ pitiate the infernal gods. This custom was introduced in the room of the more inhuman practice of sacrificing cap¬ tives at the bustum, or on the tombs of warriors. BUSTUM, in Antiquity, denotes a pyramid or pile of wood whereon the bodies of the deceased were placed in order to be burnt. The Romans borrowed the custom of burning their dead from the Greeks. The deceased, crowned with flowers, and dressed in the richest habits, was laid on the bustum. Some authors say it was only called bustum after the burning, quasi bene ustum vel combustum: before the burning it was more properly called pyra, during it rogus, and after¬ wards bustum. When the body was only burnt there, and buried elsewhere, the place was not properly called bustum, but ustrina, or ustrinum. Bustum was also figuratively used to denote any tomb; hence/acere bustum,, violate bustum, fyc. BUTCHER, one who slaughters cattle for the use of the table, or who cuts up and retails the same. Among the ancient Romans there were three kinds of established butchers, viz., the suarii, who provided hogs ; the pecuarii or boarii, who furnished oxen, &c.; and the lanii or carni- Jices, who slaughtered the animals. Butcher-Bird. See Ornithology, Index. BUTE, John Stuart, third earl of, a British statesman of the time of the second and third Georges, was born in Scot¬ land in 1713. He was educated at Eton, and in his youth was better known as a voluptuary than as a student. He entered parliament as one of the representative peers of Scotland in 1737, and signalized himself by his determined opposition to every measure of the existing government. Soon after he attracted the favourable notice of Frederic Prince of Wales, by whom, in 1738, he was made a knight of the Thistle, and one of the lords of the bedchamber. After the death of that prince he gained a great ascendency over the mind of his son, afterwards George III. For the undue use which he was supposed to have made of his influence, he was bitterly attacked by Junius. On the accession of George III., he was sworn a member of the privy council, and made groom of the stole. In 1762, he became first lord of the treasury, an office which he only retained till the 10th of April of the following year. On that day he suddenly resigned ; and the cause of his resignation is not yet clearly ascertained. (For the details of his political life, see Great Britain.) He retired to his mansion near St Albans, where he spent the remainder of his days in literary pursuits. He collected a splendid library, and formed one of the best galleries of Dutch and Fle™5^ "Wures in the kingdom. It was to VOL. VI. BUT 25 Inm that Dr Johnson was indebted for his pension ; and by Buteshire, his influence a place was secured for Home, the author of Douglas. He died March 10, 1792. BUTESHIRE, a county on the west coast of Scotland, in the Firth of Clyde, is composed of seven islands, viz. Bute, Arran, Great Cumbrae, Little Cumbrae, Inchmar- nock, Holy Island, and Pladda. Bute, from which the county derives its name, is situated between Long. 4. 51. and 5. 2. W., and Lat. 55. 41. and 55. 43. N., and is 16 miles west from Greenock, 38 miles from Glasgow, and 83 from Edinburgh; but the usual route to these places is about 4 or 5 miles longer. It is about 15 miles long, in a straight line from N.N.W. to S.S.E., and the average breadth is 3^- miles, although it is much in¬ dented with bays: in some places it is not above half that breadth, but in other places it is at least a mile broader. It is separated on the north from the district of Cowal in Ar- gyleshire by the Kyles of Bute, which for a considerable distance along the shore are not above half a mile broad. The more southerly part of the island is separated from Ayrshire by the Firth of Clyde, which at that point is from 5 to 7 miles broad ; but the channel is much narrowed by the islands of Cumbraes, situated between Bute and Ayrshire, and distant from Bute about 3 miles, but much nearer Ayrshire. Arran lies off the south point of Bute, distant about 6 miles; and Skipness in Argyleshire bounds it on the west at a distance considerably greater. There is considerable uncertainty as to the origin of the name of Bute. Some contend that it is derived from Both, signifying in the Irish tongue a cell; and they ground this on the fact, that it has been so writ¬ ten by ancient authors, and that St Brendan, an Irish abbot, caused a cell to be erected on it in the sixth century. It has been written Both, Bote, Boot, and Botis; but Mr Blain, some time commissary of the isles, and sheriff-substitute of Buteshire, in his manuscript history of Bute, endeavours to show, with considerable ingenuity, that it has been derived from the old British word Ey Budh, or Gaelic word Ey Bhiod, signifying the Island of Corn or Island of Food, from its being more fertile than the adjacent highland countries; and this opinion appears to be still further supported by the fact, that at the time of valuing the teinds, the grain in the island amounted to about 34,700 bolls. The Butemen were anciently called Brandanes, and looking upon themselves as a distinct people, refused to identify themselves either with the highlanders or lowlanders. The island has an area of about 30,000 English acres, of which about two-thirds may be con¬ sidered as arable; the remainder consists of woods, muirs, mosses, and lakes. There are six lakes in the island. The largest, Loch Fad, extended originally to 138 acres, but is now considerably enlarged by the embankments of the cotton spin¬ ning company, whose works are placed on the water flowing from this lake. Ascog Loch is 72 acres in extent. The water flowing from this loch has also an excellent fall for a mill or other public work ; but nothing has yet been erected on it except a dye-work, and a carding and wauking mill. It is hoped, however, that it will soon be made more available. Quien Loch covers 54 acres; Greenan Loch, 12 acres ; Loch Dhu, or Black Loch, 9 acres ; and Lochan- tarbh, 5 acres. The climate is more mild, genial, and healthy, than in any other part of the west of Scotland. It is frequently compared to that of Devonshire, to which it is in some respects considered as superior. The lofty mountains of Arran and Argyle skirt it on the west and south, and break the clouds coming from the Western Ocean, so that they pass over Bute with a discharge of comparatively but little of their contents, and less rain falls here than on the rest of the west coast of Scotland. In summer the air is kept cool by the sea breeze, and in winter the same cause prevents intense frost; while snow seldom falls to the depth of twelve inches, and very rarely remains above two or three days on the ground. The winds most prevalent blow from the south and west. D 26 BUTE Buteshire. Agriculture, under the fostering care of the late Marquis of Bute, has of late years made considerable progress in the island, especially in the middle and southern divisions. The soil in the southern half of the island is light and sandy; in the more northern it is of a clayey nature. The land is generally well subdivided with ditches and white-thorn hedges. Crops of all kinds common in the lowlands are produced in Bute. Freestone and coal are both found in the island, but neither to any great extent. Several attempts have been made to discover a good working vein of coals, but hitherto without success. Slate and lime, however, abound. The slate has been principally wrought on the estate of Karnes, for¬ merly the seat of the deceased Sir William M‘Leod Ban- natyne, one of the lords of session, but now possessed by James Hamilton, Esq. The lime has been chiefly wrought in the south end of the island, in the parish of Kingarth; and that manufactured there is considered as equal, if not superior, in point of adhesiveness, to the far-famed Arden lime of Lanarkshire, when properly wrought; and it is much cheaper, though not so white in the colour. Inexhaustible beds of shells are found on the west side of the island, and considerable quantities of sea-weed are driven in upon the shores. Jhe rocks in the north end are chiefly mica, clay, and chlorite slate, intersected with quartz and trap. Whiii- stone is chiefly found near the town of Rothesay, and sand¬ stone stretches along from thence to the south. Excellent banks for fishing are found round the island ; and the herring fishery is prosecuted vigorously by the in¬ habitants, especially by residents in Rothesay. The Marquis of Bute is the chief proprietor of the island. His seat, Mountstuart, is beautifully situated on the east side of the island, about four miles from Rothesay. The real rent of his property in the island is about L.9000, including L.440 of feu-duty for ground feued chiefly within the burgh of Rothesay. The other proprietors of any extent are James Hamilton, Esq. of Karnes, rent L.1500; Robert Thom, Esq. of Ascog, L.700; M‘Conechy of Ambrisbeg, L.70 ; James M£Kay of Garx-achty, L.70; and George Campbell, Esq. of Dunoon, whose lands of Ardbeg, let on long building leases, are now nearly covered with villas, and form substantially a part of the town of Rothesay. The burgh of Rothesay, the capital of the island and shire, is beautifully situated at the head of a deep bay on the N.E. side of the island, where there is safe anchorage-ground for vessels of any size, in any wind, and i-oom enough to con¬ tain a very large fleet. The territory of the burgh is about nine miles in circumference, extending fully a mile beyond the town on the east, south, and west sides. The burgh has an extensive harbour built in 1822 at an expense of L.6000, and on which large sums have been since expended. It is now in an excellent state. The shipping belonging to the port was at one time upwards of 4000 tons, but it has de¬ creased of late, owing to the decline of the herring trade. There is a large spinning factory, consisting of two mills, in Rothesay, driven by water from Loch Fad; and it may be worthy of notice, that the second mill erected in Scotland for the spinning of cotton was upon this w ater only about fifty-five yeai's ago, when the business was cai'ried on with the strictest secrecy. The house then used was a thatched building, which is still standing. There ai’e three power-loom factories in Rothesay, in one of which cotton is also spun. Numerous steam-boats ply daily to and from Glasgow and the intermediate ports. These convey the mail; and in the summer season there are generally two mails in the day. The town has of late been rapidly increasing, and handsome new streets are building. The places of worship in Rothesay are the parish church, situated on a gentle eminence about a quarter of a mile from the town ; another Established church close to the town; three Free churches (the pre- SHIRE. dominant denomination), one being Gaelic; one Reformed Buteshire. Presbyterian, one United Presbytei'ian ; one Episcopalian ; one Baptist; and about two miles from Rothesay thei'e is a Roman Catholic chapel. The County Buildings are situated in Rothesay, and contain a large and handsome court¬ room with the requisite offices attached. The prison is under the same roof, and affords good accommodation for proper classification of the prisoners. The courts are held in Rothe- say. The sheriff'court is held every Tuesday and Friday, and the burgh court every Thursday. There is a local police act, under which the burgh magistrates act as judges and try petty delinquencies. The ruins of an ancient castle, which was once the residence of the kings of Scotland, are situated in the middle of the town. The castle originally con¬ sisted of a circular court, 138 feet in diameter, sui’rounded by a wall eight feet thick and seventeen feet high, with bat¬ tlements. It had four towers and was surrounded by a wet ditch. It is supposed to have been built about the year 1100, though the precise date is not known. It is first men¬ tioned in history in 1228. Heulbec, king of the Isles, was killed in besieging this castle in 1263. It was taken pos¬ session of by the English during the reign of John Baliol, but surrendered to Robert the Bruce in 1311. King Ro¬ bert the Second built a palace adjoining the castle, and fre¬ quently took up his residence in it betwixt 1376 and 1398, when he ci'eated his eldest son Prince David Duke of Rothesay, a title which the king’s eldest son still bears. This was the first dukedom conferred in Scotland. On the 12th January 1400 Robert granted the charter of erection of the burgh of Rothesay. He died in the castle of Rothe¬ say on 4th April 1406, and was buried in the abbey of Paisley. This castle was burned by the Earl of Argyll’s brother in 1685, and has since x'emained in ruins. The popu¬ lation of the burgh of Rothesay in 1831 was 4817, besides upwards of 300 seamen belonging to registered vessels, not included in the census. The island is divided into three parishes, Rothesay, Kin- garth, and North Bute; the first containing a population (1851) of 7354, including the burgh; the second a population of 1007, and the third a population of 1025, making the wdiole population of the island 9386, exclusive of seamen absent when the census was taken. In Kingarth parish there is, besides the parish church, a Fx-ee church at Ascog, and in the parish of North Bute there is a Free church at Port Bannatyne. Lord Bute is the patron of all of the parish churches. The island is highly esteemed, and is much resorted to as sea-bathing quarters in the summer season; and many invalids are induced, by the mildness of the climate, to re¬ side there during the winter. There are several remains of druidical monuments on the island, but the chief or most entire is at Langalchorid, in the parish of Kingarth. At Dunagoil, in this parish, there is a vitrified fort, and the remains of an old church, and burying- ground, where, until after the Reformation, the two sexes were not allowed to intermingle. Near this church there is a circular inclosure called the Devil’s Cauldron, where pen¬ ance was wont to be performed. As this rite of superstition is somewhat singular, we shall describe it. Transgressors wei'e imprisoned in this terrene purgatory for a given time, which, it may be readily conceived, was proportioned to the magnitude of the offences committed, being some¬ times for several days and nights together. The priest threatened eteimal punishment to the whole party if but one of their number fell asleep. To provide against this, the penitents were furnished with a sharp instrument, with which they pricked each other when inclined to somnolency. There are three villages in the island; Port Bannatyne, situated at the head of Kames Bay, about two and a half miles from Rothesay, which is of some extent, has a good quay, and a pretty numerous fishing population ; Ker- BUTESHIRE. 27 Juteshire. rycroy, near Mountstuart, the seat of the Marquis of Bute ; and Kilcatten Bay, situated on the south side of the island. The natives formerly spoke the English and Gaelic lan¬ guages indifferently, but English is now chiefly spoken. Arran is situated about six miles south of Bute. It is very mountainous. Goatfell, a mountain situated about the centre of the island, is upwards of 2945 feet high; and some others approach to that height. There is a remark¬ ably fine view from this mountain on all sides, whence is seen part of the Atlantic Ocean, Ireland, the counties of Ayr, Renfrew, Argyle, and Bute, the Firth of Clyde, Loch Fine, and other scenery both beautiful and picturesque. There are many druidical remains and monumental stones on the island. Fingal’s Cave is still pointed out; and tradition says that Ossian died on this island. The island is about twenty miles long and eleven broad, and contains about 106,000 English acres, of which only 15,000 are arable. Abundance of game and some wild deer are found on the mountains, which are either bare rocks, or only covered with heath and fern, but including magnificent glens. There is comparatively little wood in the island, except near Brodick Castle, where there are fine old woods and thriving young plantations. A large addition has but lately been made to Brodick Castle, and improvements are in progress which, when completed, will, combined with the mixed grand and beautiful scenery, make Brodick Castle one of the most attractive seats in Scotland. The climate in winter is mild, but'generally moist. The whole island, except a small estate, belongs to the Duke of Hamilton, in which family it has been for several centuries. The other proprietor is Cap¬ tain Fullarton, of Kilmichael, descended of a very ancient family formerly bearing the name of MacLoy. The roads are for the most part very good, having been chiefly made by the parliamentary commissioners several years ago ; and the expense of repairs is defrayed partly by the exchequer, and partly by the proprietors, in terms of the act 59th Geo. III. cap. 135. The herring fishery is prosecuted to a con¬ siderable extent, but this is almost wholly done by means of boats and other small vessels. There are two excel¬ lent harbours in the island, Lamlash and Loch Ranza, but without piers of any extent. There is a small pier at Bro¬ dick, but the bay is not well sheltered for anchorage. An extensive pier was commenced at Lamlash in the reign of Queen Anne, and a considerable part erected, but it was afterwards neglected ; and all the stones above the water have from time to time been removed for building or other purposes, so that now the foundation can scarcely be traced ; and the only landing place is a small jetty recently built. The island produces barley, bear, oats, peas, beans, pota¬ toes, and turnips. The islanders were long addicted to illicit distillation, a practice which has been given up, owing chiefly, it is believed, to the strong laws enacted against it, and the firmness with which they are executed. Agriculture was at one time neglected, every farm being occupied by a society of tenants, among w hom the arable part of the farm was divided in small lots, while the pasturage grounds and moors wTere a common under one herd. The farms are now w ell subdivided, and some of them are large and well culti¬ vated by tenants of enterprise and skill. There was many years ago a great emigration from this island to America, al¬ though the inhabitants were strongly attached to their native soil. The language chiefly spoken by the natives is Gaelic, but they are advancing in the knowledge of English. The islanders are all Protestants, and strongly attached to the Free Church of Scotland, about 9-10ths of them belonging to that denomination. Christianity is said to have been in¬ troduced here by St Molios, a disciple of St Columba. The island is divided into two parishes, Kilbride and Kilmory, and has also two chapels. There are three places of wor¬ ship belonging to the Free Church of Scotland. The largest parish is named Kilmory, and contained (1851) 3414 inhabitants ; the other parish named Kilbride, contains Buteshire. 2533 inhabitants, making the population of the island 5947, besides a few seamen belonging to registered vessels, being a decrease from 6427 (census 1831), attributed to emi¬ gration. Arran is highly celebrated for its mineralogy. (See Jameson’s Mineralogy of the Scottish Isles, Headrich’s Sur¬ vey of Arran, and Dr McCulloch’s works.) Granite, rock crystal, quartz, and small-grained granite, are abundant in the northern division of the island. Mica slate and granite unite at Catacoal. Gneiss, micaceous schist, and pudding- stone, are abundant at Glenrosa. Quartz is found in all kinds of crystallization, in beds of clay slate and in other situations. Greenstone, sandstone resting on clay slate, basalt, trap, and limestone, are abundant. Pitchstone is found on the south, with pearlstone, ironstone, and porphyry; also flint, agate, siliceous spar, jaspar, and various beautiful crystals. Great Cumbrae is situated in the Firth of Clyde betw ixt Ayrshire and the Island of Bute. It is the property of the Marquis of Bute and the Earl of Glasgow. It is about two and a half miles long, and one and a half broad, and measures about 2500 acres, one-half of which is arable. It has a gentle ascent of about 400 feet from the sea to the centre of the island. The village of Millport is situated on the S.W. side of the island, opposite to which there is safe anchorage-ground (which, however, is not easily reached), and a small harbour is formed with a stone pier. Millport is increasing very fast, both in extent and popula¬ tion. Many neat villas have lately been built, and it has become a favourite watering place, as the bathing ground is excellent. There is a college belonging to the Scotch Episcopal Church. It is a handsome Gothic building wdth a chapel and spire, and attached to it are an excel¬ lent garden and pleasure grounds, which are open to the public at certain hours. There are a provost, dean, and choristers, and the necessary establishment for education. The college was erected and endowed, it is understood, chiefly at the expense of the Honourable Mr Boyle, the brother of Lord Glasgow. There is in Millport a residence of the Earl of Glasgow called The Garrison. It is oc¬ cupied by the countess-dowager, and is a neat Gothic building, with pleasure grounds. The great defect in Cum¬ brae is the absence of roads: there is only one made road, and it is a bad one. The farms are of some size, and the agriculture is good. The climate is mild and healthy. The island abounds with lime and freestone. Considerable quantities of the freestone are exported, but the lime is seldom wrought. There are two basaltic rocks on the east side of the island, called Reppel Walls. It forms one parish, and has one Established church and a Free church. The population in 1851 was 1266, besides seamen belong¬ ing to registered vessels. Little Cumbrae lies about half a mile south of Great Cumbrae. It is the property of the Earl of Eglinton. It is about a mile in length, and half a mile in breadth. Eccle¬ siastically Little Cumbrae is attached to the parish of Kil- lin in Ayrshire, while civilly and politically it is in Buteshire. Rabbits are very plentiful on this island. A lighthouse was erected in 1750 on the highest point of the island, but it was found that the fogs obscured the light; it was therefore removed to a lower situation. Three or four families live on it. The ruins of a castle are situated on the south side. The ascent from the shore is over rocks, which rise one above another like steps of stairs. There are several caves in the island, two of them very large. The extent of one of these is not known, but the other is thirty-two feet square, and six feet in height. Inchmarnoch is a low-lying, small, beautiful island, situ¬ ated about a mile west from Bute. It takes its name from a chapel built on it, dedicated to St Marnoch, and which had a burying-ground attached. The ruins were visible till very lately, when they were removed by the rude hands 28 B U T v Eut*er‘ y a farmer. It is about a mile long and half a mile broad, f~*~ and is divided into three farms, and nearly one-half is arable. It is the property of the Marquis of Bute, and abounds in sea shell or marl. The inhabitants acknowledge the spirit¬ ual jurisdiction of the parish of Rothesay, although it was long considered as belonging to Saddel in Argyleshire, from the monks of St Marnoch being attached to the con¬ vent of Saddel; and still the minister of Kerry in Aro-yle- shire derives a portion of his stipend from this island. & Pladda is a small island, which lies about a mile S.E. from Arran, on which there is a lighthouse, which directs the mariner to the Cumbrae light. Holy Island is a small island situated in the mouth of Lamlash Bay, in Arran, and helps to form that safe and capacious harbour. There is one house upon it, and the island forms a farm of some value. The valued rent of the county in Scots money is L. 15,042, 13s. 10d. The lands belong to ten proprietors. The va¬ luation Scots of the Marquis of Bute’s land is L.8066, 5s. 4|d.; that of the Duke of Hamilton is L.4955, 1 Is. Nearly one-fourth of the lands in the