BEERBHOOM-BEET. Licensing Act of 1872, c. 94, and of 1874, c. 49, to create more uniformity as well as stringency in the requirements. During Sundays, all licensed houses require to be shut except between 12 or 1 P.M. and 2 or 3 P.M., and between 6 P.M. and 10 or 11 P.M., the justices having a slight power to vary these hours. A fixed time of opening and closing is also prescribed for week-days. When a keeper of the house is convicted of an offence, it is usually indorsed on his license, and after three indorsements he forfeits the license; and, in some cases, even the landlord's power to relet the house for the sale of liquors is suspended for some years, according to the nature of the offences. Though the houses are closed for part of Sundays, yet travelers and lodgers are exempted in most cases, and can be supplied as usual with liquors. Some of the penalties have been admitted to be too severe, and require modification. The place where beer is exclusively sold is called a beer house, differing in this respect from an ale-house, which means a place where other liquors as well as beer are retailed. The term publichouse applies to the second most frequently. The sale of beers or ales in Scotland is regulated by the act 25 and 26 Vict. c. 35, amending the act 9 Geo. IV. c. 58, and the 16 and 17 Vict. c. 67, commonly called the 'Forbes Mackenzie Act.' Justices and Magistrates meet twice a year to grant certificates. By the form of license thereby prescribed, no liquors of any kind can be sold on Sunday in any inn, hotel, shop, or any publichouse, except to lodgers and travelers. In the English acts, the words 'bond-file travelers' are used, which mean the same thing, and they are held to include persons traveling two or three miles for business or pleasure. Many of the penalties of the act 25 and 26 Vict. c. 35 exceeded those of the English acts, but the English act of 1872 far outstripped in stringency (except as regards Sunday) the Scotch acts.* BEER, J. MEYER. See MEYERBEER. BEERBHOOM, or BIRBHOO'M, a district in the lower provinces of Bengal, with an area of 1344 square miles, and a pop. (1871) of 695,921. It extends between N. lat. 23° 32′ and 24° 40′ and between E. long. 86° 25′ and 88° 30'. The chief town is Suri, 100 miles N.N.W. of Calcutta, and after it the district is sometimes named. The inhabitants are generally a rude race, and there appear to be hardly any places worthy of the name of towns. BEER-MONEY was a peculiar payment to non-commissioned officers and soldiers in the English army. It was established in the year 1800, at the suggestion of the Duke of York, and consisted of one penny per day for troops when on home-service, as a substitute for an issue of beer and spirits. It continued as an addition to the daily pay until 1873, when, the stoppages for rations having been abolished, the opportunity was taken to consolidate Beer-money and pay proper. 589 from plants, yet, when they are fed entirely upon pure sugar, they continue to elaborate wax, and to build up the walls and. partitions of the honey-comb. The wax procured from British hives is considered the purest and best, but the smallness of the amount necessitates the importation of comparatively large quantities from North America, Brazil, Singapore, Ceylon, Gambia, and Mogadore. British B. is naturally of a yellow color, whilst that procured from foreign countries is darker in tint; and in the case of the wax from Brazil, which is yielded by a species of black bee hiving under ground, the color is a dark mahogany, and the material is soft and tenacious. In the separation of the honey from the wax, the honey-comb is subjected to pressure, which squeezes out most of the honey; the residual comb is then treated with water, and heated, with constant stirring, till the wax melts, when the whole is passed through hair-bags. The wax is received in a vessel of cold water, where it is at the same time washed, and cooled down till it solidifies, as a thick cake, on the surface of the water. For many purposes, it is necessary to bleach the wax, and the common method is to obtain it in thin sheets or ribbons, by melting it under water, and pouring it upon horizontal wooden cylinders, which are kept revolving half immersed in water in a perforated vessel. The sheets or ribbons of wax so obtained are laid out upon a field with a southern aspect, and being repeatedly watered, are subjected to the joint action of the sun's rays, the ozone of the air, and moisture. In a short time, the wax loses its yellow tint, and becomes white. Attempts have been made to perform the bleaching more expeditiously by employing chlorine, bleaching-powder, and other chemical agents. The only process which appears not to injure the wax is to melt it, and for every pound add two ounces of pulverized nitrate of soda, and one ounce oil of vitroil, diluted previously with eight ounces of water. While the latter is gradually poured in, heat is applied, and the whole mixture swells up, necessitating the emthe surface, and being repeatedly treated with hot water, to wash ployment of a capacious vessel. On cooling, the wax gathers on away impurities, is finally allowed to solidify in a cake. than water, which is taken as 1000. Purified B. has a lensity of 960 to 966, and is therefore lighter lucent, and is tasteless, odorless, and colorless. At 32° F., it is In thin slices, it is transhard, brittle, and solid. When heated to 85°-90° F., it softens, and can then be kneaded between the fingers like moist dough or putty, and at 145° F. it fuses, and becomes a true liquid. It is insoluble in water, and is partly soluble in boiling alcohol, and partly not. The alcoholic solution, which takes up about 80 to 90 per cent. of the wax, contains principally a substance called cerine, which separates in crystals as the solution cools, and ceroleine, which remains dissolved in the cold alcohol. The matter which resists the solvent action of the alcohol is a substance called myricine. B. is largely used in the manufacture