wrote several pamphlets on the means of reforming the police, which he caused to be printed in different European countries, at his own expense, and to be distributed gratis. His prize-questions gave rise to many pamphlets and treatises on the means of saving the drowned and the seemingly dead. He offered a prize of 1000 florins for the best treatise on beneficent institutions, and was himself the founder of many. From 1795 to 97, he travelled through Asiatic and European Turkey, chiefly for the purpose of counteracting the ravages of the plague. At a later period, he was engaged in making vaccination more extensively known. During the famine that raged in the Riesengebirge (Giant mountains), from 1805 to 1806, he procured corn and other provisions from distant regions. He fitted up the palace Buchlowitz on his estate Buchlau in Moravia, as an hospital for the sick and wounded Austrian soldiers. Here this patriot and philanthropist was carried off by a contagious nervous fever, July 26, 1809.

BERCY; a village on the Seine, at its confluence with the Marne, in the neighborhood of Paris. The Parisian wine-merchants have here their stores of wine, wine-vinegar, distilled liquors, &c.; so that the intercourse between B. and the capital is extremely active. It is increased also by several important tanneries, sugarrefineries and paper-mills. A large palace, Le grand Bercy, was built by Levau at the close of the 17th century. The park which belongs to it, containing 900 acres, was planted by Lenôtre. M. de Calonne was for some time in possession of it. The present possessor is M. de Nicolai.

BERENGARIUS, or Berenger, of Tours, a teacher in the philosophical school in that city, and, in 1040, archdeacon of Angers, is renowned for his philosophical acuteness as one of the scholastic writers, and also for the boldness with which, in 1050, he declared himself against the doctrine of transubstantiation, and for his consequent persecutions. He was several times compelled to recant, but always returned to the same opinion, that the oread the Lord's supper is merely a symbol of the body of Christ, in which he agreed with the Scotchman John Erigena (called Scotus). The Catholics -anked him among the most dangerous neretics. He was treated with forbearance by Gregory VII, but the scholastics belonging to the, party of the great Lanfranc. archbishop of Canterbury, were

irritated against him to such a degree, that he retired to the isle of St. Cosinas, in the neighborhood of Tours, in the year 1080, where he closed his life at a great age, in pious exercises (1088). On the history of this controversy, which has been very much misrepresented by the Benedictines, new light has been shed by Lessing, in his Berengar (1770), and by Stäudlin, who has likewise published the work of B. against Lanfranc. This B. must not be confounded with Peter Berenger of Poitiers, who wrote a defence of his instructer Abelard.

BERENHORST, Francis Leopold von ; one of the first of the writers by whom the military art has been founded on clear and certain principles. He was a natural son of prince Leopold of Dessau, and was born in 1733. In 1760, he became the adjutant of Frederic II. After the seven years' war, he lived at Dessau. He died in 1814.

BERENICE (Greek, a bringer of victory). 1. This was the name of the wife of Mithridates the Great, king of Pontus. Her husband, when vanquished by Lucullus, caused her to be put to death (about the year 71 B. C.), lest she should fall into the hands of his enemies. Monima, his other wife, and his two sisters, Roxana and Statira, experienced the same fate.-2. The wife of Herod, brother to the great Agrippa, her father, at whose request Herod was made king of Chalcis, by the emperor Claudius, but soon died. In spite of her dissolute life, she insinuated herself into the favor of the emperor Vespasian and his son Titus. The latter was, at one time, on the point of marrying her.-3. The wife of Ptolemy Euergetes, who loved her husband with rare tenderness, and, when he went to war in Syria, made a vow to devote her beautiful hair. to the gods, if he returned safe. Upon his return, B. performed her vow in the temple of Venus. Soon after, the hair was missed, and the astronomer Conon of Samos declared that the gods had transferred it to the skies as a constellation. From this circumstance, the seven stars near the tail of the Lion are called coma Berenices (the hair of Berenice).

BERESFORD, William, baron, duke of Elvas and marquis of Campo Mayor, for the ability and courage which he displayed in the war of Portugal against France, is ranked among the distinguished generals of Great Britain. ganized the Portuguese army, and also the militia of the country, in so excellent a manner, that they could vie with the