county is entailed. The real rent of the county in 1849, was'LAO,570 includino- house property. Of the thirty-three shires of Scotland, Bute was the twelfth in point of precedency in the Scot¬ tish parliament rolls and all public processions, though not entitled to that rank in point of valuation. It sent two members to parliament before the union ; from that time till the passing of the Reform bill, Bute and Caithness returned a member alternately; now Bute returns a mem- her for itself. The burgh of Rothesay is included in the county constituency, having a separate constitution for mu¬ nicipal purposes. The county constituency is about 483. .he family of Bute were hereditary sheriffs of the county for upwards of 360 years, until the jurisdictions were taken away in 1748. They were also lords of the regality of Bute. The Marquis of Bute is heritable coroner of the island of Bute, and keeper of the castle of Rothesay. By a recent statute the counties of Dumbarton and Bute are combined as one sheriffdom, under the jurisdiction of the same sheriff, but each county has a sheriff-substitute and other officials. Lord James Stuart, the uncle of the Mar¬ quis of Bute, is the lord-lieutenant. Criminals usually tried before the justiciary court are sent to the circuit court at Inveraray. Buteshire sends ten assizers to that circuit court. I he islands of Bute and Cumbrae were granted by the sovereign of Scotland, at an early period, to the lord high steward; and when they fell under the power of Norway, the monarch of that country gave Bute and certain other islands to Reginald, king of Man. After the marriage of Alexander VI., lord high steward, with Jean, daughter and heiress of Angus, one of the grandsons of the king of Man, the islands of Bute, Arran, and Cumbrae became a favoured part of the patrimony of the lord high steward, between whom and the people a strong attachment subsisted; and they were, by way of distinction, called the Lord High Steward’s Brandanes. It is probable that this name was derived from St Brandane, who flourished in the eleventh century. Sir John Stuart of Bute, from whom the family of Bute descended, was son to King Robert II., and re¬ ceived from his father the office of heritable sheriff, as well as an estate of lands in Bute and Arran. In the year 1544 the English burned the greater part of Bute and Arran. incfaV'-i? i ?ute cont:a‘ns 171 English square miles, or + i« LnoiF • i aCreS; and population in 1851 amounted 0 ’besides seamen belonging to registered vessels. . ’ , 17 , (French bouteillier, from bouteille, a bottle, t. e. tie bottler), a servant or officer in the houses of the wealthy, whose chief business is to take charge of the wine, plate, &c. 1 he title was anciently applied in the court of r ranee to an officer corresponding to the grand echanson or great cup-bearer of later times. B U T Butler, Charles, an ingenious and learned writer, born Butler, in 1559, at High Wycomb in Buckinghamshire. He en- tered of Magdalen Hall, Oxford, whence, after taking a degree in arts, he was translated to Magdalen College. He afterwards became master of the free school at Basing¬ stoke, and curate of a neighbouring parish. He was pro¬ moted about the year 1600 to the vicarage of Lawrence- Wotton, in the same county, and there he died in 1647. He published a book entitled “ The Principles of Music in singing and setting; with the twofold use thereof, eccle¬ siastical and civil4to, London, 1636. This very learned and entertaining book is highly praised by Dr Burney in his History of Music. His various works are enumerated by Wood in the AtheneB Oxonienses. Among these is a curious English Grammar, published in 1633, in which he proposes a scheme of regular orthography, and makes use of peculiar characters, some borrowed from the Saxon, and others of his own invention ; and of this imagined improve¬ ment he has made use in all his tracts. Butler, James, Duke of Ormond, was born at London in 1610. To the personal interest which King James took in his early education may be attributed that devotion to the Stuart dynasty, and to the principles of the Protestant faith, that distinguished him through life. In his 20th year he entered the army, and two years later, on the death of his grandfather, he succeeded to the earldom of Ormond. His talents attracted the notice of Strafford, at that time loid-lieutenant of Ireland; and by the influence of this nobleman he was appointed to the command of the army intended for the suppression of the Irish rebellion. Though he checked the progress of the insurgents, and gained many advantages over them, his efforts were so much impeded by the jealous interference of Strafford, that Charles granted him an independent commission under the Great Seal, and raised him to a marquisate. In 1644, three years after the death of Strafford, he was appointed lord-lieutenant of Ire¬ land, a situation rendered doubly difficult by the insubordi¬ nation of the Irish themselves, and by the intrigues of the English parliament. In 1647 he returned to England ; and though his administration was publicly approved of by Charles, the state of affairs was such that he resolved to secure his’ safety by a temporary residence in France. After the king’s death he returned to Ireland, and availing himself of the re¬ action that had taken place in consequence of that event, he caused Charles II. to be proclaimed. Cromwell, however, soon aftei landed in Ireland, and Ormond once more retired to Prance and joined the exiled family of the late king. At the Restoration he not only recovered his estates, but was rewarded for his many services with the title of duke. In 1662 he was again appointed lord-lieutenant of Ireland, and retained this office for seven years. In 1670 he narrowly escaped assassination at the hands of the notorious Colonel Blood. At the request of the king, however, he forgave his intended assassin, upon whom no punishment was ever inflicted. In 166/ he was once more appointed lord-lieu¬ tenant of Ireland, and governed that country with marked ability and success till 1685, when he resigned his office and returned to England. He died at his seat in Dorset¬ shire in 1688, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. His son, “ the gallant” Ossory, had predeceased him by eight years. Many details of his personal history, together with an admirable delineation of his character, will be found in Sir Walter Scott’s Peveril of the Peak. Butler, Joseph, Bishop of Durham—one of the most profound and original thinkers this or any country ever pro¬ duced—well deserves a place among the dii majores of English philosophy; with Bacon, Newton, and Locke. The following brief sketch will comprise an outline of his life and character, some remarks on the peculiarities of his genius, and an estimate of his principal writings. He was born at Wantage, in Berkshire, May 18, 1692 BUTLER. 29 Butler. His father, Thomas Butler, had been a linen-draper in that —town, but before the-birth of Joseph, who was the youngest of a family of eight, had relinquished business. He con¬ tinued to reside at Wantage, however, at a house called the Priory, which is still shown to the curious visitor. Young Butler received his first instructions from the Rev. Philip Barton, a clergyman, and master of the gram¬ mar-school at Wantage. The father, who was a Presby¬ terian, was anxious that his son, who early gave indica¬ tions of capacity, should dedicate himself to the ministry in his own communion, and sent him to a Dissenting academy at Gloucester, then kept by Mr Samuel Jones. “ Jones,” says Professor Fitzgerald, with equal truth and justice, “was a man of no mean ability or erudition and adds, with honourable liberality, “ could number among his scholars many names that might confer honour on any university in Christendom.”1 He instances among others Jeremiah Jones, the author of the excellent work on the Canon; Seeker, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury ; and two of the most learned, acute, and candid apologists for Chris¬ tianity England has produced—Nathaniel Lardner and Samuel Chandler. The academy was shortly afterwards removed to Tewkes¬ bury. While yet there, Butler first displayed his extra¬ ordinary aptitude for metaphysical speculation in the letters he sent to Clarke on two supposed flaws in the reasoning of the recently published a priori Demonstration; one respect¬ ing the proof of the Divine omnipresence, and the other respecting the proof of the unity of the “necessarily existent Being.” It is but just to Clarke to say that his opponent subsequently surrendered both objections. Whether the capitulation be judged strictly the result of logical necessity, will depend on the estimate formed of the value of Clarke’s proof of the truths in question ;—truths which are happily capable of being shown to be so, independently of any such a priori metaphysical demonstration. In this encounter, Butler showed his modesty not less than his prowess. He was so afraid of being discovered, that he employed his friend Seeker to convey his letters to the Gloucester post- office, and to bring back the answers. About this time he began to entertain doubts of the pro¬ priety of adhering to his father’s Presbyterian opinions, and consequently, of entering the ministry of that communion ; doubts which at length terminated in his joining the Church of England. His father, seeing all opposition vain, at length consented to his repairing to Oxford, where he was entered as a commoner of Oriel College, March 17, 1714. Here he early formed an intimate friendship with Mr Edward Talbot, second son of the Bishop of Durham, a connection to which his future advancement was in a great degree owing. The exact period at which Butler took orders is not known, but it must have been before 1717, as by that date he was occasionally supplying Talbot’s living, at Hendred, near Wantage. In 1718, at the age of twenty-six, he was nominated preacher at the Rolls, on the united recommen¬ dation of Talbot and Dr Samuel Clarke. At this time the country was in a ferment. What is called the “ Bangorian Controversy,” and which originated in a sermon of Bishop Hoadley, “ On the Nature of Christ’s Kingdom” (a discourse supposed to imperil “ all ecclesiastical authority”) was then raging. One pamphlet which that vo¬ luminous controversy called forth has been attributed to Butler. “ The external evidence, however, is,” as Mr Fitz¬ gerald judges, “ but slight; and the internal for the nega¬ tive at least equally so.” This writer says, “ On the whole, I feel unable to arrive at any positive decision on the sub¬ ject.” Readers curious respecting it may consult Mr Fitzgerald’s pages, where they will find a detail of the cir¬ cumstances which led to the publication of the pamphlet, and Butler, the evidence for and against its being attributed to Butler, 'v—v^— In 1721, Bishop Talbot presented Butler with the living of Haughton, near Dorkington, and Seeker (who had also relinquished nonconformity, and after some considerable fluctuations in his religious views, had at length entered the church), with that of Haughton-le-Spring. In 1725 the same liberal patron transferred Butler to the more lucrative benefice of Stanhope. He retained his situation of preacher at the Rolls till the following year (1726); and before quitting it published the celebrated “Fifteen Sermons” delivered there; among the most profound and original discourses which philosophical theologian ever gave to the world. As these could have been but a portion of those he preached at the Rolls, it has often been asked what could have become of the re¬ mainder? We agree with Mr Fitzgerald in thinking that the substance of many was afterwards worked into the “ Analogy.” That many of them were equally important with the “ Fifteen” may be inferred from Butler’s declara¬ tion in the preface,—that the selection of these had been determined by “ circumstances in a great measure acciden¬ tal.” At his death, Butler desired his manuscripts to be destroyed ; this he would hardly have done, had he not already rifled their chief treasures for his great work. Let us hope so at all events ; for it would be provoking to think that discourses of equal value with the “ Fifteen” had been wantonly committed to the flames. After resigning his preachership at the Rolls, he retired to Stanhope, and gave himself up to study and the duties of a parish priest. All that could be gleaned of his habits and mode of life there has been preserved by the present Bishop of Exeter, his successor in the living of Stanhope eighty years after ; and it is little enough. Tradition, said that “ Rector Butler rode a black pony, and always rode very fast; that he was loved and respected by all his parishioners ; that he lived very retired, was very kind, and could not resist the importunities of common beggars, who, knowing his infirmity, pursued him so earnestly, as some¬ times to drive him back into his house as his only escape.” The last fact the bishop reports doubtful; but Butler’s extreme benevolence is not so. In all probability, Butler in this seclusion was meditating and digesting that great work on which his fame, and what is better than fame, his usefulness, principally rests— “ The Analogy.” “ In a similar retirement,” says Professor Fitzgerald, “ The Ecclesiastical Polity of Hooker, The Intellectual System of Cudworth, and The Divine Legation of Warburton—records of genius ‘ which posterity will not willingly let die’—were ripened into maturity.” Queen Caroline once asked Archbishop Blackburne whether Butler was not “dead ?” “ No,” said he, “ but he is buried.” It was well for posterity that he was thus, for a while, entombed. He remained in this meditative seclusion seven years. At the end of this period, his friend Seeker, who thought Butler’s health and spirits were failing under excess of solitude and study, succeeded in dragging him from his re¬ treat. Lord Chancellor Talbot, at Seeker’s solicitation, appointed him his chaplain in 1733; and in 1736 a pre¬ bendary of Rochester. In the same year, Queen Caroline, who thought her court derived as much lustre from philo¬ sophers and divines as from statesmen and courtiers—who had been the delighted spectator of the argumentative contests of Clarke and Berkeley, Hoadley and Sherlock—appointed Butler clerk of the closet, and commanded “ his attendance every evening from seven till nine.” It was in 1736 that the celebrated “ Analogy” was pub¬ lished, and its great merits immediately attracted public 1 Life of Butler, prefixed to Professor Fitzgerald’s very valuable edition of the Analogy, Dublin, 1849. The memoir is derived chiefly from Mr Bartlett’s more copious “ Life;” it is very carefully compiled, and is frequently cited in the present article. 30 B U T L E Ji. Butler, attention. It was perpetually in the hands of his royal pa- troness, and passed through several editions before the author’s death. Its greatest praise is that it has been almost universally read, and never answered. “ I am not aware,” says Mr Fitzgerald, “ that any of those whom it would have immediately concerned, have ever attempted a regular re¬ ply to the ‘Analogybut particular parts of it have met with answers, and the whole, as a whole, has been sometimes unfavourably criticised.” Of its merits, and precise position in relation “to those whom it immediately concerns,” we shall speak presently. Some strange criticisms on its general character in Tho- luck’s Vermischte Schriften, showing a singular infelicity in missing Butler’s true “ standpunkt,” as Tholuck’s own countrymen would say, and rather unreasonably complain¬ ing of obscurity, considering the quality of German theolo- gico-philosophical style in general, are well disposed of by Professor Fitzgerald (Pp. xlvii.-l.) About this time Butler had some correspondence with Lord Kaimes on the Evidences of Natural and Revealed Religion. Kaimes requested a personal interview, which Butler declined in a manner very characteristic of his mo¬ desty and caution. It was “ on the score of his natural diffidence and reserve, his being unaccustomed to oral con¬ troversy, and his fear that the cause of truth might thence suffer from the unskilfulness of its advocate.” Hume was a kinsman of Lord Kaimes, and when prepar¬ ing his treatise of Human Nature for the press, was recom¬ mended by Lord Kaimes to get Butler’s judgment on it. “Your thoughts and mine,” says Hume, “agree with re¬ spect to Dr Butler, and I should be glad to be introduced to him.” The interview, however, never took place, nor was Butler’s judgment obtained. One cannot help specu¬ lating on the possible consequences. Would it have made any difference ? In the year 1737, Queen Caroline died, but on her death¬ bed recommended her favourite divine to her husband’s care. In 1738 Butler was accordingly made Bishop of Bristol, in place of Dr Gooch, who was translated to Nor¬ wich. This seems to have been a politic stroke of Walpole, who “probably thought,” says Fitzgerald, “ that the ascetic rector of Stanhope was too unworldly a person to care for the poverty of his preferment, or perceive the slight which it implied.” In the reply, however, in wdiich Butler ex¬ presses his sense of the honour conferred, he shows that he understood the position of matters very clearly. The hint he gave seems to have had its effect, for in 1740 the King nominated him to the vacant Deanery of St Paul’s, whereupon he resigned Stanhope, which he had hitherto held in commendam. The revenues of Bristol, the poorest see, did not exceed L.400. A curious anecdote of Butler has been preserved by his domestic chaplain, Dr Tucker, afterwards Dean of Glou¬ cester. He says ;—“ His custom was, when at Bristol, to walk for hours in his garden in the darkest night which the time of the year could afford, and I had frequently the honour to attend him. After walking some time, he would stop suddenly and ask the question, ‘ What security is there against the insanity of individuals ? The physicians know of none; and as to divines, we have no data, either from Scripture or from reason, to go upon relative to this affair.’ ‘ 41-ue, my Lord, no man has a lease of his understanding any more than of his life ; they are both in the hands of the Sovereign Disposer of all things.’ He would then take another turn, and again stop short—‘ Why might not whole communities and public bodies be seized with fits of insa- Butler, nity, as well as individuals.’ ‘ My Lord, I have never con- sidered the case, and can give no opinion concerning it.’ ‘ Nothing but this principle, that they are liable to insanity, equally at least with private persons, can account for the major part of those transactions of which we read in history.’ I thought little of that odd conceit of the bishop at that juncture ; but I own I could not avoid thinking of it a great deal since, and applying it to many cases.’’ In 1747, on the death of Archbishop Potter, it is said that the primacy was offered to Butler, who declined it with the remark that “ it was too late for him to try to support a falling church.” If he really said so, it must have been in a moment of despondency, to which his constitutional melancholy often disposed him. No such feeling, at all events, prevented his accepting the bishopric of Durham in 17o0, on the death of Dr Edward Chandler. About the time of his promotion to this dignity, he was engaged in a design for consolidating and extending the Church of Eng¬ land in the American colonies. With this object he drew up a plan marked by his characteristic moderation and liberality; the project, however, came to nothing. Soon after his translation to the see of Durham, Butler delivered and published his charge on the Use and Impor¬ tance of External Religion, which gave rise, in conjunction with his erection of a “white marble cross” over the com¬ munion table in his chapel at Bristol, and one or two other slight circumstances, to the ridiculous and malignant charge of popery ;—a charge, as Mr Fitzgerald observes, “ desti¬ tute of a shadow of positive evidence, and contradicted by the whole tenor of Butler’s character, life, and writings.” The revenues from his see were lavishly expended in the support of public and private charities,1 while his own mode of life was most simple and unostentatious. Of the frugality of his table, the following anecdote is proof:—“ A friend of mine, since deceased, told me,” says the Rev. John New¬ ton, “ that when he was a young man, he once dined with the late Dr Butler, at that time Bishop of Durham ; and, though the guest was a man of fortune, and the interview by appointment, the provision was no more than a joint of meat and a pudding. The bishop apologized for his plain fare, by saying, that it was his way of living; ‘ that he had been long disgusted with the fashionable expense of time and money in entertainments, and was determined that it should receive no countenance from his example.’” No prelate ever owed less to politics for his elevation, or took less part in them. If he was not “ wafted to his see of Durham,” as Horace Walpole ludicrously said, “ on a cloud of metaphysics,” he certainly was not carried there by poli¬ tical intrigue or party manoeuvres. He was never known to speak in the House of Peers, though constant in his at¬ tendance there. He had not long enjoyed his new dignity before symp¬ toms of decay disclosed themselves. He repaired to Bath in 1 752, in hope of recovering his health, where he died, June 16, in the 60th year of his age. His face was thin, and pale, but singularly expressive of placidity and benevolence. “ His white hair,” says Hut¬ chinson,2 “ hung gracefully on his shoulders, and his whole figure was patriarchal.” He was buried in the cathedral of Bristol, where two monuments have been erected to his memory. Ihey record in suitable inscriptions (one in Latin by his chaplain, Dr Foster, and the other in English by the late Dr Southey) his virtues and genius. Though epitaphs, they speak no more than simple truth. Butler must have been of a naturally munificent as well as benevolent disposition. He was extremely fond, it appears, Qiplanninq and building; a passion not always very prudently indulged, or without danger, in early days, of involving him in difficulties; from which, indeed, on one occasion Seeker’s intervention saved him. He spent large sums in improving his various residences. It was probably in the_indulgence of the love of ornamentation to which this passion led, that the “ marble cross” and other imprudent symbols which were so ridiculously adduced to support the charge of popery, originated. 2 History of Durham, vol. i. p. 578 ; cited in Fitzgerald’s “ Life.” BUTLER. 31 Butler. A singular anecdote is recorded of his last moments. —^ As Mr Fitzgerald observes, “it wants direct testimony,” but is in itself neither uninstructive nor incredible, for a dying hour has often given strange vividness and intensity to truths neither previously unknown nor uninfluential. It is generally given thus:—“ When Bishop Butler lay on his death-bed, he called for his chaplain, and said, ‘ Though I have endeavoured to avoid sin, and to please God, to the utmost of my power ; yet, from the consciousness of per¬ petual infirmities, I am still afraid to die.’ ‘ My Lord,’ said the chaplain, ‘ you have forgotten that Jesus Christ is a Saviour.’ ‘ True,’ was the answer, ‘ but how shall I know that he is a Saviour for me ?’ ‘ My Lord, it is written, Him that cometh xmto me, I will in no wise cast out.’ ‘ True,’ said the bishop, ‘ and I am surprised, that though I have read that scripture a thousand times over, I never felt its virtue till this moment; and now I die happy.’ ” The genius of Butler was almost equally distinguished by subtilty and comprehensiveness, though the latter quality was perhaps the most characteristic. In his juvenile cor¬ respondence with Clarke—already referred to he displays an acuteness which, as Sir James Mackintosh observes, “ neither himself nor any other ever surpassed an analytic skill, which, in earlier ages, might easily have gained him a rank with the most renowned of the schoolmen. But in his mature works, though they are everywhere characterized by subtle thought, he manifests in combination with it qualities yet more valuable ;—patient comprehensiveness in the survey of complex evidence, a profound judgment and a most judicial calmness in computing its several ele¬ ments, and a singular constructive skill in combining the materials of argument into a consistent logical fabric. This “ architectural power ” of mind may be wholly or nearly want¬ ing, where the mere analytic faculty may exist in much vigour. The latter may even be possessed in vicious ex¬ cess, resulting in little more than the disintegration of the subjects presented to its ingenuity. Synthetically to recon¬ struct the complex unity, when the task of analysis is com¬ pleted, to assign the reciprocal relations and law of subor¬ dination of its various parts, requires something more. Many can take a watch to pieces, who would be sorely puzzled to put it together again. Butler possessed these powers of analysis and synthesis in remarkable equipoise. What is more, he could not only recombine, and present in symmetrical harmony, the ele¬ ments of a complex unity when capable of being subjected to an exact previous analysis,—as in his remarkable sketch of the Moral Constitution of Man,—but he had a wonderfully keen eye for detecting remote analogies and subtle rela¬ tions where the elements are presented intermingled or in isolation, and insusceptible of being presented as a single object of contemplation previous to the attempt to combine them. This is the case with the celebrated “ Analogy.” In the Sermons on Human Nature, he comprehensively sur¬ veys that nature as a system or constitution ; and after a careful analysis of its principles, affections, and passions, views these elements in combination, endeavours to reduce each of these to its place, assigns to them their relative im¬ portance, and deduces from the whole the law of subordina¬ tion—which he finds in the Moral Supremacy of Con¬ science, as the key-stone of the arch—the ruling principle of the “ Constitution.” In the Analogy, he gathers up and combines from a wide survey of scattered and disjointed facts, those resemblances and relations on which the argument is founded, and works them into one of the most original and symmetrical logical creations to which human genius ever gave birth. The latter task was by far the more gigantic of the two. To recur to our previous illustration, Butler is here like one who puts a watch together without having been permitted to take it to pieces—from the mere presen¬ tation of its disjointed fragments. In the former case he Butler, resembled the physiologist who has an entire animal to 1 ^ ^ study and dissect; in the latter he resembled Cuvier, con¬ structing out of disjecta, membra—a bone scattered heie and there—an organized unity which man had never seen except in isolated fragments. All Butler’s productions—even his briefest display much of this “architectonic” quality of mind ; in all he not only evinces a keen analytic power in discerning the differ¬ ences ” (one phase of the philosophic genius, according to Bacon, and hardly the brightest), but a still higher power of detecting the “analogies” and “resemblances of things,” and thus of showing their relations and subordination. These peculiarities make his writings difficult, but it makes them profound, and it gives them singular completeness. It is not difficult to assign the precise sphere in which Butler, with eminent gifts for abstract science in general, felt most at home. Facts show us, not only that there are peculiarities of mental structure which prompt men to the pursuit of some of the great objects of thought and specula¬ tion rather than others—peculiarities which circumstances may determine and education modify, but which neither circumstances nor education can do more than determine or modify; but that even in relation to the very same sub¬ ject of speculation, there are minute and specific varieties of mind, which prompt men to addict themselves rather to this part of it than to that. This was the case with Butler. Eminently fitted for the prosecution of metaphy¬ sical science in general, it is always the philosophy oj' the moral nature of man to which he most naturally attaches himself, and on which he best loves to expatiate. Neither Bacon nor Pascal ever revolved more deeply the pheno¬ mena of our moral nature, or contemplated its inconsist¬ encies—its intricacies—its paradoxes—with a keener glance or more comprehensive survey ; or drew from such sur¬ vey reflections more original or instructive. As in reading Locke the young metaphysician is perpetually startled by the palpable apparition, in distinct sharply-defined outline, of facts of consciousness which he recognises as having been partially and dimly present to his mind before—though too fugitive to fix, too vague to receive a name ; so in reading Butler, he is continually surprised by the statement of moral facts and laws, which he then first adequately recognises as true, and sees in distinct vision face to face. It is not with¬ out reason that Sir James Mackintosh says of the sermons preached at the Rolls, “ that in them Butler has taught truths more capable of being exactly distinguished from the doctrines of his predecessors, more satisfactorily established by him, more comprehensively applied to particulars, more rationally connected with each other, and therefore more worthy of the name of discovery, than any with which we are acquainted.” Flis special predilections for the sphere of speculation we have mentioned are strikingly indicated in his choice of the ground from which he proposes to survey the questions of morals. “ There are two ways,” says he in the preface to his three celebrated sermons on Human Nature, “in which the subject of morals may be treated. One begins from inquiring into the abstract relations of things; the other, from a matter of fact, namely, what the particular nature of man is, its several parts, their economy or constitution ; from whence it proceeds to determine what course of life it is, which is correspondent to this whole nature.” As might be expected, from the tendencies of his mind, he selects the latter course. The powers of observation in Butler must have been, in spite of his studious life and his remarkable habits of ab¬ straction, not much inferior to his keen faculty of introspec¬ tion, though this last was undoubtedly the main instrument by which he traced so profoundly the mysteries of our na¬ ture. There have doubtless been other men, far less pro- 32 Butler. BUTLER. found, who have had a more quick or more vivid percep- tion of the peculiarities of character which discriminate individuals, or small classes of men (evincing, after all, however, not so much a knowledge of man, as a knowledge of men); still, the masterly manner in which Butler often sketches even these, shows that he must have been a very sagacious observer of those phenomena of human nature which presented themselves from without, as well as of those which revealed themselves from within. In general, how¬ ever, it is the characteristics of man, the generic pheno¬ mena of our nature, in all their complexity and subtilty, that he best loves to investigate and exhibit. The spirit of his profound philosophy is meantime worthy both of the Chris¬ tian character and the ample intellect of him who excogi¬ tated it. It is the very reverse of that of the philosophical satirist or caricaturist; however severely just to the foibles, the inconsistencies, the corruptions of our nature, it is a philosophy everywhere compassionate, magnanimous, and philanthropic. Its tone, indeed, like that of the philosophy of Pascal (though not shaded with the same deep melan- choly), is entirely modulated by a profound conviction of the frailty and ignorance of man, of the little we know compared with what is to be known,—and of the duty of humility, modesty, and caution in relation, to all those great problems of the universe, which tempt and exercise man’s ambitious speculations. His constant feeling, amidst the beautiful and original reasonings of the “ Analogy,” is identical with that of Newton, when, reverting at the close of life to his sublime discoveries, he declared that he seemed only like a child who had been amusing himself with pick¬ ing up a few shells on the margin of the ocean of universal truth, while the infinite still lay unexplored before him. In a word, it is the feeling, not only of Pascal and of Newton, but of all the profoundest speculators of our race, whose grandest lesson from all they learned, was the vanishing ratio of man’s knowledge to man’s ignorance. Hence the immense value (if only as a discipline) of a careful study of But¬ ler s writings, to every youthful mind. They cannot but powerfully tend to check presumption, and teach modesty and self-distrust. The feebleness of Butler’s imagination was singularly contrasted with the inventive and constructive qualities of his intellect, and the facility with which he detected and employed “ analogies” in the way of argument. He is, in¬ deed, almost unique in this respect. Other philosophic minds (Bacon and Burke are illustrious examples), which have possessed similar aptitudes for “ analogical” reasoning, have usually had quite sufficient of the kindred activity of ima¬ gination to employ “ analogies” for the purpose of poetical illustration. If Butler possessed this faculty by nature in any tolerable measure, it must (as has been the case with some other great thinkers) have been repressed and ab¬ sorbed by his habits of abstraction. His defect in this re¬ spect is, in some respects, to be regretted, since unques¬ tionably the illustrations which imagination would have supplied to argument, and the graces it would have imparted to style, would have made his writings both more intelligi¬ ble and more attractive. It is said that once, and once only, he courted the muses,” having indited a solitary “ acrostic to a fair cousin,” who for the first, and as it seems, the only time, inspired him with the tender passion. But, as one of his biographers says, we have probably no great reason to lament the loss of this fragment of his poetry. Butler s composition is almost as destitute of the vivacity of wit as of the graces of imagination. Yet is he by no means without that dry sort of humour which often accom¬ panies very vigorous logic, and, indeed, is in some sense in¬ separable from it; for the neat detection of a sophism, or the sudden and unexpected explosion of a fallacy, produces much, the same effect as wit on those who are capable of enjoying close and cogent reasoning. There is also a kind of simple, grave, satirical pleasantry, with which he some¬ times states and refutes an objection, by no means without its piquancy. As to the complaint of obscurity, which has been so often charged on Butlers style, it is difficult to see its justice in the sense in which it has been usually preferred. He is a difficu^author, no doubt, but he is so from the close pack¬ ing of his thoughts, and their immense generality and com- prehensivencss ; as also from what may be called the breadth of his march, and from occasional lateral excursions for the purpose of disposing of some objection which he does not for¬ mally mention, but which might harass his flank; it certainly is not fiom indeterminate language or (ordinarily) involved construction. All that is really required in the reader, cana¬ pe of understanding him at all, is to do just what he does with lyrical poetry (if we may employ an odd, and yet in this one point, not inapt comparison) ; he must read sufficiently often to make all the transitions of thought familiar, he must let the mind dwell with patience on each argument till its entire scope and bearing are properly appreciated. Nothing cer¬ tainly is wanting in the method or arrangement of the thoughts; and the diction seems to us selected with the ut¬ most care and precision. Indeed, as Professor Fitzgerald justly observes, a collation of the first with the subsequent edi¬ tions of the “Analogy” (the variations are given in Mr Fitz- gei aid s edition) will show, by the nature of the alterations, what pains Butler bestowed on a point on which he is errone¬ ously supposed to have been negligent. In subjects so ab¬ struse, and involving so much generality of expression, the utmost difficulty must always be experienced in selecting language which conveys neither more nor less than what is intended; .and this point Butler must Jiave laboured im¬ mensely; it may be added,^ successfully, since he has at least prouuced works which have seldom given rise to disputes as to his meaning. 1 hough he may be difficult to be understood, few people complain of his being liable to be ^understood. In short, it may be doubted whether any man of so comprehensive a mind, and dealing with such abstract subjects, ever condensed the results of twenty years’ meditations into so small a compass, with so little obscurity. No doubt greater amplification would have made him more pleasing, but it may be questioned whether the perusal of his writings would have been so useful a discipline; and whether the truths he has delivered would have fixed them¬ selves so indelibly as they now generally do in the minds of all who diligently study him. It is the result of the very activity of mind his writings stimulate and demand. But, at any rate, if precision in the use of language, and method and consecutiveness in the thoughts, are sufficient to rebut the charge of obscurity, Butler is not chargeable with the fault in the ordinary sense. We must never forget what Whately in his rhetoric has so well illustrated ; that perspi¬ cuity is a “ relative quality.” To the intelligent, or those who are willing to take sufficient pains to understand, Butler will not seem chargeable with obscurity. The diction is plain, downright Saxon-English, and the style, however homely, has, as the writer just mentioned observes, the great charm of transparent simplicity of purpose and unaffected earnestness. Butler, The immortal “ Analogy” has probably done more to silence the objections of infidelity than any other ever writ¬ ten from the earliest “apologies” downwards. It not only most critically met the spirit of unbelief in the author’s own day, but is equally adapted to meet that which chiefly pre¬ vails in all time. In every age, some of the principal, per¬ haps the principal, objections to the Christian Revelation, have been those which men’s preconceptions of the Divine character and administration—of what God must be, and of what God must do—have suggested against certain facts in the sacred history, or certain doctrines it reveals. To show BUTLER. 33 Butler. the objector then (supposing him to be a theist, as nine- tenths of all such objectors have been), that the very same or similar difficulties are found in the structure of the uni¬ verse and the divine administration of it, is to wrest every such weapon completely from his hands, if he be a fair rea- soner and remain a theist at all. He is bound by strict lo¬ gical obligation either to show that the parallel difficulties do not exist, or to show how he can solve them, while he can¬ not solve those of the Bible. In default of doing either of these things, he ought either to renounce all such objections to Christianity, or abandon theism altogether. It is true, therefore, that though Butler leaves the alternative of athe¬ ism open, he hardly leaves any other alternative to nine- tenths of the theists who have objected to Christianity. It has been sometimes said by way of reproach, that Butler docs leave that door open; that his work does not confute the atheist. The answer is, that it is not its object to confute atheism ; but it is equally true, that it does not diminish by one grain any of the arguments against it. It leaves the evidence for theism—every particle of it—just where it was. Butler merely avails himself of facts which exist, undeniably exist (whether men be atheists or theists), to neutralize a certain class of objections against Christi¬ anity. And as the exhibition of such facts as form the pivot on which Butler’s argument turns, does not impugn the truth of theism, but leaves its conclusions, and the immense preponderance and convergence of evidence which establish them just as they were, so it is equally true that Butler has sufficiently guarded his argument from any perversion ; for example, in Part I. chap, vi., and Part II. chap. viii. He has also with his accustomed acuteness and judgment shown that, even on the principles of atheism itself, its confident assumption that, if its principles be granted, a future life— future happiness—future misery—is a dream,—cannot be depended on ; for since men have existed, they may again; and if in a bad condition now, in a worse hereafter. It is not, on such an hypothesis, a whit more unaccountable that man’s life should be renewed or preserved, or perpetuated for ever, than that it should have been originated at all. On this point, he truly says, “ That we are to live hereafter, is just as reconcileable with the scheme of atheism, and as well to be accounted for by it, as that we are now alive, is; and therefore nothing can be more absurd than to argue from that scheme, that there can be no future state.” It has been also alleged that the analogy only “ shifts the difficulty from revealed to natural religion,” and that “ atheists might make use of the arguments and have done so.” 1 he answer is, not only (as just said) that the argu¬ ments of Butler leave every particle of the evidence for theism just where it was, and that he has sufficiently guarded against all abuse of them ; but that the facts, of which it is so foolishly said that the atheist might make ill use, had always been the very arguments which he had used, and of which Butler only made a new and beneficial application. The objections with which he perplexes and baffles the deist, he did not give to the atheist’s armoury; he took them from thence, merely to make an unexpected and more legitimate use of them. The atheist had never neglected such weapons, nor was likely to do so, previous to Butler’s adroit application of them. The charge is ridi¬ culous ; as well might a man, who had wrested a stiletto from an assassin to defend himself, be accused of having put the weapon into the assassin’s hands! It was there before ; he merely wrested it thence. It is just so with Butler. Further; we cannot but think that the conclusiveness of Butler’s work as against its true object The Deist, has often been underrated, by many even of its genuine admirers. Butler. Thus Dr Chalmers, for instance, who gives such glowing ■ proofs of his admiration of the work, and expatiates in a congenial spirit on its merits, affirms that “ those overrate the power of analogy who look to it for any very distinct or positive contribution to the Christian argument. To repel objections, in fact, is the great service which analogy has rendered to the cause of Revelation, and it is the only service which we seek for at its hands.”1 This, abstractedly, is true ; but, in fact, considering the position of the bulk of the objectors, that they have been invincibly persuaded of the truth of theism, and that their objections to Christi¬ anity have been exclusively or chiefly of the kind dealt with in the “Analogy,” the work is much more than an argumen- tum ad hominem ; it is not simply of negative value. To such objectors it logically establishes the truth of Christianity, or it forces them to recede from theism, which the bulk will not do. If a man says, “ I am invincibly persuaded of the truth of proposition A, but I cannot receive proposition B, because objections a, /?, y are opposed to it; if these were removed, my objections would cease;” then, if you can show that a, /3, y equally apply to the proposition A, his reception of which, he says, is based on invincible evi¬ dence, you do really compel such a man to believe that not only B may be true, but that it is true, unless he be willing (which few in the parallel case are) to abandon proposition A as well as B. This is precisely the condition in which the majority of deists have ever been, if we may judge from their writings. It is usually the d priori assumption, that certain facts in the history of the Bible, or some portions of its doctrine, are unworthy of the Deity, and incompatible with his character or administration, that has chiefly excited the incredulity of the deist; far more than any dissatis¬ faction with the positive evidence which substantiates the Divine origin of Christianity. Neutralize these objections by showing that they are equally applicable to what he de¬ clares he cannot relinquish—the doctrines of theism ; and you show him, if he has a particle of logical sagacity, not only that Christianity may be true, but that it is so ; and his only escape is by relapsing into atheism, or resting his opposition on other objections of a very feeble character in comparison, and which, probably, few would ever have been contented with alone; for apart from those objections which Butler repels, the historical evidence for Christianity,—the evidence on behalf of the integrity of its records, and the honesty and sincerity of its founders,—showing that they could not have constructed such a system if they would, and would not, supposing them impostors, if they could,—is stronger than that for any fact in history. In consequence of this position of the argument, Butler’s book, to large classes of objectors, though practically an argumentum ad hominem, not only proves Christianity may be true, but in all logical fairness proves it is so. This he himself, with his usual judgment, points out. He says : “ And objections, which are equally applicable to both na¬ tural and revealed religion, are, properly speaking, answered by its being shown that they are so, provided the former be admitted to be truer The praise which Mackintosh bestows on this great work, is alike worthy of it and himself. “ Butler’s great work, though only a commentary on the singularly original and pregnant passage of Origen, which is so honestly prefixed to it as a motto, is, notwithstanding, the most original and profound work extant in any language, on the Philosophy of Religion? The favourite topics of the “ Sermons” are, of course, largely insisted on in the “ Analogy;” such as the 1 Prelections on Butler, &c., p. 7. Utt!rly ln^onsisten.tjudgmellt in all respects is reported, in his “Life,” to have fallen from him. But as Professor somethinp- twT’ri V** 80 s.