of wax-candles and BEE'RSHEBA, or BIR-ES-SEBA ('well of the oath,' or well tapers; and though it has recently been very much excluded from of the seven'), so called because here Abraham entered into an which first-class composite candles can be made indirectly from the manufacture of ordinary candles, from the readiness with alliance with Abimelech, king of Gerar, which he ratified with an oath and a gift of seven ewe lambs. B. was situated on the south-tallow, yet it is often used as one of the ingredients in composite ern border of Palestine, about 52 miles south-west from Jerusalem, candles to impart hardness to the manufactured article. The very and formed the limit in that direction of the Israelitish dominion. large candles used in Roman Catholic countries for church-serIt was one of the most ancient as well as one of the most interest-vices, are always made of wax alone. ing places in sacred record. While Abraham resided at this place, BEET (Beta), a genus of plants of the natural order Chenopodihe received the command to sacrifice Isaac, whose residence it acea (q. v.), distinguished by a 5-cleft perianth, five stamens inalso was. Esau was robbed of his birthright and blessing here, serted on a fleshy ring surrounding the ovary, and the fruit adand here Jacob sacrificed to God before departing into Egypt; the hering to the calyx, and collected in clusters of two or three. The sons of Samuel were made judges here, and it was from hence that species are not numerous; they are mostly biennials, with smooth, Elijah was forced to flee into the desert from Jezebel's wrath. ovate, stalked leaves, and tall, leafy, flowering-stems. They are After the captivity, B. was occupied for some time by the Jews, natives of the temperate parts of the Old World. The COMMON and in the 4th c. A.D., it was a Roman garrison. Afterwards, the B. (B. vulgaris) is a native of the shores of the Mediterranean, but Crusaders are said to have fortified it, and to have regarded it is now in very general cultivation both in fields and gardens, as a place of importance. Two circular wells of fine pure water-chiefly for the sake of its large succulent and generally carrotthe largest being 44 feet deep to the surface of the water, and 124 shaped roots, which are used as food both for man and for cattle, feet in diameter-and a heap of ruins about half a mile long and from which also sugar is largely extracted on the continent and a quarter broad, remain to mark the place where B. once of Europe. Beet-roots may be substituted for malt, when deprived of the greater part of their juice by pressure. The variety chiefly cultivated in gardens is known as RED B., from the color of the root, which also more or less appears in the leaves and leafstalks. The subvarieties are very numerous. In some, the root is rather turnip-shaped than carrot-shaped, and the size and color also vary much, some being of a deep blood-red, or even almost much lighter red, and internally, even white. It forms a favorite blackish color, both externally and internally; and others of a erly dressed. The seed is sown so late in spring, that the plants may not produce flowering stems the first year, which, when it (q. v.), so valuable as a field-crop for food of cattle, is, in general, occurs, renders the root fibrous and useless.-MANGOLD-WURZEL regarded as merely a larger and coarser variety of the common B., in which the red color is comparatively little exhibited, although some botanists have, on very slender grounds, endeavored to erect it into a distinct species.-The WHITE B. of our gardens was. BEE'SHA, a genus of grasses with the habit and most of the characters of bamboos, but remarkable for the fleshy pericarp which encloses the seed, forming a sort of berry.-The species are few, natives of the East Indies. BEES-WAX, is principally obtained from the ordinary bee hive, where it is elaborated by the workers. See BEE. For some time, it was matter of dispute whether the bees really manufact-pickle, and is also very agreeable as a boiled vegetable when propured the wax from other ingredients in their food, or if they performed the simple task of carrying the wax ready made from the plant to the hive. It appears now to be definitely settled, that while, in ordinary circumstances, bees may derive part of the wax * A shebeen is the name given in Scotland to a house or place where liquors are sold without a justice's or Excise certificate. Every person found in such a place, drunk or drinking, may be taken before a justice, or detained in a police-station till this can be done, and he may then be fined ten' shillings, or, in default, impris oned ten days. 590 BEET-FLY-BEET-ROOT SUGAR. Other (B. cicla of some botanists) is now also generally supposed to be tion of an earlier composition. Other dramatic pieces are-the a mere variety of the common B., with little or no red in its roots overture, interludes, and melodramatic music in Goethe's Egmont, or leaves, and a comparatively slender root. It is cultivated for and the instrumental music and choruses in the Ruins of Athens. the sake of its leaves, which are used in the same manner as-In the third and last period of B.'s career we find those two spinach, and form an excellent substitute for it, especially in the gigantic works, the Missa Solemnis in D Minor, and the ninth symbeginning of spring. The leaf-stalks and midribs (chards) of the phony (D minor) with chorus. These works transcend all common leaves, especially of a variety in which these parts are unusually laws and forms, and belong to the highest sphere of art. Their developed, are also dressed for the table.