He or

best soldiers of the combined armies in the wars of the peninsula. In 1810, B. gained a victory over Soult, at Albufera. In 1812, he commanded under Wellington, and took an important part in the victories at Vittoria, Bayonne and Toulouse. He made his entrance into Bordeaux, March 13, 1814, with the duke of Angoulême. May 6, he was raised to the rank of baron by the king of England, and, soon after, sent to Brazil, whence he returned to England in 1815. The prince regent of Portugal made him generalissimo of the Portuguese armies. He had scarcely arrived at Lisbon, when he was sent, by the English government, on an important mission to Rio Janeiro. The rigor with which he punished a conspiracy of general Freyre against the British army and the regency, in Lisbon (1817), rendered him odious to the Portuguese military. He was, therefore, dismissed by the cortes in 1820. He then went again to Brazil, afterwards to England, and, in Dec., 1826, appeared anew in Lisbon, at the head of the English forces sent to aid in quelling the rebellion. BEREZINA; a river in the Russian province of Minsk, rendered famous by the passage of the French army under Napoleon, Nov. 26 and 27, 1812. Admiral Tschitschakoff, with the Moldavian army, forced his way from the south, to join the main army, which, after Borizoff had been retaken, was to assist the army led by Witgenstein from the Dwina, and, in this manner, cut off Napoleon from the Vistula. Napoleon was, therefore, obliged to make the greatest efforts, notwithstanding immense difficulties occasioned by the nature of the country, the climate, and the critical situation of his troops, to reach Minsk, or, at least, the B., and to pass it earlier than the Russians. To effect this, it was necessary to sacrifice a great part of the baggage and artillery, Nov. 25. After the advanced guard of the Moldavian army had been repelled to Borizoff, by Oudinot, and the bridge there burnt by them, early in the morning of Nov. 26, two bridges were built near Sembin, about two miles above Borizoff, an undertaking the more difficult, because both banks of the river were bordered by extensive morasses, covered, like the river itself, with ice not sufficiently strong to afford passage to the army, while other passes were already threatened by the Russians. Scarcely had a few corps effected their passage, when the greater part of the army, unarmed and in confusion, rushed in crowds

upon the bridges. Discipline had long before disappeared. The confusion increased with every minute. Those who could not hope to escape over the bridges sought their safety on the floating ice of the Berezina, where most of them perished, while many others were crowded into the river by their comrades. In this fatal retreat, the duke of Reggio (Oudinot) led the advanced guard, with the Poles under Dombrowsky in front; the rear guard was formed by the corps of the duke of Belluno. Nov. 27, at noon the dear-bought end was gained, and the army, leaving the road to Minsk, took that of Wilna to Warsaw, with the hope of providing for their necessities in Wilna.- -Besides the multitudes who were obliged to remain beyond the B., the division of Partouneaux, which formed the rear guard, was also lost. It was intrusted with the charge of burning the bridges in its rear, but it fell into the hands of the enemy. According to the French bulletins, only a detachment of 2000 men, who missed their way, was taken; according to the Russian accounts, the whole corps, 7500 men and 5 generals.

BERG; a duchy of Germany; bounded on the north by the duchy of Cleves, on the east by the county of Mark and Westphalia, on the south by the Westerwald, and on the west by the Rhine. It belonged, formerly, to the elector of Bavaria, but has been included, since 1815, in the grand-duchy of the Lower Rhine, which belongs to Prussia. It contains 1188 square miles, with 983,000 inhabitants. There are mines of iron, copper, lead and quicksilver; but the principal objects of attention are the manufactures, which render it one of the most populous and flourishing countries in Gerinany: of these, the principal are iron, steel, linen, woollen, cotton and silk. The ex. tent of the manufactures of B. is, in a great measure, owing to the multitude of skilful workmen whom the fury of the Spaniards, in the war against the Netherlands, forced to leave their country. The richest fled to London and Hamburg, the poorer sort, which included a great proportion of the manufacturers, to the neighboring Berg. At a later period, when Louis XIV revoked the edict of Nantes, many of the most industrious of the French Protestants fled also to this duchy, which thus became the most manufacturing part of Germany. Elberfeld is the most important of the manufactur ing places of B. Another reason of the great prosperity of this country is, that ia

has been under the government of rich princes; and the smallness of its territory has often enabled it to remain a long timne neutral, when all the other German states were desolated by war. The duchy of B. continued in the possession of the electors of Bavaria until 1806, when it was ceded to France, and bestowed by Napoleon on his brother-in-law Murat, under the title of the grand-duchy of Berg. There was at the same time added to it part of Cleves, the counties of Homburg, Bentheim-Steinfurt, Hortsmar, NassauDietz, Dillenburg, Hadamar, and a number of lordships and scattered bailiwicks and towns. On Murat's receiving the kingdom of Naples, Napoleon named his nephew Napoleon Louis, eldest son of the king of Holland, hereditary grandduke of Berg, with the condition that the country should be under the immediate management of the French government until the young prince should be of age. At the same time, the Prussian part of Munster and the county of Mark were annexed to it, and the whole was divided into the departments of the Rhine, the Ems, the Roer and the Sieg, having a population of 878,000 on 699 quare miles At the congress of Vienna, in 1815, the whole was given to the king of Prussia.