^angcly’ anffi indeed, amusingly contrary to the above, that it must have been founded on some mistake of something that had been said in conversation. VOL. VI. E 34 BUT Butler. “ ignorance of man; ” the restrictions which the limitations of his nature and his position in the universe should impose on his speculations; his subjection to “ probability as the guide of life the folly and presumption of pronouncing, a priori, on the character and conduct of the Divine Rulei from our contracted point of view, and our glimpses of but a very small segment of his universal plan. These topics Butler enforces with a power not less admirable than the sagacity with which he traces the analogies between the “ Constitution and Course of Nature” and the disclosures of “ Divine Revelation.” These last, of course, form the staple of the argument; but to enforce the proper deductions from them, the above favourite topics are absolutely essential. It has been sometimes, though erroneously, surmised, that Butler was considerably indebted to preceding writers. That in the progress of the long deistical controversy many theo¬ logians should have caught glimpses of the same line of ar¬ gument, is not wonderful. The constant iteration by the English deists of that same class of difficulties to which the “ Analogy” replies, could notfail to lead to a partial perception of the powerful instrument it was reserved for Butler effec¬ tually to wield. It has been here as with almost every other great intellectual achievement of man; many minds have been simultaneously engaged by the natural progress of events about the same subject of thought; there have been “coming shadows” and “vague anticipations,” perhaps even simultaneous inventions or discoveries; and then ensues much debate as to the true claimants. Thus it was in relation to the calculus, the analysis of water, the invention of the steam-engine, and the discovery of Neptune. In the present case, however, there can be no doubt that the merit of the systematic construction of the entire argu¬ ment rests with Butler. Nor would it have much detracted from his merit, even if he had derived far larger fragments of the fabric from his contemporaries than we have any rea¬ son to believe he did. They would have been but single stones ; the architectural genius which brought them from their distant quarries and polished them, and wrought them into a massive edifice, was his alone. Professor Fitzgerald has truly remarked, that the work of Dr James Foster against Tindal (an author Butler evi¬ dently has constantly in his eye), presents some curious pa¬ rallelisms with certain passages of the “Analogy;” we have ourselves noted in Conybeare’s reply to the same infidel writer (published six years before the “Analogy”), other parallelisms not less striking. But it seems quite improbable that Butler should have derived aid from any such sources, since his work was being excogitated for many years before it was published ; nay, as we have seen, it may be conjectured that he largely transfused into it portions of the Sermons delivered so long before at the Rolls, and of which a far greater num¬ ber must have been preached than the fifteen he published; so that, perhaps, it is more near the truth to say, that contem¬ porary writers had been indebted to him than he to them. The “pregnant sentence” from Origen, however, is not the only thing which may have suggested to Butler his great work. Berkeley, in a long passage of the “ Minute Philo¬ sopher,” cited by Mr Fitzgerald, clearly lays down the prin¬ ciple on which such a work as the “ Analogy” might be con¬ structed. The spirit of the “ Analogy” is admirable. Though emi¬ nently controversial in its origin and purpose ; and though the author must constantly have had the deistical writers of the day in his eye, his work is calm and dignified, and di¬ vested of every trace of the controversial spirit. He does not even mention the names of the men whose opinions he is refuting; and if their systems had been merely some new minerals, or aerolites dropped upon the world from some un¬ known sphere, he could not have analysed them with less of passion. Of Butler’s ethical philosophy, as expounded especially BUT in the “ Sermons on Human Nature,” Sir James Mackin- Butler, tosh’s remarks prefixed to this Encyclopaedia supersede fur- ther notice in the present brief article. But it may be re¬ marked in general of the Sermons preached at the Rolls, that though not so much read (if we except, perhaps, the three just mentioned) as the Analogy, they are to the full as worthy of being read ; they deserve all that is so strik- ingly said of them in the Preliminary Dissertation. Some of them fill one with wonder at the sagacity with which the moral paradoxes in human nature are investigated and re¬ conciled. Take, for example, the sermon on Balaam. The first feeling in many a mind on reading the history in the Old Testament is, that man could not so act in the given circumstances. We doubt if ever any man deeply pondered the sermon of Butler, in which he dwells on the equally un¬ accountable phenomena of human conduct, less observed, indeed, only because more observable—and questioned any longer man’s powers of self-deception, even to such feats of folly and wickedness as are recorded of the prophet. The editions of Butler’s writings, separately or altogether, have been numerous, and it is impossible within the limits of this article to specify them ; still less to do justice to the literature which they have produced. His commentators have been many and most illustrious ; seldom has a man who wrote so little, engaged so many great minds to do him homage, by becoming his exponents and annotators. It may be permitted, however, to mention with deserved honour the Remarks of Sir James Mackintosh prefixed to this Ency¬ clopaedia; the “Prelections” of Dr Chalmers on the “Ana¬ logy;” the valuable “Essay” of Dr Hampden “ On the Phi¬ losophical Evidence of Christianity;” some beautiful appli¬ cations of Butler’s principle in Whately’s “ Essays on the Peculiarities of Christianity; ” and the admirable edition of the “Analogy” by Professor Fitzgerald, which is enriched by many very acute and judicious notes, and by a copious and valuable index. A very neat and convenient edition of Butler’s entire works, in two volumes, 8vo, has been issued from the Claren¬ don press. (h.r.) Butler, Samuel, the author of Hudibras, was the son of a respectable Worcestershire farmer, and was born at Stren- sham in that county, February 13, 1612. He passed some time at Cambridge, but was never matriculated in that uni¬ versity. Returning to his native county, he lived some years as clerk to a justice of peace, and also applied himself to his¬ tory, poetry, and painting. Being recommended to Eliza¬ beth, Countess of Kent, he enjoyed in her house not only the use of all kinds of books, but the conversation of the illustrious Selden, who often employed Butler to write let¬ ters and translate for him. He lived also some time with Sir Samuel Luke, a gentleman of an ancient family in Bed¬ fordshire, and a famous commander under Oliver Crom¬ well ; and he is supposed at this time to have written, or at least to have planned, his celebrated Hudibras, and under that character to have ridiculed the knight. The poem itself furnishes this key in the first canto, where Hudibras says— “ ’Tis sung, there is a valiant Mameluke In foreign land yclep’d To whom we oft have been compar’d For person, parts, address, and beard.” After the Restoration, Butler was appointed secretary to the Earl of Carbury, lord-president of Wales, who ap¬ pointed him steward of Ludlow Castle when the court was revived there. No one proved a more generous friend to him than the Earl of Dorset and Middlesex, to whom it was owing that the court relished his Hudibras. He had pro¬ mises of a good place from the Earl of Clarendon, but they were never accomplished; though the king was so much pleased with the poem as often to quote it pleasantly in con¬ versation. It is indeed said that Charles ordered him the BUT Butrinto sum of L.3000; but the sum being expressed in figures, Button sornebody tllrouSh whose hands the order passed reduced • it, by cutting off a cypher, to L.300, and though it passed the offices without fees, it proved not sufficient to pay what he then owed; so that Butler benefited but little by the king’s bounty. During the latter years of his life he was reduced to almost absolute want, and his fate might have been that of the ill-starred Otway, had not the kind inter¬ ference of Mr Longueville, a bencher of the Inner Temple prevented such a catastrophe. This gentleman likewise erected a monument in memory of Butler, after his death which took place in 1680. Granger observes, that Butler stands without a rival in burlesque poetry. His Hudi- br-as ” he adds, “ is in its kind almost as great an effort of genius as the Paradise Lost itself. It abounds with un¬ common learning, new rhymes, and original thoughts. Its images are truly and naturally ridiculous. There are many strokes of temporary satire, and some characters and allu¬ sions which cannot be discovered at this distance of time.” 1 KIN 1 O (the ancient Ihuhrotum), a fortified mari¬ time town of European Turkey in Albania, immediately opposite the island of Corfu. It stands at the mouth of a stream three or four miles in length, connecting the lake of \ atzindro (the ancient Pelodes), with the bay. It is said to have been founded by Helenus, the son of Priam ; and on the conquest of Epirus by the Romans, it became a Roman colony. The Roman walls, which still exist, are about a mile in circumference, and are mixed up with re¬ mains both of later and of Hellenic work. Pop. about 2000. BUTT, a measure of wine, containing two hogsheads or 126 wine gallons. See Pipe. BUTTER, the unctuous substance obtained from milk by churning. It was not till a late period that the Greeks became acquainted with butter. The Romans used it as a medicine, but not as food. According to Beckmann, the discovery of butter belongs neither to the Greeks nor to the Romans. The former, he thinks, derived their knowledge of butter from the Scythians, the Thracians, and Phry¬ gians ; and the latter from the people of Germany. For the process of butter-making, see Dairy. The ancient Christians of Egypt burnt butter in their lamps instead of oil; and in the Roman churches it was anciently allowed, during Christmas time, to burn butter instead of oil, on account of the great consumption of the latter at that season. Butter, in the old chemistry, was the term applied to vari¬ ous preparations ; as butter of antimony (sesquichloride of antimony); butter of arsenic (sublimated muriate of arsenic); butter of bismuth (sublimated muriate of bismuth); butter of tin (sublimated muriate of tin); butter of zinc (subli¬ mated muriate of zinc). Butterfly. See Entomology, Index. Buttermilk, milk from which the butter has been sepa¬ rated by churning. 1 Butter-Tree, a species of Bassia, found in Africa. It yields a substance like butter, which is called by Park Shea butter. BUTTERIS, an instrument of steel set in a handle for paring the hoof of a horse. BUTTEVANT, a market-town of Ireland, county of Cork on the Awbeg, 137 miles from Dublin by the Great Southern and Western railway. It was formerly a walled town of some importance, and has remains of two castles and an abbey, founded about the end of the thirteenth cen- (1851) ^ eXtensive infantry barracks. Pop. BUTTON, a knob, or small ball; or a similar article used tor fastening or ornamenting different parts of dress. These latter are formed of a great variety of materials and shapes, l he method of making solid metal buttons is as follows 1 he metal with which the moulds are intended to be covered B u T 35 is first cast into small ingots, and then flatted into thin Buttress plates by the flattening mill; these are cut into small II round pieces proportional to the size of the mould they Buxar- are intended to cover, by means of proper punches, on a V'— block of wood covered with a thick plate of lead. Each piece of metal thus cut out of the plate is reduced into the form of a button by beating it successively in several concave moulds, with a convex puncheon of iron, always beginning with the shallowest cavity of the mould, and pro¬ ceeding to the deeper, till the plate has acquired the intended form ; and the better to manage so thin a plate, ten, twelve, and sometimes even twenty-four, are formed to the cavities, or concave moulds, at once; often annealing the metal during the operation, to make it more ductile. This plate is generally called by workmen the cap of the button. The form being thus given to the plates or caps, the intended impression is struck on the convex side, by means or a similar iron puncheon, in a kind of mould engraven en creux, either by the hammer or a press, similar to that used in coining. The mould in which the impression is to be made is of a diameter and depth suitable to the sort of button intended to be struck in it; each kind requiring a particular mould. Between the puncheon and the plate is placed a thin piece of lead, called by w orkmen a hob which greatly contributes to take off all the strokes of the engraving ; the lead, by reason of its softness, easily o-ivW way to the parts which have relief, and as easily insinuating itself into the traces or indentures. The plate thus prepared makes the cap or shell of the button. The lower part is formed of another plate, in the same manner, but much flatter, and without any impres¬ sion. To the last or under plate is soldered a small eye made of wire, by which the button is to be fastened. The two plates being thus finished, they are soldered together with soft solder, and then turned in a lathe. Generally indeed a wooden mould is used instead of the under plate; and in order to fasten it, a thread or gut is passed across through the middle of the mould, and the cavity between the mould and the cap is filled with cement in order to render the button firm and solid ; for the cement entering all the cavities formed by the relief of the other side, sustains it, prevents its flattening, and preserves its boss or design. BUTTRESS, a kind of abutment built archwise, or a mass of stone or brick, serving to support the side of a build¬ ing or wall externally, when very high or loaded with a leavy superstructure. Buttresses are chiefly used against the angles of steeples and on the outside of such buildings as have heavy roofs, which would be apt to thrust out the walls if unsupported in this manner. They are sometimes placed for a support and abutment against the feet of arches that are turned across great halls in old palaces, abbeys, &c. Hying buttresses are such as are carried across by an arch from one wall to another. See Architecture. BUTZOW, a city in the duchy of Mecklenburo-- Schwerin, on the Warnow, 16 miles from Rostock. It was formerly the seat of the bishops of Schwerin ; and in 1760 a university was founded here, which, however, in 1789 was united with that of Rostock. It manufactures paper playing-cards, linen, and brandy. Pop. 4050. BUXAR, a town of Hindustan, in the province of Ba- har, district ofShahabad, situated on the south bank of the Ganges. The fort, though of small size, commanded the Ganges, but is now dismantled. This place is distinguished by a celebrated victory gained there on the 23d October 1764 by the British forces under Major (afterwards Sir Hector) Munro, over the united armies of Sujah ud Dowlah and Cossim Ah Khan. The action raged from nine o’clock till noon, when the enemy gave way. Pursuit was, how- ever, frustrated by Sujah ud Dowlah sacrificing a part of his army to the safety of the remainder. A bridge of boats had 36 B U X Buxton. been constructed over a stream about two miles distant from the field of battle, and this the enemy destroyed before their rear had passed over. Through this act two thousan troops were drowned, or otherwise lost; but destructive as was this proceeding, it was, says Major Munro the best piece of generalship Sujah ud Dowlah showed that day because if 1 had crossed the rivulet with the army, I should either have taken or drowned his whole army m the Caram- nassa, and come up with his treasure and jewels, and Cossim Ali Khan’s jewels, which I was informed amounted to be¬ tween two and three millions.” Lat. 25. 32., Long. 84. 3. BUXTON, a market-town and fashionable watering-place of Derbyshire, in the parish of Bakewell, and hundred of High Peak, 31 miles N.W. of Derby, and 160 miles from London. It is’situated in a deep valley surrounded by hills of con¬ siderable elevation, except on the side where the Wye, which rises near this, has its exit. It consist of an old and new town, the former more elevated than the latter, and con¬ sisting of one wide street with some good inns and lodg¬ ing-houses ; but most of the buildings are low and mean. In the centre of the market-place is an old cross. 1 he new town is much more elegant, and contains many hand¬ some buildings. Among these is the crescent, a noble range of buildings in the Grecian style, erected by the late Duke of Devonshire in 1779-86, at a cost of L.120,000, and containing hotels, ball-room, lodging-houses, bank, library, arcade, promenade, and an extensive range of stables with riding gallery behind. At the west end of the crescent is the old hall, built by the Earl of Shrewsbury in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, once the residence of Mary Queen of Scots. The church is a handsome edifice, built in 1812 by the Duke of Devonshire. There are numerous public and private baths. The springs, which were known to the Romans, are inclosed in a small Grecian building, and supply hot and cold water within a few inches of each other. They are saline, sulphurous, and charged with nitrogen, and flow at the rate of 60 gallons a minute. They are found useful in cutaneous and nervous complaints, in¬ digestion, gout, and rheumatism. Besides these there is a chalybeate spring behind the crescent, the water of which when mixed with that of the other springs, proves purga¬ tive. The “ Bath Charity,” supported by subscription, is for the maintenance for one month of poor invalids who may require to use the waters. The season extends from June to October, and from 12,000 to 14,000 visitors arrive annually. The public walks are numerous and tastefully laid out. In the vicinity are Pool’s Hole (a vast stalac- titic cavern), and the Diamond Hill, so called from the pro¬ fusion of crystals dispersed through the soil. Pop. (1851) 1235, mostly engaged in the manufacture of alabaster, spar, and other ornaments, and in lime-burning. Buxton, Jedediah, a prodigy of skill in numbeis, was born in 1704, at Elmton, near Chesterfield, in Derbyshire. Although his father was schoolmaster of the parish, and his grandfather had been the vicar, his education had been so neglected that he could not write; and with respect to any other knowledge but that of numbers, he seemed always as ignorant as a child. How he came first to know the relative proportions of numbers, and their progiessive denominations, he did not remember ; but on such matters, his attention was so constantly rivetted, that he frequently took no cognizance of external objects, and when he did, it was only with reference to their numbers. If any space of time was mentioned, he would soon afterwards reduce it to minutes ; and if any distance, he would assign the number of hair-breadths, without any question being asked or any calculation expected by the company. He worked out every question after his own method, without any external aid, or even understanding the common rules of arithmetic as taught in the schools. He would stride over a piece of land or a field, and tell the contents of it almost as exactly Byng. B Y N as if it had been measured by the chain. In this manner Buxtorf he measured the whole lordship of Elmton, consisting o some thousand acres, and gave the contents not only in acres, roods, and perches, but even in square inches. After this, for his own amusement, he reduced them into square hair¬ breadths, computing forty-eight to each side of the inch. His memory was so great, that in resolving a question he could leave off and resume the operation again at the same point after the elapse of a week, or even of several months. His perpetual application to figures prevented the smallest acquisition of any other knowledge. On his return fiom church, it never appeared that he had brought away one sentence, his mind, having been busied in his favourite occupation. His wonderful faculty was tested in 1/54 by the Royal Society of London, who acknowledged their satisfaction by presenting him with a handsome^ gratuity. In this visit to the metropolis, the great object of his curi¬ osity was to see the king and royal family but in this he was disappointed by their recent removal to Kensington. He was taken to see the tragedy of Richard III. performed at Drury Lane theatre; but his mind was solely employed in his usual occupation. He attended to Garrick only to count the words he uttered. During the dance, he fixed his attention upon the number of steps; and he declared that the innumerable sounds produced by the musical in¬ struments had perplexed him beyond measure. Jedediah returned to the place of his birth, where he died about the age of seventy. BUXTORF, John, a famous Hebrew scholar, was born at Camen in Westphalia, Dec. 25, 1564. He became pro¬ fessor of the Hebrew and Chaldee languages at Basle, where he was settled as a Calvinist minister. He died of the plague, Sept. 13, 1629. His principal works are, a small but excellent Hebrew Grammar, the best edition of which is that of Leyden, 1701, revised by Leusden ; A treasure of the Hebrew Grammar; A Hebrew Concordance ; several Hebrew Lexicons ; Institulio epistolaris Hebraica ; De Abbreviaturis Hebrceorum, See. Buxtorf, John, the son of the preceding, and a learned professor of the oriental languages at Basle, distinguished himself, like his father, by his knowledge of the Hebrew language, and his rabbinical learning. He died at Basle in 1664, aged sixty-five. His principal works are, his trans¬ lation of the More Nevochitn of Maimonides, and the Liber Cosri; A Chaldee and Syriac Lexicon ; An Anti-critique against Capellus; A treatise on the Hebrew Points and Accents, also against Capellus. See Capellus. BUYING, the act of making a purchase, or of acquiring the property of a thing for a certain price. Buying the Refusal is giving money for the right of pur¬ chasing at a fixed price at a stated time ; chiefly used in dealing for shares in stock. This is sometimes called by the cant phrase of buying the bear. BUZOT, a town of the province of Valencia, in Spain, about ten miles from Alicant, in a most romantic situation. It is celebrated for its warm baths, and for the kermes col¬ lected from the quercus coccifera. BUZZARD. See Ornithology, Index. BYNG, George, Lord Viscount Torrington, a distin¬ guished English admiral, was born in 1663. At the^age of fifteen he went to sea as a volunteer with the king s war¬ rant. After being several times advanced, he was in 1 / 02 raised to the command of the Nassau, a third rate, and wras at the taking and burning of the French fleet at Vigo ; and the next year he was made rear-admiral of the red. In 1704 he served in the grand fleet sent to the Mediterranean under Sir Cloudsley Shovel as rear-admiral of the red ; and reduced Gibraltar. He was in the battle of Malaga, which followed soon afterwards ; and for his gallantry jn that ac¬ tion received the honour of knighthood. In 1718 he was made admiral and commander-in-chief of the fleet, and w as B Y R B Y R 37 Bynker- sent with a squadron into the Mediterranean for the protec- shoek tion of Italy. This commission he executed so well, that II the king made him a handsome present, and sent him full ^1'on' y powers to negotiate with the princes and states of Italy, as there should be occasion. He procured the emperor’s troops free access into the fortresses which still held out in Sicily, sailed afterwards to Malta, and brought out the Sicilian galleys, and a ship belonging to the Turkey com¬ pany. Soon afterwards he received an autograph letter from the Emperor Charles VI., accompanied with his por¬ trait, set round with large diamonds, as a mark of his grate¬ ful sense of his services. It was entirely owing to his ad¬ vice and assistance that the Germans retook the city of Messina in 1719, and destroyed the ships which lay in the basin ; an achievement which completed the ruin of the naval power of Spain. The Spaniards being much dis¬ tressed, offered to quit Sicily ; but the admiral declared that the troops should never be suffered to depart from the island till the king of Spain had acceded to the quadruple alliance. And to his conduct it was entirely owing that Sicily was subdued, and his Catholic Majesty forced to ac¬ cept the terms prescribed him by the quadruple alliance. After performing so many signal services, he was received by the king with the most gracious expressions of favour and satisfaction ; and made rear-admiral of England and treasurer of the navy, a member of the privy-council, Baron Byng of Southill, in the county of Bedford, Viscount Tor- rington in Devonshire, and one of the knights companions of the bath upon the revival of that order. In 1727 George II., on his accession to the crown, placed him at the