-SEA-B. (B. maritima) deep mysteries can be apprehended only by those who have deep grows wild upon the shores of Britain, and differs from the com- emotions and profound technical knowledge of music. mon B. in its perennial root, its partly prostrate stems, and other works of this last class approach those just mentioned, though characters. The leaves are used for food in Ireland, as are also they do not reach the same elevation. But all are alike in passing those of B. Bengalensis in the East Indies. far beyond the ordinary traditional forms of art. All are pervaded by an impulse as of inspiration. Among these works may be lished after the death of B.), the grand overtures-works 115 and mentioned, the great quartetts for bow-instruments (mostly pub124-and several sonatas for pianoforte, especially that in Bflat major. BEET-FLY (Anthomyia Beta), an insect which infests crops of mangold-wurzel, and other kinds of beet, depositing its eggs on the leaves, the soft parts of which the larvæ devour, causing them to assume a blistered appearance, and when numerous, injuring the health of the plants. It is a two-winged insect (see DIPTERA), of the great family Muscides, of which the common house-fly may be regarded as the type, and belongs to a genus of which more than 100 British species are known, the larvæ of some of which are well known as feeding upon the roots of cabbages, turnips, &c. See CABBAGE-FLY, TURNIP-FLY, and POTATOE-FLY. It is not so large as the common house-fly. The life of B. has been written by Schlosser, Schindler, Moscheles, Marx, Nohl, Thayer (1866-1871). See also Nottebohm, Skizzenbuch B.'s. BEETLE, a name popularly applied to many kinds of coleopterous insects. It is never extended to insects of any other order, and it is sometimes used in works on natural history as a common name for all coleopterous insects; but this makes it to include many kinds to which it is not popularly applied, as fireflies, lady-birds, weevils, cantharides, &c. It is also employed by some authors in a more restricted sense, as a designation of the insects forming the large tribe Scarabaides; but the restriction, equally with the extension, is an interference with the popular use of the English word, of which, however, the limits are very uncertain. To frame an article, with strict regard to that popular use, and at the same time to science, would not be easy, nor would it be profitable, as the assemblage of kinds would be not only large, but very miscellaneous. We think it better to refer to the article COLEOPTERA, and to the articles SCARABEIDE, BOMBARDIER BEETLE, STAG BEETLE, BURYING BEETLE, GOLIATH BEETLE, ROSE BEETLE, &c. The name BLACK BEETLE is often given to the COCKROACH (q. v.). See also BLAPS. burgh to hard nodules of clay ironstone, found abundantly in a low BEE'TLE-STONES, the name given by the lapidaries of Edincliff, composed of shale, at Newhaven, or strewed upon the beach in that neighborhood. They take a beautiful polish, and have been employed to make letter-weights and other ornamental articles. The name was given in consequence of the supposed origin of the fossil which is of most frequent occurrence as the nucleus of the nodules, which, however, is not a fossil beetle, but a coprolite (q. v.). Some of the nodules contain a fossil fish, and some a fossil of vegetable origin. BEETHOVEN, LUDWIG VAN, the unrivalled composer, whose works have made a new epoch in the development of music, was born at Bonn, December 17, 1770, and died in Vienna, March 26, 1827. His father, a tenor-singer in the elector's chapel at Bonn, began to cultivate the genius of his son when only five years of age. He next placed him under the court-organist, Van Eden, and shortly after under the composer Neefe. In his eighth year he created astonishment by his performance on the violin; when only eleven, he played the music in Bach's Wohltemperirtes Klavier; and in his thirteenth year he published at Manheim, a volume of variations on a march, songs, and sonatas. In 1792, he was sent to Vienna by his patron, the Elector of Cologne, to enjoy the instructions of Haydn, who first made him acquainted with the works of Händel. He also studied composition under Albrechtsberger. There he soon attracted notice by his extraordinary ability as an extempore player of fantasias, and also by some compositions, which, however, did not escape the censure of critics. He became so much attached to Vienna, that, after his patron's death in 1801, he determined to remain, and declined an invitation to England. In 1809, when another offer tempted him to leave Vienna, several friends of music, with the Archduke Rudolf at their head, raised a subscription to provide for the composer a pension sufficient to retain him. At Vienna, therefore, he stayed during the remainder of his life, secluded from the world, of which he knew as little as it knew of him; and in later years, still more isolated from society by a defect of hearing, which gradually became confirmed into entire deafness. In this sad inviolable solitude, he produced his new symphonies, his sublime overtures, his quintetts and quartetts, so full of profound conceptions and mysterious revelations of the highest harmonies, and his pianoforte sonatas, which express, sometimes, a peculiar train of feelings, at other times appear to represent his own recluse character. Shut out in a large measure from the ordinary pleasures of life, ignorant of the sweetness of married life, and able to enjoy only in a slender measure social intercourse, he retired for compensation into the world of his own imagination, and brought forth from its deep resources those Linen weft is likewise beetled, but by hand-hammering, on a treasures of harmony which, though at first received with a shy large flat stone, with a wooden mallet, to soften the yarn for easiastonishment rather than a cordial admiration, are now rankedness of working it, or getting it on,' in the language of the craft, among the works of art which cannot die. These new forms and in weaving. Beetling is likewise a process in flax-dressing, to original creations, which display B.'s majestic powers in music, separate the woody from the flexible fibres of the plant. See were only gradually developed; in his early productions, he subFLAX-DRESSING. mitted to established forms of composition. BEE'TLING is a finishing mechanical process applied originally to linen shirting, and