BERG, BOOK OF. (See Symbolic Books.) BERGAMO, capital of the district of Bergamo (1150 square miles and 806,600 inhabitants), in the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom, is situated on hills between the rivers Brembo and Serio, ha castle within the city, and another, called la capella, without it, besides two suburbs encircled by walls, and four other that are open, containing together 30,68 inhabitants. Amongst many distinguished men born here, is the famous Tiraboschi, the historian of Italian literature. E exported, formerly, more than 1200 bale of silk, which produced, on an average, 150,000 sterling yearly. In 1428, the Be gamese put themselves under the republic of Venice. In 1796, Bonaparte took B., and it was subsequently made the capital of the department of the Serio, in th kingdom of Italy. Lon. 9° 38′ E.; t. 45° 42 N. The city is the seat of a bishop and of the authorities of the district. It has an academy of painting and scuture, a museum, an athenæum, a public libra ry, several academies, many manu actories, especially of silk. There is, so, a small Protestant congregation in this city. The comic characters, Arlechin or Truffaldino, and Brighella, in the Italian

masqued comedy, are Bergamese, or affec* the dialect of the country people in the neighborhood of this city.

BERGAMOTS are a variety of citron. It is said to have been produced at first by grafting a citron on the stock of a bergamot pear-tree. The fruit has a fine taste and smell, and its essential oil is in high esteem as a perfume.

BERGASSE, Nicholas; a statesman and author, born at Lyons, in 1750, where he was an advocate. He afterwards became advocate to the parliament of Paris. Here he showed his talents in the famous lawsuit of Beaumarchais (q. v.) with the banker Kornmann. Upon the breaking out of the revolution, he was chosen a member of the states-general by the city of Lyons, but abandoned his seat, even earlier than Mounier and Lally-Tollendal, a step which, both in his case and theirs, was universally condemned. During the reign of terror, his life was saved only by the events of the 9th of Thermidor. Since that time, B. has devoted himself to metaphysical speculations. He is distinguished among the modern French ideol

gists by a splendid style and richness of near He is the author of Morale réligieuse, De l'Influence de la Volonté et sur l'Intelligence, and De la Propriété (1807). B. was a so one of the most zealous adherents to the doctrine of Mesmer respecting anima magnetism. During the abode of the Russian emperor in Paris, 1815, this monarch paid him a visit.

BERGEN; a bishopric in the kingdom of Norway, that borders on Aggerhuus to the east Drontheim to the north, Christiansand to the south, and the German ocean to the west; lon. 4° 45'-6° 55′ E.; lat. 59° 4-62° 39′ N. It contains about 13,900 square miles, 57 parishes, 180 churches and chapels, 137,700 inhabitants, or 1 early 10 to a square mile.-Bergen, the fortified capital, with a citadel (Bergenhaus), the largest city in Norway, is situated in lon. 5° 21′ E., lat. 60° 10′ N., 180 miles N. of Stavanger, 270 S. W. of Dronthein, at the bottom of the bay of Waag, that stretches far into the country, forming a safe harbor, surrounded by high and steep rocks. The entrance, however, is dangerous. The wall of rocks also makes the access to the city on the land side di ficult. The climate is comparatively mild, on account of the sheltered situation of the town. It is remarkable for frequent rains. B. is well built, yet several streets are crooked and uneven. on account of the rocks. The city contains 2200 houses, 18,000

mhabitants, 1 German and 3 Danish churches it has a bishop, a classical school, a seminary, founded by bishop Pontoppidan, for 12 students, who are instructed gratis in the higher branches of literature, a naval academy, an hospital for such as are infected with the scurvy, which is common among the fishermen, arising from their food, principally smoked or salt meat and fish; besides other useful institutions. The inhabitants of the middle coast of Norway bring their boards, masts, laths, fire-wood, tar, trainoil, hides, &c., and particularly dried fish (stock-fish), to B., to exchange them for corn and other necessaries, brought thither by the English, Dutch and Germans. B. thus carries on its commerce with but 100 vessels of its own. In the year 1445, a factory and several warehouses were established here by the Hanseatic cities of Germany, and the German traders, as they called them selves, enjoyed, for some time, the protection of the Hanseatic league. The German factory consisted of about 60 warehouses. The roads leading into the interior of the country are frequented only in the winter, when they are passable in sleds. B. is the native place of the poet Holberg-Bergen is also the name of other places; amongst them is, 1, a town in the Netherlands, a post of some consequence in the wars of 1739 and 1814.-2. A town in the electorate of Hesse. A bloody battle was fought here, April 13, 1759, between the French and allies, in the seven years' war, in which the former were victorious. It is three miles N. E. Frankfort. -3. The capital of the island of Rügen, in the Baltic, now subject to Prussia.-4. A small island in the Indian ocean, 60 miles W. of Sumatra ; lat. 3° 20′ S.