head of naval affairs, as first lord of the admiralty. He died January 15, 1733, in the seventieth year of his age, and was buried at Southill, in Bedfordshire. For the trial and judicial murder of his son, the Hon. John Byng, see Britain. BYNKERSHOEK, Cornelius van, a distinguished Dutch jurist, was born at Middleburg in Zealand, in 1673. In the prosecution of his legal studies he found the common law of his country so defective, as to be nearly useless for practical purposes. This abuse he resolved to reform, and took as the basis of a new system the principles of the an¬ cient Roman law. His works are very voluminous. Of these the most important are the Observation.es Juris Romani, published in 1710, of which a continuation in four books appeared in 1733 ; his treatise De Dominio Maris, pub¬ lished in 1721 ; and his Qucestiones Juris Publici, pub¬ lished in 1737. Complete editions of his works were pub¬ lished after his death ; one in folio at Geneva in 1761, and another in two volumes folio at Leyden in 1766. BYROM, John, an ingenious poet born at Kersall, near Manchester in 1691, and educated at Trinity College, Cambridge. His first poetical essay appeared in the Spec¬ tator, No. 603, beginning, “ My time, O ye Muses, was happily spentwhich, with two humorous letters on dreams, are to be found in the eighth volume. He was elected a member of the Royal Society in 1723 ; and having originally entertained thoughts of practising physic, he used to be styled doctor by his friends, though he had never obtained a diploma. Having reduced himself to narrow circum¬ stances by a precipitate marriage, he supported himself by teaching a new method of writing short-hand, of his own invention, until an estate devolved to him by the death of an elder brother. He was a man of lively wit; of which, whenever a favourable opportunity tempted him to indulge it, he gave many specimens. He died in 1763 ; and a col¬ lection of his miscellaneous poems was printed at Man¬ chester, in two vols. 8vo, 1773, and reprinted at Leeds in 1814, with a Life of Byrom by an anonymous writer. BYRON, Lord George Gordon, the only son of Cap¬ tain Byron, and Catharine, sole child and heiress of George Gordon, Esq. of Gight, in Scotland, was born on the 22d January 1788, in Holies Street, London. His father, a Byron, man of dissolute and extravagant habits, died in 1791, at Valenciennes, leaving his widow, who was then residing at Aberdeen, to support herself and her son on a pittance of L.135 per annum. In 1794 his cousin, the grandson of the fifth Lord Byron, died in Corsica, and he became the presumptive heir to the peerage. The fifth Lord Byron died in 1798, and he succeeded to the title; and in the autumn of that year removed with his mother from Aber¬ deen to Newstead Abbey, in Nottinghamshire, which since the reign of Henry VIII. had been in the possession of the ancient family of Byron. Lord Byron had received the first rudiments of education at a grammar-school in Aberdeen. He was next sent in 1799 to the school of Dr Glennie at Dulwich, and in 1801 to Harrow, which he quitted in 1805. He is described by the head master of the latter school, the Rev. Dr Drury, as sensitive in dispo¬ sition, intractable except by gentle means, shy, defectively educated, and ill prepared for a public school; but exhi¬ biting the germs of considerable talent, though it does not appear to have been then foreseen in what mode his ta¬ lents would display themselves. He excelled in declama¬ tion ; and oratory, rather than poetry, was thought to be the prevailing bent of his genius. He seems to have been an active and spirited boy, at first unpopular, but finally a favourite; ardent in his school friendships, and jealous of the attachment of those whom he preferred. Among these the most learned were Lords Clare and Delawarr, the Duke of Dorset, Mr Harness, and Mr Wingfield. He was on friendly but less intimate terms with the most distinguished of his school-fellows, the late Sir Robert Peel. In classical scholarship Lord Byron acknowledged himself very inferior to Peel; but he was thought supe¬ rior to him and to most others in general information. This was indeed extensive to a very unusual degree; and he has left on record an almost incredible list of works, in many various departments of literature, which he had read before the age of fifteen. In October 1805 he was removed to Trinity College, Cambridge. He slighted the university, neglected its studies, and rebelled against its authority. Meanwhile he had commenced his poetical career, but at first feebly and with faint promise of future excellence. He first at¬ tempted poetry as early as 1800, under the inspiration of a boyish attachment to his young cousin, a daughter of Admiral Parker. In November 1806 he caused to be printed by Ridge, a bookseller at Norwich, for private cir¬ culation, a small volume of poems, among which one, written at the age of fifteen, is remarkable as containing a presage of his future fame. Some of the poems in this collection were of too licentious a character ; and, on the advice of Mr Becker, a gentleman to whom the first copy had been presented, it was with praiseworthy promptitude suppressed, and replaced by a purified edition. In 1807 appeared his first published work, The Hours of Idleness ; a collection of poems little worthy of his talent, and chiefly remembered through the castigation which it received from the Edinburgh Review. To this critique, which galled but did not depress him, we owe the first spirited outbreak of his talent, the satire entitled English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, which was published in March 1809. The length of this poem was increased, and many changes made in it, during its progress through the press. Cen¬ sures of individuals were turned into praises, and praises into censures, with all the fickleness and precipitance of his age and character. It contained many harsh judg¬ ments, of which he afterwards repented; and able and vigorous as the satire was, and creditable to his talents, the time soon arrived when he was laudably anxious to suppress it. A few days previous to the publication of this B Y R O N. 38 Bjron. satire, on the 17th of March 1809, he took his seat in the House of Lords. He seems on that occasion to have keenly felt the loneliness of his position. He was almost unknown to society at large; there was no peer to intro¬ duce him; and his mortification led him to receive with ungracious coldness the welcome of the lord chancellor. His unfriended situation inspired him with disgust, and chilled his incipient longing for parliamentary distinc¬ tion ; and even a few days after taking his seat he retired to Newstead Abbey, and engaged with his friend Mr (now Sir J. C.) Hobhouse to travel together on the Con¬ tinent. About the end of June the friends sailed to¬ gether from Falmouth to Lisbon; travelled through part of Portugal and the south of Spain to Gibraltar; sailed thence to Malta and afterwards to Albania, in which country they landed on the 29th of September. From this time till the middle of the spring 1811, Lord By¬ ron was engaged in visiting many parts of Greece, Tur¬ key, and Asia Minor; staying long at Athens, Constanti¬ nople, and Smyrna. He touched again, on his return, at Malta, quitted it on the 2d of June, and early in July, after two years absence, landed in England. His affairs during this period had fallen into disorder, and it became advisable to sell either Rochdale or Newstead. The lat¬ ter he was then most anxious to retain, and professed that it was his “ only tie” to England, “ and if he parted with that, he should remain abroad.” In a letter to a friend, written during his homeward voyage, he thus expresses his melancholy sense of his condition: “ Em¬ barrassed in my private affairs, indifferent to public,— solitary without the wish to be social,—with a body a little enfeebled by a succession of fevers, but a spirit I trust yet unbroken,—I am returning home without a hope, and almost without a desire.” This gloom was still deep¬ ened by numerous afflictions. His mother died on the 1st of August, without his having seen her again since his return to England; and he was deprived by death of five other relatives and friends between that and the end of August. “ In the short space of one month,” he says, “ I have lost her who gave me being, and most of those who made that being tolerable.” Amongst the latter were Wingfield, and Matthews, the brother of the author of the Diary of an Invalid. At this period of distress he was ap¬ proaching unsuspectingly a remarkable epoch of his fame. He had composed while abroad two poems very different in character, and which he regarded with strangely misplaced feelings; the one called Hints from Horace, a weak imi¬ tation of his former satire; the other the first two can¬ tos of Childe Harold. The former he intended to pub¬ lish immediately ; but the latter he thought of so disparg- ingly (owing probably to the injudicious comments of the single friend who had hitherto seen it), that it might pro¬ bably have never become known to the public but for the wise advice of Mr Dallas. In compliance with the request of that gentleman, he withheld the Hints from Horace, which would have been injurious rather than beneficial to his fame, and allowed Childe Harold to be offered for publication. He received from his publisher, Mr Murray, L.600 for the copyright, which he gave to Mr Dallas. The publication was long delayed; for though placed in the publisher’s hands in August, it did not appear till the beginning of March 1812. It, however, received during this interval considerable improvements ; and the fears of the author were allayed by the approbation of Mr Gifford, the translator of Juvenal, and then editor of the Quarterly Review. The success of the poem exceeded even the an¬ ticipation of this able critic ; and Lord Byron emerged at once from a state of loneliness and neglect, unusual for one in his sphere of life, to be the magnet and idol of society. As he tersely says in his memoranda, “ I awoke one morn¬ ing and found myself famous.” A few days before the Byron, publication of Childe Harold, he attracted attention, but in a minor degree, by his first speech in the House of Lords on the subject of the house-breaking bill. He op¬ posed it, and with ability; and his first oratorical effort was much commended by Sheridan, Sir F. Burdett, and Lords Grenville and Holland. He had prepared himself, by hav¬ ing committed the whole of this speech to writing. It was well received, and he was extremely gratified by its suc¬ cess. He might perhaps have been incited by the praises it received to seek political distinction; but the greater success which attended his poem turned his ambitious feelings into a different channel. He nevertheless spoke again about six weeks afterwards, on a motion of Lord Donoughmore, in favour of the claims of the Roman Ca¬ tholics, but less successfully than before. Less clear¬ ness was displayed in the matter of his speech, and his de¬ livery was considered as theatrical. In the autumn of this year he wrote an address at the request of the Drury- lane Committee, to be spoken at the re-opening of the theatre; and not long afterwards he became a member of that committee. The same autumn he epgaged to sell Newstead for L.140,000, of which L.60,000 was to remain in mortgage on the estate for three years ; but this pur¬ chase was never completed. In May 1813 appeared his Giaour, a wildly poetical fragment, of which the story was founded on an event that had occurred at Athens while he was there, and in which he was personally concerned. It was written rapidly, and with such additions during the course of printing as to be more than trebled in length, and swelled from about four hundred lines to upwards of fourteen hundred. On the 2d of June in this year he spoke for the last time in the House of Lords, on pre¬ senting a petition from Major Cartwright. He had now apparently ceased to regard parliamentary distinction as a primary object of ambition. In his journal of November 1813 is the following entry : “ I have declined presenting the debtors’ petition, being sick of parliamentary mummeries. I have spoken thrice, but I doubt my ever becoming an orator; my first was liked, my second and third, I don’t know whether they suc¬ ceeded or not; I have never set to it con amore.” In No¬ vember he had finished the Bride of Abydos (written in a week), and it was published the following month. The Corsair, a poem of still higher merit and popularity, ap¬ peared in less than three months afterwards: it was writ¬ ten in the astonishingly short space of ten days. During the year 1813 he appears to have first entertained a serious intention of marriage, and became a suitor to Miss Mill- banke, only daughter and heiress of Sir Ralph Millbanke. His first proposal was rejected; but the parties conti¬ nued on the footing of friendship, and maintained a cor¬ respondence, of which, and of that lady, he thus speaks, and it may be presumed with the most perfect sincerity, in his private journal: “Yesterday a very pretty letter from Annabella, which I answered. What an odd situation and friendship is ours! without one spark of love on either side, and produced by circumstances which in general lead to coldness on one side, and aversion on the other. She is a very superior woman, and very little spoiled, which is strange in an heiress—a girl of twenty—a peeress that is to be in her own right—an only child, and a savante, who has always had her own way. She is a poetess, a mathe¬ matician, a metaphysician, and yet withal very kind, ge¬ nerous, and gentle, with very little pretension: any other head would be turned with half her acquisitions and a tenth of her advantages.” In September 1814 he made a second proposal by letter, which was accepted; and on the 2d of January 1815 he was married to Miss Millbanke, at Seaham, the country seat of her father. The only is- B Y R O N. Byron, sue of this marriage, Augusta Ada, was born on the 10th wof December of that year. We cannot lift the veil of their domestic life; we can only state the unfortunate results. On the 15th of January 1816, Lady Byron left London for Kirkby Mallory, the residence of her parents, whither Lord Byron was to follow her. She had, with the con- cuirence of some of Lord Byrons relatives, previously consulted Dr Baillie respecting the supposed insanity of her husband, and by the advice of that gentleman had written to him in a kind and soothing tone. Lady Byron s impressions of the insanity of Lord Byron were soon removed, but were followed by a resolution on her part to obtain a separation. Conformably with this reso¬ lution, Sir Ralph Millbanke wrote to Lord Byron on the 2d of hebruary, proposing such a measure. This proposal Lord Byron at first rejected, but afterwards consented to sign a deed to that effect. Dr Lushington, the legal ad¬ viser of Lady Byron, has stated in a published letter, that he “ considered reconciliation impossible.” Of the cir¬ cumstances which led to such an event, and on which Dr Lushington founded such an opinion, the public is at pre¬ sent uninformed. We are therefore, in absence of full and satisfactory evidence, bound to suspend our judgment on the merits of this melancholy case, and dismiss it with the foregoing statement of the leading facts. In the course of the spring he published the Siege of Corinth and Parisina. He also wrote two copies of verses, which ap¬ peared in the public papers, Fare thee well, and A Sketch from Private Life ; of which his separation from his wife, and the instrumentality which he imputes to an humble in¬ dividual in conducing to that separation, were the themes. This private circumstance had become the subject of general comment. The majority of those who filled the circles in which Lord Byron had lately lived declared against him, and society withdrew its countenance. Lord Byron, deeply stung by its verdict, hastily resolved to leave the country; and on the 25th of April 1816 he quitted England for the last time. His course was through Flan¬ ders and along the Rhine to Switzerland, where, at a villa called Deodati, in the neighbourhood of Geneva, he resid¬ ed during the summer. From thence he made two excur¬ sions, one in the central part of Switzerland, in company with Mr Hobhouse, and another shorter excursion with a celebrated poetical compeer Mr Shelley, with whom he became acquainted soon after his arrival at Geneva. He remained in Switzerland till October, during which time he had composed some of his most powerful works; the third canto of Childe Harold, the Prisoner of Chilian, Dark¬ ness, the Dream, part of Manfred, and a few minor poems. In October he quitted Switzerland in company with Mr Hobhouse, and proceeded by Milan and Verona to Ve¬ nice. Here he resided from the middle of November 1816 to the middle of April 1817. During this period his principal literary occupation was the completion of Manfred, of which he re-wrote the third act. He visit¬ ed Rome for about a month in the spring, and then re¬ turned to Venice, at which city, or at La Mira, in its im¬ mediate vicinity, he resided almost uninterruptedly from this time till 1819. He wrote during this period the La¬ ment of Tasso, Beppo, the fourth canto of Childe Harold, Marino Faliero, the Foscari, Mazeppa, and part of Don Juan. The licentious character of his life while at Venice corresponded but too well with the tone of that produc¬ tion. His able biographer and friend Mr Moore, after ad¬ verting to his liaison with a married Italian woman, says : “ Highly censurable in point of morality and decorum as was his course of life while under the roof of Madame * * it was (with pain I am forced to confess) venial in comparison with the strange headlong career of license to which, when weaned from that connection, he so unre- 39 strainedly, and, it may be added, defyingly, abandoned him- Byron, self.” This course of unbridled libertinism received its first check from the growth of attachment which, as it was still unhallowed, not even the good which it may seem to have done in the substitution of a purer sentiment, will enable us to regard with satisfaction. In April 1819 he first became acquainted with the Countess Guiccioli, the young and newly-married wife of an elderly Italian noble- A mutual attachment, which appears to have com¬ menced on the part of the lady, soon arose between Lord Byron and the Countess Guiccioli. Their passion was aug¬ mented by occasional separation, the interest excited by her severe illness during one of their forced absences, and the imprudent complaisance of the husband in leaving them much in the society of each other. They long lived to¬ gether in a half-permitted state of intimacy, the lady ap¬ pearing with the consent of her husband to share his pro¬ tection with that of Lord Byron. But this equivocal po¬ sition soon terminated in the separation of the Count and Countess Guiccioli. I he lady then went to reside with her father; and under his sanction, during the next three or four years, she and Lord Byron enjoyed the intimate possession of each other’s society. In December 1819 Lord Byron quitted Venice for Ravenna, where he re¬ mained till the end of October 1821. During this period he wrote part of Don Juan, the Prophecy of Dante, Sar- danapalus, a translation of the first canto of Pulcis Mor- gante Maggiore, and the mysteries, Heaven and Earth, and Cain; thelatter of which may bejustlyconsideredasamong the most faulty in principle, and powerful in execution, of the productions of his genius. He also wrote a letter on Mr Bowles’s strictures on Pope, dated 7th February 1821, in which he defends the poet against his commentator; and an answer to an article in Blackwood’s Magazine, en¬ titled “ Remarks on Don Juan,” but this was never pub¬ lished. During this period an insurrectionary spirit broke out in Italy ; the Carbonari appeared ; and secret societies began to be formed. The brother of the Countess Guiccioli, Count Pietro Gamba, espoused the cause of the insur¬ gents, and through his means Lord Byron became impli¬ cated in the proceedings of that party. In his private journal of 16th February 1821, Lord Byron complains of the conduct of that gentleman and others, in sending to his house, without apprising him, arms with which he had a short time previously furnished them at their request, and thereby endangering his safety, and exposing him to the vengeance of the government, which had lately issued a severe ordinance against all persons having arms concealed. In July 1821, the father and brother of Ma¬ dame Guiccioli were ordered to quit Ravenna, and re¬ paired with that lady, first to Florence, and afterwards to Pisa, where they were joined in October by Lord By¬ ron. He remained at Pisa till September 1822, Madame Guiccioli still living with him under the sanction of her father, who, in consequence of one of the conditions of her separation from her husband, was always to reside with her under the same roof. While here he lost his il¬ legitimate daughter Allegra, and his friend Shelley, who was drowned in July 1822 in the Bay of Spezia. The body was burned, and Lord Byron assisted at this singular rite. His principal associates during this time had been theGambas, Shelley, Captain IVledwyn, and MrTrelawney. He had also become associated with the brothers John and Leigh Hunt, in a periodical paper called the Liberal; a transaction certainly disinterested, inasmuch as it does not appear that he expected either profit or fame to accrue to himself from the undertaking; and beseems to have allowed his name to be connected with it from a desire to serve the Hunts, of whom Leigh Hunt, with his wife and family,. 