afterwards to cotton shirting, in imitation of linen, to give the cloth a hard and wiry look, by flattening the yarn irregularly in an angled manner. This is done by the rising and falling of upright wooden stampers, placed close together in a row, with their square buts resting on a roller over which the cloth passes under them, doubled in a particular way so as to give the yarn an angled appearance when struck. The stampers are worked bythe rotation of a horizontal shaft, acting with tapets, like the cylinder of a barrel-organ. BEET-ROOT SUGAR. See SUGAR. The sugar obtained from The works of B. may be divided into three classes, or may be the beet is similar to cane-sugar, but inferior in sweetening power. assigned to three distinct periods of his intellectual development. Beet-root contains on an average about 10 per cent. of saccharine All the works of his first period, though important, show the in-matter (sugar-cane, 18 per cent.); of the varieties, the white Slesfluence of his teacher Haydn, or of his more highly esteemed vig beet is the richest. To obtain the sugar, the roots, after being model, Mozart. This period of composition may be said to extend to washed, are first rasped down by machines, so as to tear up the his 16th orchestral work, including, besides several pianoforte cells. The pulp is then put into bags, and the juice is squeezed sonatas, trios for pianoforte and for stringed instruments, All out by presses. The juice is next treated with lime or sulphuric these early works display the highest cultivation of the forms and acid, to clarify it, and also filtered till no deposit is formed; after principles of art previously established in the Viennese school of which it is boiled in large boilers to concentrate it. When it has music. The second period of B.'s artistic life, in which his genius attained a certain density (25° Beaumé), it is poured through flanwas completely self-reliant, extends from the 16th to the 80th nel, and is now a dark-colored sirup, which, in order to yield pure work. This was certainly the most productive and brilliant part sugar, must be deprived of its coloring-matter and mucilage. This of his career. To it belong his greatest creations, his magnificent is effected by filtering it through animal charcoal or bone-black. and powerful orchestral works-symphonies, overtures, &c.-all The filtered juice is now treated with lime-water beat up with a of which display the highest qualities of imaginative composition. little white of egg to a lather, till it is slightly alkaline, and is Besides the great orchestral works, it includes many sonatas for then further concentrated by boiling in copper pans, care being pianoforte, and various compositions of chamber-music-septetts, taken to stir and scum it all the while. When sufficiently conquintetts, quartetts, trios, serenades, &c. In dramatic composi- centrated, it is put into vessels, and allowed to stand several days tion, B. produced only one opera, but this was Fidelio, the first in a warm room to crystallize; the uncrystallized part, or molastruly German musical work of a dramatic character. This was ses, is then drained off, and what remains is raw sugar. This is still the result of great study, and, as it is now given, is the reconstruc- further refined by again dissolving and treating it with albumen BEET-ROOT SUGAR-BEFFROI. 591 and blood. In separating the crystallized from the uncrystallized yet; but there really seems no good reason why both sugar and part, centrifugal machines are now much used. Another improve- spirits should not be profitably made from beet either in England, iment is the vacuum-pan, which allows the juice to be boiled down Scotland, or Ireland. without burning. The molasses drained off from beet-root sugar has a disagreeable taste, and cannot be used for sweetening, like BEFFA'NA, a corruption of Epiphania (Epiphany), is the name given in Italy to a singular custom prevailing on Three Kings' Day cane molasses. About the middle of the 18th c., Marggraf, an apothecary in (see BEAN-KING'S FESTIVAL), or Twelfth Night. According to Berlin, drew attention to the sugar contained in beet-root; but tradition, the B. was an old woman who, being busy cleaning the Achard, the Prussian chemist, was the first who was tolerably house when the three wise men of the East passed by on their way to offer their treasures to the infant Saviour, excused herself successful in extracting it. Still, as only 2 or 3 per cent. of sugar for not going out to see them on the ground that she would have was obtained, the product did not pay the cost, until Napoleon's continental system raised the price of sugar, and gave rise to im- an opportunity of doing so when they returned. They, however, proved methods of manufacturing it. Even after the fall of Na- went home by another way; and the B., not knowing this, has poleon, protective duties kept alive this manufacture in France; take a great interest in children, who on Twelfth Night are put ever since been watching for their return. She is supposed to and when numerous improvements of method had raised the per- earlier to bed, and a stocking of each is hung before the fire. centage of sugar realized to about 5 lb. from 100 lb. of beet, it took a fresh start (about 1825) in France and Belgium, was revived Shortly, the cry, Ecco la B.' is raised; and the children, who have in Germany, and spread even to Russia. The falling of the cus-in which each finds a present bearing some proportion in value to not gone to sleep, dart out of the bed, and seize their stockings, tom's duties on the import of colonial sugar obliged the German his conduct during the year. If any one has been conspicuously governments to impose a small duty on beet-sugar, which checked ill-behaved, he finds his stocking full of ashes-the method the B. the manufacture for a time; but owing to the protective measures of the Zollverein, the trade soon recovered and is still brisk. takes of expressing her disapprobation. It was also customary in Large quantities are annually imported from the continent of Italy, on Twelfth Night, to carry an effigy called the B. in proEurope, and are used by our refiners mixed with cane sugar, with- cession through the streets amid great rejoicings; but this, which out which it is not successful, for producing the best qualities of was probably the relic of the celebration of the middle-age mysrefined or loaf-sugar. The imports into Great Britain have attery,' has fallen greatly into disuse. The word is also used to awe present an annual value of seven or eight millions sterling. naughty children. BE'FFROI, or BELFRY, was the name of a tower used in the BEET-ROOT SUGAR. The production of beet-sugar is an industry entirely of modern growth, taking root first in France dur-military sieges of ancient and medieval times. When a town was ing the reign of Napoleon I., and subsequently establishing itself to be besieged, a movable tower, as high as the walls, was brought after many difficulties in Belgium, Germany, Austria, Russia, and Holland. The table shows the produce of beet-sugar in the four principal beet-growing countries for the year 1871-72, as compared with the year 1881-82. 1870. .84,000 tons. 1881. 310,700 tons. Raw beet-sugar. Refined beet-sugar.. ......82,000 The produce of Holland and Belgium is also large and increasing; but inconsiderable compared with that of the four countries given above. In Sweden, Denmark, England (at Lavenham), and California, beet-sugar factories have also been established; and attempts have been made to promote the manufacture in Ireland, but none have as yet been quite successful. The following figures show how rapidly the beet-sugar manufacture has on the whole prospered. Total produce of all countries: This large annual yield of 1 million tons has been maintained for some years, and forms about one-fourth of the sugar now produced from all sources. An acre of land planted with beet can be made without difficulty to yield at least a ton of sugar, worth from £20 to £24, and there are certain by-products besides. The average percentage composition of the root of the sugar-beet is as follows: Sugar, 104; fibre, &c., 5; gluten, soluble organic compounds, and ash, 3; water, 814. But the proportion of sugar varies much-it being greater in small than in large beets, in dry than in moist climates, in light than in heavy soils, in the part of the root under than in that above ground, and when manure has not been directly applied to the crop. Crystallized sugar although by far the most valuable, is not the only useful product of beet-root, as the following list of its products will show: (1) Crystallized sugar; (2) Exhausted pulp useful for cattle-food; (3) Coarse spirit obtained by fermenting the uncrystallizable sugar; (4) Potash salts. The fibrous portion of the root is sometimes used to mix with other material for making paper. Beffroi, or Breaching Tower.-From Grose's Military Antiquities. near it; and this tower was the beffroi. Its use is more than once spoken of by Cæsar in his account of his campaigns in Gaul. Froissart describes, with his usual spirit, a B. employed at the siege of the castle of Breteuil in 1356. At the siege of Jerusalem by the Crusaders, a B. was carried in pieces, put together just beyond bow-shot, and then pushed on wheels to a proper position. The object of such towers was to cover the approach of troops. Sometimes they were pushed on by pressure, sometimes by capstans The distillation of spirits from beet is largely practised on the and ropes. The highest were on six or eight wheels, and had as continent, and many good judges maintain that it is really a more many as twelve or fifteen stories or stages; but it was usual to profitable business than the manufacture of beet-root sugar. In limit the height to three or four stages. They were often covered Belgium and Germany the two industries are frequently combined, with raw hides, to protect them from the flames of boiling grease an arrangement which possesses the advantage that, in a season and oil directed against them by the besieged; and there was a when the proportion of sugar in the roots is too small to yield more hinged drawbridge at the top, to let down upon the parapet of than a bare profit, the manufacturer may ferment the sugar-con- the wall, to aid in landing. The lower stage frequently had a taining juice. The spirit thus obtained yields a fair return even ram (see BATTERING RAM); while the others were crowded with when the beets contain only from 5 to 6 per cent. of sugar. This archers, arbalestiers, and slingers; or there were bowmen on all manufacture has been tried in England with but little success as the stages except the top, which had a storming or boarding party. 592 BEG-BEGGAR-MY-NEIGHBOR. During the wars under Charles I., the royalists made a B. to aid in the besieging of a town or castle in Herefordshire; it was higher than the defence-works, and was provided with loop-holes, a bridge, &c.; but the Roundheads captured it before it could be applied to use. Ducange thinks that the name of belfry (q. v.) given to a bell-tower, was derived from the warlike machine called the beffroi or belfry. BEG, or BEY, a Turkish title, rather vague in its import, and commonly given to superior military officers, ship-captains, and distinguished foreigners. More strictly, it applies to the governor of a small district, who bears a horse-tail as a sign of his rank. The governor of Tunis has this title- Beglerbeg,' or, more correctly, Beilerbegi (lord of lord'), is the title given to the governor of a province who bears three horse-tails as his badge of honor, and has authority over several begs, agas, &c. This superior title belongs to the governors of Rumelia, Anatolia, and Syria. BEGAS, KARL, court-painter to the king of Prussia, professor and member of the Academy of Art in Berlin, was born there in 1794. He had been destined for the law, but early manifested a love for art, and while at Bonn, received his first lessons in