40 BYRON. Byron, received an asylum in his house. An affray with a ser- jeant-major at Pisa rendered his residence in that city less agreeable; and his removal from it was at length de¬ termined by an order from the luscan government to the Gambas to quit the territory. Accordingly, in September 18-22, he removed with them to Genoa. While at Pisa he had written, besides his contributions to the Liberal, Werner, the Deformed Transformed, and the remainder of Don Juan. In April 1823 he commenced a correspondence with the Greek committee, through Messrs Blaquiere and Bow¬ ring, and began to interest himself warmly in the cause of die Greeks. In May he decided to go to Greece; and in July he sailed from Genoa in an English brig, taking with him Count Gamba, Mr Trelawney, Dr Burns, an Italian physician, and eight domestics; five horses, arms, ammunition, and medicine. The money which he had raised for this expedition was 50,000 crowns; 10,000 in specie, and the rest in bills of exchange. In August he arrived at Argostoli, the chief port ot Cephalonia, in which island he established his residence till the end of Decem¬ ber. His first feelings of exaggerated enthusiasm appear to have been soon cooled. Even as early as October he uses, in letters to Madame Guiccioli, such expressions as, “ I was a fool to come hereand, “ of the Greeks I can’t say much good hitherto; and I do not like to speak ill of them, though they do of one another.” During the latter part of this year we find him endeavouring to com¬ pose the dissensions of the Greeks among themselves, and^ assisting them with a loan of L.4000. About the end ot December 1823 he sailed from Argostoli in a Greek mistico, and after narrowly escaping capture by a Turkish frigate, landed on the 5th of January 1824 at Missolonghi. His reception here was enthusiastic. The whole population came out to welcome him ; salutes were fired ; and he was met and conducted into the town by Prince Mavrocor- dato, and all the troops and dignitaries of the place. But the disorganization which reigned in this town soon de¬ pressed his spirits, which had been raised by this reception, and filled his mind with reasonable misgivings of the suc¬ cess of the Greek cause. Nevertheless his resolution did not seem to fail, nor did he relax in his devotion to that cause, and in his efforts to advance it. About the end of January 1824 he received his commission from the Greek government as commander of the expedition against Le- panto, with full powers both civil and military. He was to be assisted by a military council, with Bozzari at its head. Great difficulties attended the arrangement of this expe¬ dition, arising principally from the dissensions and jea¬ lousies of the native leaders, and the mutinous spirit of the Suliote troops; with which latter, on the 14th of Fe¬ bruary, Lord Byron came to a rupture, in consequence of their demand, that about a third part of their number should be raised from common soldiers to the rank of officers. Lord Byron was firm, and they submitted on the following day. Difficulties in the civil department harass¬ ed him at the same time, aggravated by a difference of opinion between himself and Colonel Stanhope, on the subject of a free press, which the latter was anxious to introduce, and for which, on the other hand, Lord Byron considered that Greece was not yet ripe. On the 15th of February, the day of the professed submission of the Suliotes, he was seized with a convulsive fit, and for many days was seriously ill. While he was on a sick bed, the mutinous Suliotes burst into his room, demanding what they called their rights; and though his firmness then controlled them, it soon afterwards became necessary to get rid of these lawless soldiers, by the bribe of a month’s pay in advance,—and with their dismissal vanished the hopes of the expedition against Lepanto. After this he turned his mind chiefly to the fortification of Missolonghi, Byron, the formation of a brigade, and the composition of the dif- ferences among the Greek chieftains. Since his attack in February he had never been entirely well. Early in April he caught a severe cold through exposure to rain. His fe¬ ver increased, and in consequence of his prejudice against bleeding, that remedy was delayed till it was too late to be effectual. On the 17th (the second day after he had been bled) appearances of inflammation in the brain presented themselves. The following day he became insensible, and about twenty-four hours afterwards, at a quarter past six in the evening of the 19th of April 1824, Lord Byron breathed his last. Public honours were decreed to his memory by the authorities of Greece, where his loss was deeply lamented. The body was conveyed to England, and on the 16th of July was deposited in the family vault, in the parish church of Hucknell, near Newstead, in the county of Notts. By his will, dated 29th July 1815, Lord Byron bequeathed to his half-sister, Mrs Leigh, during her life, and after her death to her children, the monies arising from the sale of all such property, real and perso¬ nal, as was not settled upon Lady Byron and his issue by her. The executors were Mr Hobhouse, and Mr Han¬ son, Lord Byron’s solicitor. The personal appearance of Lord Byron was preposses¬ sing. His height was five feet eight and a half inches ; his head small; his complexion pale ; hair dark brown and curly; forehead high; features regular and good, and somewhat Grecian; eyes light grey, but capable of much expression. He was lame in the right foot, owing, it was said, to an accident at his birth ; which circumstance seems always to have been to him a source of deep mortification, little warranted by its real importance. It did not prevent him from being active in his habits, and excelling in various manly exercises. He was a very good swimmer; success¬ fully crossed the Hellespont in emulation of Leander; swam across the Tagus, a still greater feat; and, greatest of all, at Venice in 1818, from Lido to the opposite end of the grand canal, having been four hours and twenty minutes in the water without touching ground. In his younger days he was fond of sparring; and pistol-shooting, in which he excelled, was his favourite diversion while in Italy. In riding, for which he professed fondness, he did not equal¬ ly excel. He wras nervous both on horseback and in a carriage, though his conduct in Greece, and at other times, proved his unquestionable courage on great occasions. He had always a fondness for animals, and seemed to have preferred those which were of a ferocious kind. A bear, a wolf, and sundry bull-dogs, were at various times among his pets. The habits of his youth, after the period of boy¬ hood, were not literary and intellectual; nor were his amusements of a refined or poetical character. He was always shy, and fond of solitude ; but when in society, lively and animated, gentle, playful, and attractive in manner; and he possessed the power of quickly conciliating the friend¬ ship of those with whom he associated. He was very sus¬ ceptible of attachment to women. The objects of his strongest passions appear to have been Miss Chawortb, afterwards Mrs Musters, and tbe Countess Guiccioli. His amours were numerous, and there was in his character a too evident proneness to libertinism. His constitution does not seem ever to have been strong, and his health was probably impaired by his modes of life. He was abste¬ mious in eating, sometimes touching neither meat nor fish. Sometimes also he abstained entirely from wine or spirits, which at other times he drank to excess, seldom preserving a wholesome moderation and regularity of system. His temper was irascible, yet placable. He was quickly alive to tender and generous emotions, and performed many acts of disinterested liberality, even to- BYRON. 41 Byron, wards those whom he could not esteem, and in spite of par- simonious feelings, which latterly gained hold upon him. He was a man of a morbid acuteness of feeling, arising partly from original temperament, and partly from circum¬ stances and habits. He had been ill educated; he had been severely tried ; his early attachments, and his first literary efforts, had equally been unfortunate; he had encountered the extremes of neglect and admiration ; pe¬ cuniary distresses, domestic afflictions, and the unnerv¬ ing tendency of dissipated habits, had all conspired to aggravate the waywardness of his excitable disposition. It is evident that, in spite of his assumed indifference, he was always keenly alive to the applause and censure of the world; and its capricious treatment of him more than ordinarily encouraged that vanity and egotism which were conspicuous traits of his character. The religious opinions of Lord Byron appear, by his own account of them, to have been “ unfixedbut he ex¬ pressly disclaimed being one of those infidels who deny the Scriptures, and wish to remain “ in unbelief.” In politics he was liberal, but his opinions were much influenced by his feelings; and, though professedly a lover of free insti¬ tutions, he could not withhold his admiration even from tyranny when his imagination was wrought upon by its grandeur. He would not view Napoleon as the enslaver of France; he viewed him only as the most extraordinary being of his age, and he sincerely deplored his fall. Lord Byron’s prose compositions were so inconsiderable that they may almost be overlooked in the view of his lite¬ rary character. His letters nevertheless must not pass wholly unnoticed. Careless as they are, and hastily writ¬ ten, they are among the most lively, spirited, and pointed specimens of epistolary writing in our language, and would alone suffice to indicate the possession of superior talent. The critical theories of Lord Byron were remarkably at variance with his practice. The most brilliant supporter of a new school of poetry, he was the professed admirer of a school that was superseded. The most powerful and original poet of the nineteenth century, he was a timid critic of the eighteenth. In theory he preferred polish to originality or vigour. He evidently thought Pope the first of our poets ; he defended the unities ; praised Shak- speare grudgingly ; saw little merit in Spencer ; preferred his own Hints from Horace to his Childe Harold’s Pilgrim¬ age ; and assigned his eminent contemporaries Coleridge and Wordsworth a place far inferior to that which public opinion has more justly accorded to them. The poetry of Lord Byron produced an immediate ef¬ fect unparalleled in our literary annals. Of this influence much may be attributed, not only to the real power of his poetry, but also to the impressive identification of its prin¬ cipal characteristics with that which, whether truly or falsely, the world chose to regard as the character of the author. He seemed to have unbosomed himself to the public, and admitted them to view the full intensity of feelings which had never before been poured forth with such eloquent directness. His poems were as tales of the confessional, portraitures of real passion, not tamely feigned, but fresh and glowing from the breast of the writer. The emotions which he excelled in displaying were those of the most stormy character,—hate, scorn, rage, despair, indomitable pride, andthedark spirit of mis¬ anthropy. It was a narrow circle, but in that he stood without a rival. His descriptive powers were eminently great. His works abound in splendid examples; among which the Venetian night-scene from Lioni’s balcony, Terni, the Coliseum viewed by moonlight, and the shipwreck in Don Juan, will probably rise foremost in the memories of many readers. In description he was never too minute. ^ OL. VI. He selected happily, and sketched freely, rapidly, and Byron, boldly. He seized the most salient images, and brought them directly and forcibly to the eye at once. There was, however, in his descriptive talent, the same absence of versatility and variety which characterized other depart¬ ments of his genius. His writings do not reflect nature in all its infinite change of climate, scenery, and season. He portrayed with surpassing truth and force only such objects as were adapted to the sombre colouring of his pencil. The mountain, the cataract, the glacier, the ruin,— objects inspiring awe and melancholy,—seemed more con¬ genial to his poetical disposition than those which led to joy or gratitude. His genius was not dramatic , vigorously as he por¬ trayed emotions, he was not successful in drawing cha¬ racters ; he was not master of variety ; all his most pro¬ minent personages are strictly resolvable into one. There were diversities, but they were diversities of age, clime, and circumstances, not of character. They were mere¬ ly such as would have appeared in the same individual when placed in different situations. Even the lively and the serious moods belonged alike to that one being; but there was a bitter recklessness in the mirth of his lively personages, which seems only the temporary re¬ laxation of that proud misanthropic gloom that is exhi¬ bited in his serious heroes ; and each might easily become the other. It may also be objected to many of his per¬ sonages, that, if tried by the standard of nature, they were essentially false. They were sublime monstrosities;— strange combinations of virtue and vice, such as had never really existed. In his representations of corsairs and re¬ negades, he exaggerates the good feelings which may, by a faint possibility, belong to such characters, and sup¬ presses the brutality and faithlessness which would more probably be found in them, and from which it is not pos¬ sible that they should have been wholly exempt. His plan was highly conducive to poetical effect; but its in¬ correctness must not be overlooked in an estimate of his delineation of human character. In his tragedies there is much vigour; but their finest passages are either solilo¬ quies or descriptions, and their highest beauties aire sel¬ dom strictly of a dramatic nature. Many of his dialogues are scarcely more than interrupted soliloquies; many of his arguments such as one mind would hold with itself. In fact, in his characters, there was seldom that degree of variety and contrast which is requisite for dramatic effect. The opposition was rather that of situation than of senti¬ ment ; and we feel that the interlocutors, if transposed, might still have uttered the same things. It is to be deplored that scarcely any moral good is derivable from the splendid poetry of Lord Byron. The tendency of his works is to shake our confidence in virtue, and to diminish our abhorrence of vice ;—to palliate crime, and to unsettle our notions of right and wrong. Even many of the virtuous sentiments which occur in his writ¬ ings are assigned to characters so worthless, or placed in such close juxtaposition with vicious sentiments, as to induce a belief that there exists no real definable bound¬ ary ; and it may perhaps be said with truth, tljat it would have been better for the cause of morality, if even those virtuous sentiments had been omitted. Our sympathy is frequently solicited in the behalf of crime. Alp, Conrad, Juan, Parisina, Hugo, Lara, and Manfred, may be cited as examples. They are all interesting and vicious. In the powerful drama of Cain, the heroes are Lucifer and the first murderer; and the former is depicted, not like the Satan of Milton, who believes and trembles, but as the compassionate friend of mankind. Resistance to the will of the Creator is represented as dignified and com¬ mendable ; obedience and faith as mean, slavish, and con- 42 B Y Z Byron temptible. It is implied that it was unmerciful to have II _ created us such as we are, and that we owe the Supreme Byzantine. Bejng neither gratitude nor duty. Such sentiments are clearly deducihle from this drama. Whether they were those of Lord Byron is not certain; but he must be held accountable for their promulgation. (t. h. L.) Byron, Hon. John, the British admiral and circumnavi¬ gator, second son of the fourth Lord Byron, and grandfather of the poet, was born November 8th, 1723. He began his naval career in the eighth year of his age, and while still very young accompanied Anson in his voyage of discovery round the world. The dreadful hardships that he endured on this voyage he has recorded in his narrative. It is of him that Campbell says in the Pleasures of Hope— “ ’Twas his to mourn misfortune’s rudest shock, Scourged by the winds and cradled on the rock; To wake each joyless morn, and search again The famish’d haunts of solitary men,” &c. On his return home he was raised to the rank of commander, and soon after to that of post-captain. During many suc¬ cessive years he saw a great deal of hard service, and so constantly had he to contend on his various expeditions with adverse gales and dangerous storms, that he was aptly nick¬ named by the sailors “ Foul-weather Jack.” In 1769 he was appointed governor of Newfoundland. In 1775 he at¬ tained his flag rank, and in the following year became a vice-admiral. In 1778 he was despatched with a fleet to watch the movements of the Count d’Estaing, who was set¬ ting out from France with an armament to assist the Ame¬ ricans. With this commander, in the July of the following year, he fought an indecisive engagement off Grenada. He shortly after returned to England, and retired into private life. Fie died on the 10th of April 1786. BYSSUS, or Byssum, in Antiquity, & fine thready cloth produced in India, Egypt, and the vicinity of Elis, of which the richest apparel was made, especially that worn by the Jewish and Egyptian priests. Some interpreters render the Greek /Svaaos, which occurs both in the Old and New Testament, by fine linen. But other versions, as Calvin’s, and the Spanish one printed at Venice in 1556, explain the word by silk. M. Simon, who renders the word by fine linen, adds a note to explain it, bearing “ that there was a fine kind of linen, very dear, which great lords alone wore in this country as well as in Egyptan account which agrees perfectly well with that given by Pliny and by Hesychius, as well as with the observation of Bochart, that the byssus was a finer kind of linen, which was frequently dyed of a crimson or purple colour. Some authors suppose byssus to have been cotton; some the linum ashestinum; while others conceive it to have been the bunch of silky hair found adhering to the pinna marina, by which the lat¬ ter attaches itself to neighbouring bodies. There were two sorts of byssus ; that of Elis, and that of Judaea, which was the finest. Bonfrerius remarks, that there must have been two sorts of byssus, one finer than ordinary, inasmuch as there are two Hebrew words used in Scripture to denote byssus; one of which is always used in speaking of the habit of the priests, and the other in alluding to that of the Levites. (See Yates, Textrinum Antiquorum, p. 267, &c.) BYZANTINE Historians, a series of Greek writers who have given an account of the Eastern or Byzantine empire from the time of Constantine, a.d. 325, to the con¬ quest of Constantinople by the Turks, a.d. 1453. They may be divided into four classes. 1st, Those whose works form a continuous history of the Byzantine empire during the above mentioned period. The works of these authors, who are nearly thirty in number, constitute the chief autho¬ rity for the history of that eventful period. 2d, The chronographers, a very numerous class, who have given a brief chronological summary of universal history from the Creation down to their own times. 3d, The writers who B Y Z have treated of particular portions of Byzantine history. 4th, Byzan* Those who have written on the politics, statistics, manners, tium. antiquities, &c., of the empire. A collection of the Byzan- tine writers was published at Paris by order of Louis XIV., in 36 vols. fob, 1645-1711. This edition was reprinted with additions at Venice, 1727-1733. Besides these, many of the Byzantine historians were published separately at different places. A new edition of the whole was com¬ menced by Niebuhr, Bonn, 1828, 8vo, under the title of Corpus Scriptorum Historice Byzantince, editio emendatior et copiosior, of which many volumes have already appeared. This important work is still (1853) in course of publication. BYZANTIUM, an ancient Greek city on the shores of the Bosporus, which occupied the most easterly of the seven hills on which the modern Constantinople has been built. It is said to have been founded by a band of Megarians B.c. 667, but the original settlement having been destroyed in the reign of Darius Hystaspes by tbe Satrap Otanes, it was re¬ colonized by Pausanias, who wrested it from the hands of the Medes after the battle of Plataea—a circumstance which has led several ancient chroniclers to ascribe its foundation to him. The advantages of its situation as a place of com¬ merce, which are said to have been pointed out to the Me¬ garians by the oracle of Apollo—in the same way that its boundaries were afterwards revealed to Constantine by an invisible guide—quickly gave it pre-eminence over the other Dorian colonies on the coast. Its position on the Bosporus gave it complete control of the extensive corn-trade carried on by the merchants of the west with the northern shores of the Euxine, the absence of tides and the depth of its har¬ bour rendered its quays accessible to vessels of large burden without the intervention of boats, while the pelamys and other fisheries at the mouth of the Lycus were so lucrative as to procure for the deeply curved bay into which that river fell the appellation of the Golden Horn. The greatest hindrance to its continued prosperity consisted in the miscellaneous character of the population, partly Lacedaemonians and partly Athenians, who flocked to it under Pausanias. From this circumstance it was the subject of dispute between both the states, and alternately in the possession of each, till it achieved its independence of both only to fall into the hands of the Macedonians ; and from the same cause arose the vio¬ lent contests of its intestine factions, which ended in the esta¬ blishment of a rude and turbulent democracy. About seven years after its second colonization, Cimon wrested it from the hands of the Lacedaemonians; but it soon after revolted, and returned to its former allegiance. Alcibiades, after a severe blockade (b.c. 408) gained possession of the city through the treachery of the Athenian party; and it con¬ tinued an ally of Athens until B.c. 405, when it was retaken by Lysander after the battle of Aigos-potamoi. It was under the Lacedaemonian power when the Ten Thousand were quartered in it after the retreat; when exasperated by the conduct of the governor, they mutinied and made them¬ selves masters of the city, and would have pillaged it had they not been repressed by the firmness and promptitude of Xenophon. In B.c. 390 Thrasybulus, with the assistance of Heracleides and Archebius, succeeded in expelling the Lacedaemonian oligarchy, and in restoring the Athenian in¬ terest both in Byzantium and Chalcedon. By his influence also the government was changed into a democracy; and under the new constitution, as under the former oligarchy, the native Bithynians, into whose territories the colonists of Byzantium and Chalcedon had for half a century been making joint inroads, suffered the degradation and misery of Helots. After having withstood an attempt under Epa- minondas to restore it to the Lacedaemonians, Byzantium joined with Rhodes, Chios, Cos, and Mausolus King of Caria, in throwing off the Athenian yoke, but soon returned to its allegiance when besieged by Philip of Macedon, after he had overrun Thrace. The succours which were sent by 6 B Y Z Byzan- the Athenians under Chares, on their arrival suffered a iiiim. severe defeat from Amyntas, the Macedonian admiral; but in the following year they gained a decisive victory under Phocion, and compelled Philip to raise the siege. The wonderful deliverance of the besieged from a surprise, by means of a flash of light which illuminated the northern horizon and revealed the advancing masses of the Macedo¬ nian army, has rendered this siege peculiarly memorable. As a memorial of the miraculous interference the Byzantines erected an altar to Torch-bearing Hecate, and stamped a crescent on their coins as a symbol of the portent, a device which is retained by the Turks to this day. In gratitude for the Athenian succours, procured chiefly by the eloquence of Demosthenes, they granted the Athenians the right of isopolity, coupled with extraordinary privileges, and erected a monument in honour of the event in a public part of the city. During the reign of Alexander, Byzantium was com¬ pelled to acknowledge the Macedonian supremacy; and after the decay of the Macedonian power, although it regained its independence, it suffered from the repeated incursions of the Scythian hordes which overran the unprotected province. The losses wdiich they sustained by land roused the Byzan¬ tines to indemnify themselves on the vessels which still crowded the harbour, and the fleets of merchantmen which cleared the straits; but this had the effect of provoking a wrar with the neighbouring naval powers. The exchequer being drained by the payment of 10,000 pieces of gold to buy off the Gauls who had invaded their territories about the year 279 b.c., and the subsequent imposition of an annual tribute which was ultimately raised to 80 talents, they were compelled to exact a toll on all the ships which passed the Bosporus; a measure which the Rhodians resented and avenged by a war, in which, though supported by Attalus King of Pergamus, they were defeated, and obliged to sue for peace on very disadvantageous terms. The subsequent retreat of the Gauls to Asia gave Byzantium another opportunity of re¬ gaining its independence, and enabled it to render consi¬ derable services to Rome in the contests with Philip II. of Macedon, Antiochus, and Mithridates. During the first years of its alliance with Rome it held the rank of a free and confederate city; but having sought the arbitration of the capital on some of its domestic disputes, it was subjected to the imperial jurisdiction, and gradually stripped of its privi¬ leges, until reduced to the status of an ordinary Roman colony. In recollection of its former services, the Emperor Claudius remitted the heavy tribute which had been imposed on it; but the last remnant of its independence was taken