paint-made, but with questionable success, to set forth an average stateing from Philippart. In 1811, he proceeded to Paris, and there spent eighteen months in the studio of the celebrated Gros. In 1815, Frederick-William III., on the occasion of his visit to Paris, bought a large original painting by B., Job surrounded by his Friends, and gave him two commissions for different churches in Berlin. This led to his moving thither in 1818, and to his subsequently residing in Italy at the king's expense. On his return to Berlin in 1825, he painted a great many biblical subjects for churches, as well as other pictures. He died 23d November 1854. There are frescoes of colossal size by him in the new church of Sacrow, near Potsdam. He is especially distinguished for the animation and individuality of his portraits, and has painted for the king a gallery of celebrated authors and artists, including Humboldt, Scheling, &c. Several of his genre paintings have been rendered familiar by repeated engravings; and his works, in general, are eminent for expression, rich coloring, and a peculiarly clear chiaro oscuro. BE'GGAR, a person who solicits charitable aid from the public at large. The word is supposed to have some connection with the fraternity known as Beghards. See BEGUIN. The actual begging or solicitation of temporal aid became, however, so conspicuous a feature among these medicant orders, that the term originally applied to their sacred duties seems at a very early period to have acquired its modern vulgar acceptation. There is no class of men who have had their lot and condition so varied by ethnical and social conditions as beggars. In a civilized industrious country, the B., to have any chance of relief, must manage to get it believed, whether it be true or false, that he is on the verge of want, and requires the solicited alms to keep him from starvation. Among oriental nations, on the other hand, beggars have often been a potent class, who may be rather considered as endowed with the privilege of taxing their fellow-creatures, than as objects of compassion. It has sometimes been supposed that a residue of this feeling of superiority characterizes the mental physiology even of the mendicant of civilization, and that, abject as he seems, he considers himself to some extent a privileged person, entitled to support from his fellows, without being amenable to the slavish drudgery by which the working-classes live. In Europe, during the middle ages, those doctrines of Christianity which are intended to teach us to abjure selfishness and worldly-mindedness, were exaggerated into a profession of total abstraction from worldly cares and pursuits. Hence arose the large body of religionists who, as hermits or members of the mendicant orders, lived on the contributions of others. In later times, the mendicant orders became the proudest and the richest of the clergy; but while the chiefs lived in affluence, the practices of the lower adherents fostered throughout Europe a system of mendicancy very inimical to civilization and industrial progress. In Great Britain its evil results have been long felt, in the inveterate establishment of practices naturally out of harmony with the independent, industrious character of the British people. Ever since the Reformation, the British laws have had a death-struggle with the B.; but neither by the kindness of a liberal poor-law, nor by the severity of a merciless criminal code, have they been able to suppress him. When a country provides, as Britain does, that no one shall be permitted to starve, it would naturally be expected that the springs of miscellaneous charity would be dried. But it is not so, and it is indeed often plausibly urged, that entirely to supersede all acts of kindly generosity between man and man, through rigid legal provisions, must lower the standard of human character, by depriving it of all opportunity for the exercise of the generous emotions. It is clear that, in the light of political economy, promiscuous charity is the most costly and most corrupting way of administering relief to indigence. No one will maintain that the idle B. on the street deserves such a luxurious table as the industrious mechanic cannot afford to himself. But, at the same time, no one who drops a coin in a beggar's hat can say how many others may be deposited there during the day, and whether the B. is merely drawing a wretched pittance, or deriving a good income. Beg ging being a trade, it is not always those that are the poorest, but those who are the most expert, who will practice it to the best re sults. The great object is to seize on and appropiate any charac teristic calculated, whether permanently or temporarily, to excite harvest of the B., and his trade rises and falls in an inverse ratio compassion. Hence periods of general distress are often the with that of the working community. Times of prosperity are not favorable to him, because he is then told that there is plenty of work for him. But when workmen are dismissed in thou sands, and their families turned on the road to seek alms, the professional beggars, by their superior skill and experience, will be sure to draw the prizes in the distribution. Many surprising statements have been made of the large incomes made by skilful professional beggars, especially in London. The most remarkable anecdotes on the subject will be found in Grose's Olio, whence they have often been repeated. Attempts have been ment of the earnings in different departments of the B. trade. A good deal of information of this kind will be found in the Report of the Constabulary Force Commission of 1839 (see p. 60, et seq.). It does not appear, however, that this trade is, like others, dependent on the law of supply and demand. The B. generally is so constitutionally, whether from hereditary or other physical causes. He has a loathing, even to horror, of steady systematic labor, and he will rather submit to all the hardships and priva tions of the wanderer's lot, than endure this dreaded evil. BEGGARS, THE LAW OF ENGLAND RELATING TO, is regu lated by the 5 Geo. IV. c. 83 (amended in regard to other points by the 1 and 2 Vict. c. 38). By the third section of the 5 Geo. IV. it is enacted that every person wandering abroad, or placing him or her self in any public place, street, highway, court, or passage, to beg or gather alms, or causing or procuring, or ercouraging any child or children so to do, shall be deemed an idle and disorderly person; and it shall be lawful for any justice of the peace to commit such offender to the house of correction, there to be kept for any time not exceeding one calendar month. And by section 4, it is further provided that any person so convicted, and offending in the same way again, shall be deemed a rogue and a vagabond, and may be punished by being committed to the house of correction for three months, with hard labor; and by the same section, every person wandering abroad and endeavoring, by the exposure of wounds or deformities, to obtain or gather alms, and every person going about as a gatherer or collector of alms, er endeavoring to procure charitable contributions of any nature cr kind under any false or fraudulent pretence, shall be deemed a rogue and vagabond, and be punishable as before mentioned. By section 15, however, of the same act, the visiting justices of any county jail, house of correction, or other prison, may grant certificates to persons discharged, to receive alms on their route to their places of settlement; but if such persons shall act in a manner contrary to the directions or provisions of their certificates, or shall loiter upon their route, or shall deviate therefrom, they shall be deemed rogues and vagabonds, and punished accordingly, Other later statutes, however, enable justices to give aid to al prisoners on being discharged from prison, and supersede this doubtful license to beg on their way home. Many prisoners' sid societies are established in different parts of the country, and if their rules are good, they receive a certificate from the visiting justices of jails. When the time arrives for the discharge of a prisoner, the justices have power, out of the moneys under their control, to order a payment of £2, either to the prisoner, or the treasurer of the aid society, for his benefit; and they may also par his railway fare, so that by this means he can always reach his home without begging. The attempt or purpose to obtain money or alms by means of shows or entertainments on the streets of London, is also an offence under the Metropolitan Police Act, 2 and 3 Vict. c. 47, s. 54 (No. 14), and punishable by a fine of forty shillings. In the Scotch law, there are many severe statutes of the Scotch Parliament against beggars and vagabonds, all of which, along with the proclamations of the Scotch Privy Council on the same subject, are renewed and ratified by the act 1698, c. 21, which forms the existing Scotch law in regard to beggars. The Scotch Poor-Law Amendment Act, 8 and 9 Vict. c. 83, contains no provision on the subject. Anciently, in Scotland, legal permission to beg was given to certain sick and infirm poor persons, and in the reign of James V., a system of tokens for the same purpose was established.-See Burn's Justice of the Peace, vol. vi.; Charnock's Police Guide, Dunlop's Parochial Law of Scotland, Lorimer's Hand-book of the Scotch Law, and the works and authorities referred to in these publications. BEGGAR-MY-NEIGHBOR, a game of cards usually played by two persons, between whom the cards are divided. Holding their BEGHARMI-BEGUINES. 593 cards with the backs upwards, the players lay down a card alter-order appears to owe its institution. The members use secret nately, until an honor is played, which is paid for by the adversary signs and pass-words as means of recognition, in the same way as -four cards for an ace, three for a king, two for a queen, and one is done by the masonic orders, some of them indeed appearing to for a knave; such payment being made, the winner lifts the trick. be identical with those of freemasonry. Although numbering If, however, an honor should be laid down during the payment, many thousands of influential persons in its ranks, the society does then the opposite party must pay for that in the same way; and so not appear to exercise any material influence in the religion or on, till a payment is made without an honor. The game is played politics of Turkey. chiefly by children. earliest of all lay societies of women united for pious purposes. BEGHA'RMI, or BAGI'RMI, a country in Central Africa, bounded on the N. by Lake Tsad; on the W. by the Shari, or Great River, which divides it from the kingdom of Bornou; and on the E. by the Waday kingdom. It extends southward to about lat 10° N. Its greatest length is about 240 miles, and its breadth 150. The whole of B. Proper is flat, with a slight inclination towards the north-its general elevation being about 1000 feet above the level of the sea. The outlying provinces in the south-east are slightly mountainous. B. has three considerable rivers flowing through and along its borders-the Bénuwé, Logan, and Shari, the last of which, augmented by the Logon, is upwards of 600 yards across at Mele. There is, in general, however, the utmost scarcity of water in the country, and the inhabitants' guard their wells with jealous care. The soil is partly composed of sand, and partly of lime, and produces the grain and fruit common to countries of Central Africa. Worms and ants are very destructive to the crops. The ants appear to be a perfect pest. Dr. Barth describes them as eating through his matting and carpeting, and he had the utmost difficulty in preserving his goods from entire destruction by them. The total population is about a million and a half. From the numerous deserted villages with which the traveler constantly meets, the population would appear to have been much greater at one time. Mohammedanism has been introduced among them, but many are still pagans, and all are