away by Vespasian, who, in answer to a remonstrance from Apollonius of Tyana, taunted the inhabitants with having “ forgotten to be free.” During the civil wars, it espoused the party of Pescennius Niger; and though skilfully defended by the engineer Periscus, it was besieged and taken (a.d. 196) by Severus, who destroyed the city, demolished the famous wall built of massive stones so closely ri veted toge¬ ther as to appear one block, put the principal inhabitants to the sword, and subjected the remainder to the Perinthians. B Z 0 43 Severus, however, afterwards relented, and rebuilding a large Bzovius. portion of the town, gave it the name of Augusta Anto- nina. He ornamented the city with baths, and surrounded the hippodrome with porticoes; but it was not till the time of Caracalla that it was restored to its former political privi¬ leges. It had scarcely begun to recover its former flourish¬ ing position when, from the capricious resentment of Gallienus, the inhabitants were once more put to the sword, and the town given up to be pillaged. From this disaster the inhabitants recovered so far as to be able to give an effectual check to an invasion of the Goths in the reign of Claudius II., and its fortifications were greatly strengthened during the civil wars which followed the abdication of Dio¬ cletian. Licinius, after his defeat before Adrianople, retired to Byzantium, where he was besieged by Constantine, and compelled to surrender. To check the inroads of the bar¬ barians on the north of the Black Sea, Diocletian had re¬ solved to transfer his capital to Nicomedia; but Constantine, struck with the advantages which the situation of Byzantium presented, resolved to build a new city there on the site of the old, and transfer the seat of government to it. The design was quickly put into execution, and the new capital was inaugurated with special ceremonies, a.d. 330. See Constantinople. The ancient historians invariably note the profligacy of the inhabitants of Byzantium. They are described as an idle and depraved people, spending their time for the most part in loitering about the harbour, or carousing over the fine wine of Maronea and the neighbourhood. In war they trembled at the sound of a trumpet, in peace they quaked before the shouting of their own demagogues; and during the assault of Philip II. they could only be prevailed on to man the walls by the savour of the extempore cook-shops distributed along the ramparts. BZOVIUS or Bzowsia, Abraham, one of the most vo¬ luminous writers of the seventeenth century, was born at Prosovitz in 1567. Losing his parents in early life, he was brought up by his grandmother, who sent him to study at Cracow, where he entered the order of Dominicans. From Cracow he went to Milan, where he taught philosophy, and afterwards to Bologna, where he read lectures on theological subjects. He soon afterwards returned to Poland, and was appointed principal of a Dominican college. A man¬ date of the pope, Paul V., summoned him to Rome, where he found apartments prepared for him in the Vatican, and the office of librarian of the Virginia dei Ursini at his dis¬ posal. While living in the papal palace, he was robbed, and his attendant murdered; and he soon after retired to the convent of Minerva, and there devoted himself entirely to literature for the remainder of his days. His death took place in 1637. Though he wrote an astonishing number of books, he is now chiefly remembered for his continuation of the Annals of Baronius. This work he took up from the year 1198—where Baronius left off'. Nine volumes of it have been published; the first eight of which appeared at Co¬ logne, 1616-1641, the last at Rome in 1672. 44 v'> C 1 ' iT Vv .S-. THE third letter and second consonant of the alpha- CaLanis. } bet, is pronounced like k before the vowels a, o, and . u, and like s before e, i, and y. ■ "C is formed,1 according to Scaliger, from the k of the Greeks; by retrenching the stem or upright line ; though- others derive it from the^3 of the Hebrews, which has in effect the same form ; only, that as the Hebrews read towards the left, and the Latins and other western nations towards the right, each turned the letter their own way. v However, the C not being* the same as to sound* with the Hebrew caph, and it being certain that the Romans did;not borrow*their letters immediately from the Hebrews or other orientals, but from the Greeks, the derivation from 'the Greek k is upon the whole the more probable. Indeed Montfaucoh, in his Palceographia, gives some forms of the Greek'k which approach very near to that of our C ; and SuldaS calls the C the Roman kappa. Be¬ fore the first Pubic war’d held the place which is now oc¬ cupied by G, as appears from the Duilian Column, where we meet with acnam for agnam, lecionem for legionem, and exfociont for effugiunt. The second sound of C resembles that of the Greek 2 ; and many instances occur of ancient inscriptions in which % has the same form with our C. Grammarians are pretty generally agreed that the Romans pronounced their Q like our C, and their C like our K. Mabillon informs us that Charles the Great was the first who wrote his name with a C ; whereas all his predecessors of the same name wrote it with a K; and the same difference is observable in their coins. As an abbreviature, O-starids for Caius, Carolus, Caesar, condemno, &c., and CC repre¬ sent consulibus. As a numeral, C signifies 100, CC 200, and so on. C, in Music, placed after the cleff, intimates that the music is in common time, which is either quick or slow as it is joined with allegro or adagio ; but if alone, it is usually adagio. If the C be crossed or turned, the first re¬ quires the air to be played quick, and the last very quick. CAABA, or Kaaba, properly signifies a square stone building, but is particularly applied to the temple of Mekka, built, as the Mahommedans pi'etend, by Abraham and his son Ishmael. This temple enjoys the privilege of an asylum for all sorts of criminals; but it is most remarkable for the pilgrimages made to it by the devout Moslemins, who pay it so great a veneration that they account the mere sight of its sacred walls, without any particular act of devotion, as meri¬ torious in the sight of God as the most careful discharge of their duty for the space of a whole year in any other temple. See Mekka. CAB, a Hebrew measure, mentioned in 2 Kings vi. 25. The Rabbins make it the sixth part of a seah or satum, and the eighteenth part of an ephah. A cab would hence con¬ tain pints of our wine measure, or 2£ pints of our old corn measure. CABAL (Italian cabala, knowledge of secret things ; Spanish secret science), a number of persons united in some close design, usually for the purpose of promoting their private views by intrigue. This name was given to one ministry of Charles II., con¬ sisting of Clifford, Ashley, Buckingham, Arlington, and Lauderdale, the initials of whose names compose the word cabal. CAB ALL ARIA, in middle-age writers, lands held by the t Aure of furnishing a horseman with suitable equipage dur¬ ing war, or when the lord had occasion for him. CABALLINE, pertaining to a horse ; as caballine aloes, so called from being chiefly used as a purge for horses. CABANIS, Pierre Jean George, a distinguished wri¬ ter and physician at Paris, was born at Conac in 1757. His v 4" ‘ ^ ’ .4 Ci ^ CV /V .. father, Jean Baptiste Cabanis, was a lawyer of eminence, Cabania. and chief magistrate of a district in the Lower Limousin, highly respected for his great acquirements and integrity, and entitled to the gratitude of his country for the many im¬ provements he has introduced in agriculture and’ farming. Young Cabanis was sent at ten years of age to the college of Brives ; and he afterwards studied at Paris, where he de¬ voted himself to the acquisition .of classical knowledge. At first he paid no attention to the lectures of his professors ; but afterwards, of his own accord, he resumed those branches of his education in which he had remained deficient, arid devoted himself entirely to the cultivation of his inind. Thus constantly occupied, two years had pdssed away, when he received'the offer of the place of secretary to a Polish nobleman. This offer he embraced without hesita¬ tion, and, though pnly sixteen, comniitfed himself into the hands of strangers, in a distant country, 'which was repre¬ sented to him as in a state of barbarism. This Was in 1773, the year during which that diet was sitting which was to'de- liberate lipoti giving- its sanction to the-"first'partition/of Poland. ThC corrhpt intrigues and compulsory measures which were practised on" that ocCasibn, irispii-ed'him with a contempt for mankind,'and a degree of misanthropic-gloom, which are generally the fruits bf a later experience of human depravity. He' returned to Paris two years afterwards, when ’Tiirgot, the frifend of his father, was -minister of finance. On being'presehted to this statesman he was deceived 'with kindness, and'would soon have been placed in a situatiqh perfectly' conformable to his tastes and wishes, had not a court intrigue caused the sudden downfall Of the*minister'. He now felt the n'ecCsrity of making Up for the’ time he had lost, and again applied to his studies with his formef ar¬ dour. He had contracted' a friendship with the poet Roucher, who enjoyed some celebrity. This connection rekindled his taste for poetry ; and the'French Academy having proposed as a prize subject the ’ translation of a' pas¬ sage in the Iliad, he not only ventured to appear as a Com¬ petitor, but set about translating the entire poiem. The two specimens which he sent to the Academy did not obtain any public notice, but they were judged of favourably by several persons of taste. He was soon, however, sensible’ of the emptiness of these applauses ; and, urged by his father4jtO choose a useful profession, he at length decided for that ot medicine. Dubreuil offered to be his guide in the new and arduous career which he was commencing; and Cabanis continued for six years the pupil of this able master. In 1789 he published Observations sur les Hopitaux, a work which procured him the appointment of administrator of hospitals at Paris. His state of health requiring occasional relaxation, he fixed upon Auteuil, in the immediate vicinity of Paris, as his place of residence. He continued his intercourse with Turgot; was on terms of intimacy with Condillac, Thomas, and D’Alembert ; and acquired the friendship of Holbach, Franklin, and Jefferson. During the last visit which Vol¬ taire made to Paris, Cabanis was presented to him by Tur¬ got, and read to him part of his translation of the Iliad, which that acute critic, though old, infirm, and fatigued with his journey, listened to with great interest, and bestowed much commendation on the talents of the author. Cabanis had now, however, long ceased to occupy himself with that work; and, even bade a formal adieu to poetry in his Ser- ment d’un Medecin, which appeared in 1789. In the poli¬ tical struggle which now began to engross the general at¬ tention, Cabanis espoused with enthusiasm the cause of the revolution, to which he was attached from principle, and w CAB Cabanis. of which the opening prospects were thoroughly congenial to his active and ardent mind. During the two last years of Mirabeau’s life he was in¬ timately connected with that extraordinary man, who had 'the singular art of pressing into his service the pens of all his literary friends. Cabanis united himself with this dis¬ interested association of labourers, and contributed the Travait syr l’Education Publique ; a tract which was found among the papers'of Mirabeau at his death, and was edited by the real author soon afterwards in 1791. During the illness which terminated his life, Mirabeau confided himself entirely to' the professional skill of Cab'anis. Of the pro¬ gress of the malady, and the circumstances attending the death of Mirabeau, Cabanis has drawn up a very detailed narrative, vvliich is not calculated, however, to impress us with dny high idea of his skill in the treatment of an acute inflammatory disease. '. Condprcet was another distinguished character with whom Cabanis was intimate, and whom he endeavoured, though without Success, to save from the destiny in which he after¬ wards became involved by the calamitous events of the revolution. Shortly after this he married Charlotte Grouchy, sister to Madame Cohdorcet and to General Grouchy; a union which was a great .source of happiness to him during the retiiainder of his life. 0.. w ^ After the subversion of the government of the terrorists, Cabahis, on the establishment of central schools, was named proffessdr.of' Hygiene- in fho medical schools of the metro¬ polis. .Next year he was chosen member of the National Institute, and vvas subsequently-appointed clinical profes¬ sor. He was afterwards member of the Council of Five Hundred, and then of the Conservative Senate. The dissolution of the Directory was the result of a motion which.’he'made to that effect. But his political career was riot of long continuance. A foe to tyranny in every shape, he was decidedly hostile to the policy , of Bonaparte, and constantly rejected every solicitation to accept a place under his government,'' '' ' ? v.„ - ... . ; For some years before his death, his health became gra¬ dually more impaired, and he ’ retired from the laborious duties of his profession, spending the greatest part of his time 'at the chateau of bis fatlrer-iri-law.at Meulan. Here he solaced himself with reading' his- favourite poets, and even had it in contemplation to resume that translation of the Iliad which had been the first effort of his youthful muse. ' The rest of his time was devoted to kindness and beneficence, especially towards the poor, who flocked from all parts to consult him on their complaints. Cabanis died May 5, 1808, leaving a widow and a daughter. .Besides the tracts already mentioned, Cabanis was author of Melanges de Literature Allemande, ou Choix de Traductions de VAl- lemande, &c., Paris, 8vo, 1797; Du Degre de Certitude de la Me- decine, 1797 and 1803, containing a republication of his Observations sur les Hopitaux, and his Journal de la Maladie et de la Mort de Mirabeau Vaine ; together with a short tract on the punishment of the guillotine, in which he combats the opinion of Soemmerring, CElsuer, and Sue, that sensibility remains for some time after de¬ capitation. This tract had already appeared in the Magazin En- cydopedique, and in the first volume of the Memoires de la Societe Medicale d'Emulation. This new edition also contains his Rapport fait au Conseil des Cinq-cents sur V Organisation des Ecoles de Mede- cineand a long dissertation entitled Quelques Principes et quelques Vues sur les Secours Publiques. Quelques Considerations sur V Orga¬ nisation sociale en general, et particulierement sur la nouvelle Consti¬ tution, 12mo, 1799. His principal work, however, is that entitled Des Rapports du Physique et du Morale de VHomme, 1803, in two volumes 8vo. This work was reprinted in the following year, with the addition of a copious analytical table of its contents by M. Destutt-Tracy, and alphabetical indexes by M. Sue. His Coup d' (Eil sur les Revolutions et les Reformes de la Medecine appeared in 1803. Of this work we possess an excellent English translation, with notes by Dr Henderson. His only practical work on medicine is the Observations sur les Affections Catarrhales en general, et parti¬ culierement sur celles connues sous le nom de Rhumes de Cerveau, et CAB 45 Rhumes de Poitrine, 8vo, 1807. He also wrote many interesting Cabbage articles in the Magazin Encyclopedique.^ ... ^ \ || ' CABBAGE. See Horticulture. ,, .. , ■ > Cabenda. CABBALA, or Kabbalah ^according to the: Hebrew style, has a very distinct signification from that in which we understand it in our language. The word is an abstract, and means reception, a doctrine received,by oral transmis¬ sion. The rabbis who are called cabbalists .study.; princi¬ pally the combination of particular words, letters, and num¬ bers, by which means they pretend to discover what.is to come, and to see clearly into the sense of many difficult passages of Scripture. There are no sure principles of this knowledge, which in fact depends upon some particular tra¬ ditions of the ancients ; for which reason it is termed cab¬ bala. The cabbalists have abundance of names which they call sacred, and not only make use of in invoking spirits, but imagine that they derive great light from them. They tell us that the secrets of the cabbala were discovered to Moses on Mount Sinai; and that these have been delivered down fp.fhem from father to son without interruption, and without any,use of letters; for to write them down is yrhat they are by no means permitted to do. This is like¬ wise termed,the oral law, as passing from father to son, in order to distinguish it from the written law. There is another cabbala, called artificial, which consists in search¬ ing for abstruse and mysterious significations of a word in Scripture, from which are borrowed certain explanations, by combining the letters which compose it. This cabbala is divided into three species, viz., the Gematria, the Notaricon, and the Temurah. The first, or Gematric, consists in, taking the letters of a Hebrew word for ciphers or arith¬ metical numbers, and explaining every word by the arith¬ metical value of the letters of which it is composed; the second, called Notaricon, consists in taking every particular letter of a word for an entire diction ; and the third, called Temurah, or change, consists in making different transpo¬ sitions or changes of letters, placing one for the other, or one before the other. Among the Christians, likewise, a certain sort of magic is, by mistake, called cabbala, and consists in using improperly certain passages of Scripture for magical operations, or in forming magical characters or figures with stars and talismans. Some visionaries among the Jews believe that our Saviour wrought his miracles by virtue of the ridiculous mysteries of the cabbala. Wolfius has given an extended account of the cabbala, and of the numerous manuscripts and printed Jewish works in which its principles are contained, as well as abundant references to Christian authors who have treated of it. {Biblioth. Hebr. ii. 1191, sq.) See also Beer, Geschichte der Lehren aller Secten der Juden, und der Cabbala, Briinn, 1822, 2 vols. 8vo. CABBALISTS, or Kabbalists, the Jewish doctors who profess the study of the cabbala. In the opinion of these men, there is not a word, letter, nor accent in the law, with¬ out some mystery in it. The Jews are divided into two general sects; the Karaites, who refuse to receive either tradition or the Talmud, or anything but the pure texts of Scripture ; and the Rabbinists, or Talmudists, who besides this receive the traditions of the ancients, and follow the Talmud. The latter are again divided into two other sects; pure rabbinists, who explain the Scripture in its natural sense, by grammar, history, and tradition ; and cabbalists, who, to discover hidden and mystical senses, which they suppose to have been couched therein by God, make use of the cabbala and the mystical methods above mentioned. CABENDA, a seaport town of Western Africa, in Lower Guinea, 40 miles north of the mouth of the Zaire, Lat. 5. 33. S. Long. 15. 40. E. From the great beauty of its situation, and the fertility of the adjacent country, it has been called the paradise of the coast. The harbour is well sheltered and commodious, and the trade is considerable. 46 Cabeza del Buey CAB CABEZA DEL BUEY, a town of Spain, province of Badajos, 86 miles E.S.E. from the city of that name. It Cabinet contains 850 houses, 4 schools, and several manufactories of . jt coarse frieze, linen, and cloth. Pop. 5395. CABIN, an apartment in a ship for officers and passen¬ gers. There are many of these in a large ship, the princi¬ pal of which is occupied by the captain. In small vessels there is one cabin in the stern, for the accommodation of the officers and passengers. The sleeping apartments in ships are also called cabins. CABINET, a closet, small room, or retired apartment. It is also the name of a piece of furniture, consisting of a chest with drawers and doors. Cabinet, a word of daily use in modern politics, ap¬ plies specifically to those heads of ministerial departments in Britain whose co-operative action marks the policy of the administration. It has a similar meaning in the United States, and is applied by analogy to the chief organs or ad¬ visers of the government in other countries. The word was first used in France, where it meant the inner apartment of a house, and when employed as a general term, that of the palace. To have the entree of the cabinet meant to have influence with the sovereign, and at an early period the term was thus applied to the secret council of the king. It is singular that a body so great in its power and influence, and so well suited, according to all practice and experience, for conducting the business of a great constitutional state, should have arisen as it were by stealth, should possess no settled constitutional rights and functions, and should be subject to no specific responsibilities. By the older con¬ stitutional authorities it has always been held, that those sworn advisers of the monarch who form his privy-council are the responsible officers for conducting the government. A habit of listening to one or two favourite advisers, in¬ stead of laying matters before the privy-council, was fre¬ quently referred to as one of the innovations made by Charles I. in the direction of arbitrary government. The practice of consulting only a small committee was in full force in the reign of Charles II., whose cabinet at one time received the name of the “ Cabal,” from the initial letters of the names of its members. The practice became even more systematic after the Revolution, and was the object of an interesting debate in the year 1692, on the occasion of the king seeking the advice of the House of Commons on the crisis in the foreign relations of the nation. Mr Goodwin Wharton, referring to the divided and imperfect responsibility of the existing system, said, “ The method is this:—Things are concerted in the cabinet and then brought to the council; such a thing resolved in the council and brought and put upon them for their assent without showing any reason. This has not been the method of England. I am credibly informed that it has been complained of in council, and not much backed there. If this method be, you will never know who gives advice.” On the same oc¬ casion it was said by Mr Waller, “‘cabinet council* is not a word to be found in our law books. We knew it not be¬ fore ; we took it for a nickname. Nothing can fall out more unhappily than to have a distinction made of the ‘ cabinet ’ and ‘ privy-council.’ It has this effect in the country, and must have, that the justices of peace and de¬ puty ueutenants will be afraid to act; they will say they cannot go on—and why ? Because several of them have been misrepresented and are not willing to act; they know not who will stand by them, and are loth to make disco¬ veries unless seconded. If some of the privy-council must be trusted and some not, to whom must any gentleman app!y ? Must he ask who is a cabinet-councillor ? This creates mistrust in the people. I am sure these distinct- tions of some being more trusted than others have given great dissatisfaction.”