grossly superstitious. The only industrial arts are weaving and dyeing. Physically, they are a fine race of people, superior to the tribes around them, the women being especially handsome. The men are subject to a peculiar disease in the little toe, called mukárdam. It seems to be caused by a worm, which eats the toe away. One in ten of the male population are said to have lost their little toes through this cause. The sultan is absolute in his own dominions, and several smaller states are tributary to him; and he, in his turn, is tributary to the more powerful ruler of Bornou. The fighting-force of the kingdom is about 13,000 men. Masena (q. v.), the capital, has a circumference of about 7 miles.tion by the mendicant orders of friars; but, on account of their Barth's Travels in Central Africa. BE'GKOS, or BEI KOS, a large village of Anatolia, on the Bosphorus, 8 miles north-north-east of Scutari, said to be the locality of the contest between Pollux and Amycus, in which the latter was killed. See ARGONAUTS. At the commencement of the Crimean war, the Allied fleets anchored in B. Bay, prior to their entering the Black Sea in January 1854. BE'GLERBEG. See BEG. BEGONIA CE, a natural order of exogenous plants, the place of which in the system is doubtful, but is supposed by Lindley to be near Cucurbitacea (q. v.). The B. are herbaceous or suffruticose plants, with alternate leaves, which are oblique at the base, and have large dry stipules. The flowers are in cymes, unisexual, the perianth colored, with four unequal divisions in the male flowers, and five or eight in the female; the stamens are numerous; the fruit is membranous, winged, 3-celled, bursting by slits at the base, the seeds minute -The order contains about 160 known species, all of which have pink flowers. They are almost all tropical plants, and some of them are often to be seen in British hot-houses; but a small species of Begonia ascends the Himalaya to at least 11,500 feet, often growing on the trunks of trees. The leaves of the Begonias have a reddish tinge. The leaves and young stems are succulent and acid, and those of B. Malabarica, B. tuberosa and other species, are used as pot-herbs, or in tarts. The juicy stalks of a large species found in Sikkim, at an elevation of five or six thousand feet, are mentioned by Dr. Hooker as employed to make a pleasant acid sauce. This, and the small Himalayan species already mentioned would probably succeed in the climate of Britain. The roots of some are used in their native countries as astringents, and some of the Mexican species are used as drastic purgatives. practical usefulness, were sheltered by the pope and councils as well as by secular authorities. In the 13th and 14th centuries, the B. became united with the persecuted spiritualists among the Franciscans (Fratricelles), and with the sect of the Brethren and Sisters of the Free Spirit.' Hence arose certain heresies, which, of course, occasioned interference on the part of the Inquisition; and on account of certain immoralities, à synod held at Fritzlar required that all candidates must be forty years old before they could enter a society of Beguines. These sisterhoods maintained their position in Germany and the Netherlands longer than in other countries. In Holland, they existed at the close of the 18th C.; and in the present day we find here and there so-called Beguinen-häuser (Beguin-houses) in Germany; but they are now there is still a celebrated institution of B., numbering as many as nothing more than almshouses for poor spinsters. At Ghent, 600 sisters, besides 200 locataires, or occasional inmates. Their houses form a kind of distinct little town, called the Béguinage, which, though environed by a wall is open to the visits of strangers. Living here a life of retirement and piety, the B., in their simple dark dresses, go out as nurses to the hospital, and perthey are under no monastic vow, but having attached themselves form other acts of kindness among the poor. As above stated, ted it. There are houses of B. also at Antwerp, Mechlin, and to the sisterhood, it is their boast that none is known to have quitBruges; and in 1854, one was established in France, at Castelnaudary, in the department of Aude. of laymen styling themselves B., first appeared in Germany, the BEGARDS (Ger. begehren, to seek with importunity). Societies Netherlands, and the south of France in the beginning of the 13th C., and were known in Italy as Bizachi and Bocasoti; but they Towards the end of the 13th c., they were commonly stigmatized never obtained the reputation enjoyed by the Beguine sisterhood. as bons garçons, boni pueri, ‘ ministers' men,' bedesmen.'' pietists,' BEG-SHE'HR, a fresh-water lake of Asia Minor, Karamania, 44 miles south-west of Koniyeh, presumed to be the ancient Cara-mation in which they were held. vagabonds'-contemptuous titles, which expressed the low estiOn account of heretics of all litis. It is about 20 miles long, and from 5 to 10 miles broad. It sorts retreating into these half-spiritual communities, they were contains many islands, and discharges itself by a river of the same subject to severe persecutions after 1367, and were gradually disname into Lake Soglah. On its east and north shores are the persed, or joined the orders of Dominicans and Franciscans. In towns of Begshehr and Kereli, the old Caralio, which issued im- the Netherlands, where they had preserved a better character than perial coins, and which is also supposed to have occupied the site elsewhere, they maintained their ground longer, and were proof Pamphylia. tected by Pope Innocent IV. (1245), in Brussels by Cardinal Hugo (1254), and in Liege by Pope Urban IV. (1261); but their communities disappeared in the 14th c.-See Mosheim, De Beghardis et Beguniabus (Leip. 1790), and Hallman's Geschichte des Ursprungs der BEGTA'SHI, a religious order in the Ottoman empire, which had its origin in the 14th c. The name is believed to be derived from that of a celebrated dervise, Hadji Begtash, to whom also the |