—(Pari. Hist., v. 731-3.) The continued prevalence of such views is apparent in Cable. CAB the clause of the Act of Settlement of 1705, requiring all Cabiri acts of state to be transacted in the privy-council, and signed by the members; a provision which, probably as inconsistent , with a settled practice, was repealed two years afterwards. The last time when a privy-councillor entered a cabinet- council without invitation, was that memorable occasion of the last illness of Queen Anne, when the Dukes of Somer¬ set and Argyle, believing that there was a plot to defeat the Hanover succession, entered the council-room and dictated measures for the safety of the kingdom and the proclamation of King George. The privy-council, from whom the cabinet is selected, now forms a considerable body, many of whom hold the membership as a mere mark of distinction. It has often been asked how the system of governing by a cabinet is consistent with personal respon¬ sibility, since there is no such executive body known to the law, it passes no specific acts, and the votes and opinions of its individual members are unrecorded. From this last feature, however, there seems to arise an effective collective responsibility, since every member of the cabinet is held to support and be compromised by the leading acts of the go¬ vernment. Certain great officers of state are invariably members of the cabinet; as the first lord of the treasury, the lord chancellor, the three principal secretaries of state, and the chancellor of the exchequer. Sometimes the post¬ master-general, the commander-in-chief, the chief secretary for Ireland, the president of the board of trade, and on one or two occasions the chief justice of the Queen’s Bench, have been members. At the commencement of the year 1854, besides the invariable members, the cabinet included the lord president of the council, the lord privy-seal, the first lord of the admiralty, the president of the board of control, the secretary-at-war, and the first commissioner of public-buildings, while Lord Lansdowne and Lord John Russell were members without office. (j. h. b.) CABIRI (Ka/3etpot), mystic deities of antiquity whose names and rites were widely diffused, but whose special functions have not been determined. Even among the an¬ cients themselves great diversity of opinion prevailed on this point. They are first mentioned as inhabiting the island of Lemnos, where they presided over the fruits of the earth, and vineyards in particular. Herodotus mentions that they wrere worshipped at Memphis in Egypt as the children of Vulcan ; Stesimbrotus endeavours to identify them with the Corybantes and Curetes. Though the wor¬ ship of these divinities spread gradually over the whole of Greece and Italy, it was nowhere performed with greater solemnity than in Lemnos, Imbros, and Samothrace. The mystic rites which accompanied the worship of these great and powerful deities, as celebrated in those islands, were only inferior in solemnity to the Eleusinian mysteries of the goddess Demeter (Ceres). CABIRI A (Ka/3etpia), festivals in honour of the Cabiri, celebrated in Thebes and Lemnos, but especially in Samo- thracia, an island consecrated to the Cabiri. All persons initiated in the mysteries of these gods were thought to be thereby secure against storms at sea, and all other dangers. I he ceremony of initiation was performed by placing the candidate, crowned with olive branches, and girded about the loins with a purple riband, on a kind of throne, about which danced the priests and persons previously initiated. (See Guthberlet, De Mysleriis Deorum Cabirorum ; E. G. Haupt, De Religions Cabiriacai) CABLE, a large strong rope, or iron chain, made fast to the anchor, by which a ship is secured. It is usually 120 fathoms; hence the expression a cable's length. See Rope¬ making. The Sheet Anchor Cable is the greatest cable belong¬ ing to a ship. The Stream Cable is a hawser or rope used to moor the ship in a river or haven sheltered from the wind and sea. CABOT. Cabot. CABOT, Sebastian, the celebrated navigator, and re- —discoverer1 of the American continent, was the son of John Cabot, a Venetian merchant resident in England, and was born about the year 1477. Although long the subject of much dispute, it is now certain that England was the place of his nativity. In an ancient collection of voyages and travels by Richard Eden, a learned writer and contem¬ porary of Sebastian, the author in a marginal note says, “ Sebastian Cabote tould me, that he was borne in Bry- stowe (Bristol), and that at iiii yeare ould he was carried with his father to Venice, and so returned agayne into Eng¬ land with his father after certayne years, whereby he was thought to have been born in Venice.” (Decades of the New World, fob 255.) It also appears that he returned, while still young (pcene infans), to England, and remained there till he grew up to manhood. The brilliant discoveries of Columbus having awakened a spirit of enterprise throughout the enlightened nations of Europe, Henry VII. of England was not slow in perceiv¬ ing the advantages to be gained by promoting adventure in the new career opened up to human ambition. The all- important and engrossing object was to discover a route to India; and an expedition in a north-westerly direction, os¬ tensibly to reach what was called Cathay, or the Land of Spice, was projected by Sebastian Cabot, and fitted out un¬ der the auspices of the English government. The first patent, which bears date March 5, 1496 (Rymer, Feeder a, vol. xii. p. 595), was given to John Cabot and his three sons, Lewis, Sebastian, and Saucius. The patentees were em¬ powered to set up the royal banner, and occupy and possess all the “ newly found” lands in the name of the king, who reserved a fifth of the profits. It was also stipulated that the vessels should return to Bristol, and that the privilege of exclusive resort and traffic should belong to the patentees. Although the patent was conferred on John Cabot and his three sons, there can be no doubt, even if the father did accompany the expedition, that its success was entirely owing to the genius of Sebastian. It is now undoubted, that to Sebastian alone belongs the glory of the re-discovery of the terra firma of the West¬ ern World. The expedition, consisting of the ship com¬ manded by Sebastian, and three or four smaller vessels, sailed from Bristol in the beginning of May 1497; and an ancient Bristol manuscript records the fact, that, “ in the year 1497, the 24th June, on St John’s day, was New¬ foundland found, by Bristol men, in a ship called the Ma¬ thew.” On the authority of Peter Martyr, we learn, that after quitting the north, where he reached latitude sixty- seven and a half, Cabot proceeded along the coast of the continent, to a latitude corresponding probably with that of the Straits of Gibraltar. Indeed he is said to have gone so far southward, “ ut Cubam Insulam a laeva longitudine graduum pene parem habuerit.” A failure of provisions at this point compelled him to desist from further pursuit, and the expedition returned to England. The second patent is dated 3d February 1498, and gives authority to “John Kabotto or his deputies,” to take at pleasure six English ships, and “ them convey and lede to the londe and isles of late found.” Shortly after the date of this patent John Cabot died; and it is said that his sons Lewis and Saucius went to settle in Italy. Sebastian, however, did not abandon the enterprise in which he had embarked ; and a second voyage was zealously undertaken under his superintendence. A ship equipped at the king’s expense, along with four small vessels, sailed from Bristol in the spring of the year 1498. The result of the expedition is unfortunately wrapt in much obscurity. Gomara alone furnishes us with what may be a correct account. Accord¬ ing to this author, Cabot “ directed his course by the 47 tracte of islande, uppon the Cape of Labrador, at Iviii. de- Cabot, grees; affirmynge that, in the monethe of July, there was such could, and heapes of ise, that he durst passe no fur¬ ther ; also, that the dayes were very longe, and in maner without nyght, and the nyghtes very clear. Certayne it is, that at the lx. degrees, the longest day is of xviii. houres. But consyderynge the coulde, and the straungeness of the unknowen lande, he turned his course from thense to the west, folowynge the coast of the lande of Baccalaos unto the xxxviii. degrees, from whense he returned to Englande.” (Eden’s Decades, fol. 318). The results of this second voyage were not sufficiently important to induce Henry to equip another expedition. We have good authority for believing, however, that Cabot, in 1499, “ with no extraordinary preparations sett forth from Bristoll, and made greate discoveries.” (Seyer’s Me¬ moirs of Bristol.) But the narrative of Cabot’s life for the fifteen years subsequent to the departure of his second ex¬ pedition is meagre and unsatisfactory. One circumstance deserves notice, that during that period Amerigo Ves¬ pucci, in company with Hojeda, crossed the Atlantic for the first time, whilst Sebastian was prosecuting his third voyage. After the death of Henry VII., upon the invitation of Ferdinand, Sebastian Cabot went to Spain; and Vespucci, who held the office of pilot-major, having died, he was ap¬ pointed his successor. He was soon employed in a general revision of maps and charts ; and his public and private cha¬ racter endeared him to most of the learned and good men in Spain. The death of Ferdinand put an end to an expe¬ dition then in contemplation. The ignoble commencement of the reign of Charles V. frustrated all further hopes of its prosecution ; and Cabot returned to England, where, under Henry VIII. he got honourable employment, and performed another westwardly voyage in 1517, which, however, proved unsuccessful. In 1518 we find Cabot in Spain, and again reinstated in the appointment of pilot-major. The dispute between Spain and Portugal in regard to their respective rights to the Mo¬ luccas having been decided at the congress of Badajos in 1524 in favour of Spain, a company was formed at Seville to open a commercial intercourse with those islands; and Cabot, with the title of Captain-general, after many delays, set sail with a fleet in April 1526. The squadron was ill assorted, and a mutiny broke out; in consequence of which he diverted his course from the Moluccas to the mouth of the Rio de la Plata, up which he penetrated about three hundred and fifty leagues. He erected a fort at St Salvador; and afterwards sailing up the Parana, he built other two forts. Lie subsequently entered the Paraguay, where he was drawn into a sanguinary contest with the natives. From the re¬ port then made by him to Charles V. it is probable, had he been supplied with means and ammunition, he would have made the conquest of Peru, which Pizarro afterwards accom¬ plished with his own private resources. After tarrying in the hopes of receiving supplies, Cabot was forced to return to Spain, where he resumed his functions of pilot-major. Lie finally settled in England, where he appears to have exercised a general supervision over the maritime concerns of the country, and enjoyed a pension of two hundred and fifty merks. It was then that he disclosed to Edward VI. his discovery of the phenomenon of the variation of the needle ;—a discovery for which alone his name deserves to be immortalized. It was also at his instigation that the im¬ portant expedition was undertaken which resulted in the opening of the trade with Russia; and in the charter of the company of merchant adventurers he was nominated gover¬ nor for life, as “ the chiefest setter forth” of the enterprise. Cabot lived to a very advanced age, and died about 1557, 1 The continent of North America had been seen, and even repeatedly visited about five centuries before by the Icelanders. 48 CAB Cabi'a probably in London ; but neither the date of his death nor |1 the place of his interment’is properly authehtieated. v a u ' , Sebastian Cabot may be justly regarded as one of the J most illustrious navigators the world has ever seen; and England owes him a debt of imperishable gratitude. “ He ended,” says the author of the Memoir which has rescued so much of his life from obscurity, “ he ended, as he had be¬ gun, his,career in the service ofliis native country;1 infusing into her marine a spirit of lofty enterprise, a High moral tone, and a system of mild but inflexible discipline,'of winch the results were not long after so conspicuously displayed. 'Finally, he is seen to open new sources of commerce, of which the influence may be distinctly traced oti heh'present greatness and prosperity.” (See Memoir of Sebastian Cabot, with a Review of the History of Maritime Discovery, illiis- trated by documents from the Rolls, now, first published. 8 vo. London, 1831.) ,‘ OABRA, a town of Spain, in the province of Cordova, about 28'miles S.E* of that city. It is situated in a-fertile valley near the source of the riyeh of the same haitie, and contains about 1346 houses. It has a college'With classes for the'study of philosophy, mathematics, languages, and de¬ sign, and several public and private schools. The fields of day in the neighbourhood afford- materials for a considera¬ ble trade in bricks and pottery'; and there is an abundant 'Supply of wine, vmegkr, oil, and flour, from the surrounding agricultural districts. The manufacture of coarse linen, wObllen, and hempen stuffs is considerable. There are some interesting Moorish remains to be seen in the town and sub¬ urbs.' Pop. 9576. ■ .CABRERA, (called by the ancients Capraria from the number of goats upon it), a rocky and almost uninhabited islet in the Mediterranean, belonging to the Balearic group, about 10 miles south of Cape Salinas in Majorca. In the peninsular war it was used by the English as a depot for French prisoners. CABUL, or Caubul, a province of Afghanistan, which still retains the name by which the whole Durani kingdom was formerly known. The events which resulted in the dismemberment of the empire, will be found detailed in the article Afghanistan. Cabul proper lies between the 33d and 36th degrees of N. Lat. Its length from east to west is about 250 miles, and its breadth 150. In 1818, upon the revolution which deprived Mahmood the brother of Shah Shooja of his throne, Cabul was seized by Dost Mahomed Khan, its present ruler. Cabul, the capital of the province, and during the integrity of the empire the seat of its go¬ vernment, is situate on the Cabul river immediately above its confluence with that of the Logurh. The immediate vicinity of the town is highly picturesque, well watered, and fertile. It is especially productive of the finest fruits ; and the beautiful gardens, orchards, and groves are a source of great delight to the citizens during the fine season. A re¬ cent traveller who had often joined their festive parties, thus describes the environs of the beautiful site of the tomb inclosing the remains of the illustrious emperor Baber :1— “ Baber Badshah, so the interesting spot is called, is distin¬ guished by the abundance, variety, and beauty of its trees and shrubs. Besides the imposing masses of plane-trees, its lines of tall, tapering, and sombre cypresses, and its mul¬ titudes of mulberry trees, there are wildernesses of white and yellow rose-bushes, of jasmines and other fragrant shrubs. The place is peculiarly fitted for social enjoyment, and no¬ thing can surpass the beauty of the landscape, and the pu¬ rity of the atmosphere.” The river of Cabul, though giving name to the great body of water which is poured into the Indus at Attock, adds nothing to the charms of the land¬ scape, being here a small and dirty stream. The city, about three miles in circuit, is not wholly surrounded by a wall, CAB being defended on the western side merely by a line of weak Cabul. ramparts running from ojie hill to another, and of course - r- v-«_/ affording no defence if turned.,:'It stands at the western extremity of a plain of considerable extent,: and in a recess formed by the junction of two ranges of hills. The'hduSes are in general two or three stories high, built of sun-dried bricks with a large admixture of wood, as' a security against the shocks .of earthquakes; Four spacious bazaars were erected here in the centre of the city, by Ali Murdan Khan, a celebrated Persian nobleman, Who for many years governed tlie western provinces; but these'were demolished by the British in retribution of the murderous treachery of the in¬ habitants. The citadel called Bala-Hissar, or upper Fort, is sitiiate on a rising ground in the eastern quarter of the city, and contains the palace. The mosques and other public buildings have nothing to recommend them in an architec¬ tural point of view. There is but one college, and it has ’been allowed to fall into decay. The serais, or public build¬ ings for lodging and entertaining strangers, are about fif¬ teen in number, and are remarkable neither for elegance nor convenience. There are several public baths, repul¬ sive alike from want of cleanliness and from offensive smell, originating in the nature of the fuel used for heating them. Water is sufficiently supplied, both for the irrigation of the adjacent country and for domestic purposes, by the Cabul river. This river is crossed by three bridges. One, the Pul Kuhto, is in the middle of the city, and is substantially built of brick and stone; another, the Pul Noe, is a frail fabric of wood, trembling under the weight of foot-passen¬ gers, who alone can cross it; a third, to the west of the town, is a fortified bridge, crossing the river where it passes through the gorge between the hills which bound the city on that side, and by this means the lines are continued across the stream. The climate, from the vicinity of the great central range of the Hindu Koh mountains, covered with perpetual snow, and from the great elevation of the town, which is situate 6396 feet above the level of the sea, is severe, the winter setting in at the beginning of October and continuing to the end of March. During this season the more opulent inhabitants rarely stir out, spending their time in such sedentary indulgences as they can command. Cabul is a place of considerable trade. The city is men¬ tioned by the Arabian historians of the seventh century as a residence of a Hindu prince. It was for some time the capital of the emperor Baber, and in the year 1739 was taken by Nadir Shah, who annexed it with the province to his Persian dominions. On his death Ahmed Shah Ab- dally, the founder of the Durani empire, took possession of it, and in the year 1774 it was constituted the capital of Afghanistan by his son Timour Shah, and so remained till the downfall of the short-lived dynasty, when, as above no¬ ticed, it was seized by Dost Mahomed Khan, who for some time maintained an unquiet and precarious rule. In 1839, a British army marched into Afghanistan, to re¬ store to the throne Shah Shooja, who took possession of the city of Cabul and retained it until the commencement of 1842, when a dreadful outbreak of native fury and perfidy deprived them of it. The chief civil officer, Sir William Macnaghten, was basely assassinated, the troops cut off from their magazines and stores, and compelled to attempt a re¬ treat under circumstances which rendered its successful ac¬ complishment hopeless. Of 3849 soldiers and about 12,000 camp-followers, only one European, severely wounded, and four or five natives, escaped. In the same year a British army took the town, recovered some prisoners, including the heroic Lady Sale, wife of Sir Robert Sale, and hav¬ ing destroyed the principal bazaar and some other public buildings, returned leaving the place to its fate. The po- 1 Narrative of various Journeys in Beluchistan, Afghanistan, and the Punjaub, by Charles Masson. London, 1842. C A C Cacao pulation of Cabul is about 60,000. Lat. 34. 30. Long. || 69.6. Cachao. CACAO or Cocoa, the substance prepared from the seeds of the Theobronia cacao. When the bruised seeds are flavoured with the Epidendrum vanilla, mixed with a little sugar, they form the agreeable confection well known under the name of chocolate. CACERES, a province of Spain, forming, by the division of 1833, the northern half of the old province of Estremadura. It is bounded north by Salamanca and Arvila, east by To¬ ledo and Ciudad-Real, south by Badajos, and west by Por¬ tugal, embracing an area of 615 Spanish square leagues. It contains 13 partidos, 226 ayuntamientos, 3 cities, 122 towns, and 100 villages. Pop. (1849) 264,988. See Estre¬ madura. Caceres, the capital of the above province, on the left bank of the Tagus, on a ridge of hills which stretch from east to west, 24 miles west of Truxillo. It is the residence of the Bishop of Coria, and contains a handsome episcopal palace. The monastery and college of the Jesuits was one of the finest in the kingdom, but has been secular¬ ized and converted into an hospital. It has a public school, a college with professorships of grammar, rhetoric, mathe¬ matics, philosophy, moral and scholastic theology, &c., a foundling hospital and several other charitable institutions. In the neighbourhood are large gardens, well cultivated fields, and extensive pasture grounds; while in the town are numerous oil and fulling mills, soap-works, and lime¬ kilns. It occupies the site of the ancient Castra Ccecilia, and was a place of some importance both under the Ro¬ mans and the Moors. Pop. 12,051. CACHALOT, the spermaceti or sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus). CACHAO, Kacho, Kecho, or Bak-thian, the largest city of Anam, and the capital of the province of Tonquin, in Asia, situated on the west side of the Tonquin river, about eighty miles from the sea. It is of great extent, and has neither walls nor fortifications, being merely sur¬ rounded by a bamboo stockade. The principal streets are wide and airy, and for the most part are paved with bricks and small stones; intermediate spaces being, however, left for the passage of elephants and other beasts of burden. The other streets are narrow and ill paved. Most of the houses are constructed of mud and timber, and thatched with leaves, straw, or reeds, and are generally one story in height. The magazines and warehouses belonging to foreigners are the only edifices built of brick ; and these, though plain, yet, by reason of their height and more ele¬ gant structure, make a considerable show among the rows of wooden huts. The public edifices are very spacious, but particularly the royal palace, which is several miles in circuit, and is surrounded by high walls. It contains many buildings within its precincts, which are devoted to different purposes, and embellished with a variety of carvings and gildings after the Indian manner, all finely varnished. Be¬ sides this palace there are to be seen the ruins of one still more magnificent, which is said to have been six miles in circumference. Cachao is a great commercial resort, and its trade is facilitated by the river, which is always crowded with vessels. The imports are long cloths, chintz, arms, pepper, and other articles, which are exchanged for gold and manufactured goods, namely, beautiful silks and lackered ware, which last is generally reckoned superior to any in the East. The English factory, which stood on the banks of the river, north of the city, and that of the Dutch, south of it, have long been withdrawn. Cachao, built chiefly of wmoden and brick houses, is peculiarly liable to fires; and to prevent these, or to extinguish them after they have broken out, the city is governed by a very rigid police, and is divided into wards, each subjected to a certain jurisdiction. Fires for domestic use are only permitted VOL. VI. CAD 49 during certain hours of the day. About the middle of the Cacholong eighteenth century the city was nearly burnt to the ground II by a conflagration, which w as the work of incendiaries, who CadiZi discharged fire-arrows during the night against the straw- covered roofs, and the whole was in a moment in a blaze. Population estimated at about 100,000. Long. 105.35. E., Lat. 21. N. CACHOLONG, a peculiar variety of calcedony com¬ monly of a milk-white colour, and transclucent. It occurs imbedded in the trap rocks of Iceland and Faro, along with calcedony, and is also found in Bukhara, on the borders of the river Cach; whence its designation. See Miner¬ alogy. CACHUNDE, a medicine highly celebrated among the Chinese and Indians. It is composed of several aromatic ingredients and perfumes, made into a stiff paste, and shaped in various figures, which are dried for use. CACOPHONY (khkos and