BERGER, Louis von, was born in Oldenburg, where he held a high office in the administration. When the Russians approached, in 1813, the citizens of Oldenburg took up arms. The French magistrates fled, but not until they had appointed a committee of regency, of which von Berger and Fink were members. This committee was afterwards summoned before a court-martial in Bremen, in which general Vandamme presided, and these two excellent men were condemned to death, though their accuser had only proposed their imprisonment. They were shot, April 10, 1813. The clearness, firmness and power of language, with which von Berger exposed this mock-trial, is well described in the Murder of Fink and Berger, written by Gildemeister of

Bremen. The remains of the two patri ots are deposited in Oldenburg.

BERGERAC; a town of France, in the department of the Dordogne, 48 miles E. of Bordeaux, which gives the name to an agreeable French wine, cultivated on the banks of the Dordogne. There is a white and a red sort. In France, it is sometimes also called petit Champagne.

BERGHEM, Nicholas, born at Harlem, in 1624, received his first instruction in painting from his father, Peter of Harlem, who was a very indifferent artist. He then continued his studies under van Goyen, and the elder Weenix. It is related, that once, when pursued by his father, he fled into the workshop of van Goyen, who, to protect him, called to his pupils, "Berg hen" (conceal him): this, it is said, occasioned his new name. Love of his art, and the great demand for his paintings, as likewise the avarice of his wife, prompted him to labor with extreme assiduity. To buy engravings, of which he was very fond, he was often compelled to borrow money from his students, which he could only refund by deceiving his wife in regard to the price of his paintings. In this manner he obtained a rich collection. B's. landscapes and representations of animals adorn the most celebrated galleries. The distinguishing characters of the pictures of B. are the breadth and just distribution of the lights, the grandeur of his masses of light and shadow, the natural ease and simplicity in the attitudes of his figures, the brilliancy and harmony as well as transparency of his coloring, the correctness and true perspective of his design, and the elegance of his composition. Although he hardly ever left his workshop, yet he had closely observed nature, during a long residence in the palace of Benthem. He died at Harlem, 1683. Charles Dujardin and Glauber were among his pupils. At the auction of P. de Smeth's collection of paintings, Amsterdam, 1810, four of B.'s were sold for 800, 1000, 1625, 2500 Dutch guilders.

BERGMANN, Torbern Olof, a natura. philosopher and chemist, born at Catharineberg, in the Swedish province of West Gothland, March 9, 1735, obtained, after many difficulties, the permission of his family to devote himself entirely to the sciences. At that time, disciples flocked from all quarters to Linnæus at Upsal. They were joined by B., in 1759, who, by his acuteness and his discoveries. which were facilitated by his attainmems in geometry and physics, excited the no

tice of this great man. In 1758, he became doctor of philosophy and professor of physics at Upsal. Upon the resignation of the celebrated Wallerius, B. was a candidate for the professorship of chemistry and mineralogy. His competitors charged him with ignorance of the subject, because he had never written on it. To refute them, he shut himself up for some time in a laboratory, and prepared a treatise on the manufacture of alum, whic is still considered as a standard WOIK. In 1767, he became professor of chemistry, and devoted himself with ardor to this science. He invented the preparation of artificial mineral-waters, and discovered the sulphuretted hydrogen gas of mineral springs. We are indebted to him for a knowledge of the characters which distinguish nickel from other metals. On a number of minerals he made chemical experiments, with an accuracy before uncommon. He published a classification of minerals, in which the chief divisions are based on their chemical character, and the subdivisions on their external form. In preparing this work, he was much aided by his former discovery of the geometrical relations between different crystals of the same substance, which may be deduced from one primitive form, and are produced by the aggregation of similar particles, according to fixed and obvious laws. His theory of the chemical relations is still esteemed, and, if it has received some new developements from the further researches of Berthollet, it has not been overthrown. The order of Gustavus Vasa was bestowed on B. He declined the invitation of Frederic the Great to remove to Berlin. He died, exhausted by his exertions, in 1784, in the 49th year of his age. Among his works, the first place is due to Opuscula Phys. et Chem. (Stockholm, 1779, 3 vols.), and Physical Description of the Globe.

BERGSTRASSE (Germ., mountain road); a fertile tract of land on the right of the Rhine, lying west of the Odenwald and Melibus, and forming a beautiful road about 30 miles in length, planted with walnut and chestnut-trees and vines. It extends from Darmstadt to the convent of Neuburg, about a mile distant from Heidelberg. All travellers on the Rhine are delighted with this road.

BERKELEY, doctor George; bishop of Cloyne, in Ireland; celebrated for his ideal theory. He maintains that the belief in the existence of an exterior material world is false and inconsistent with

itself; that those things which are called sensible material objects are not external, but exist in the mind, and are merely impressions made on our minds by the immediate act of God, according to certain rules termed laws of nature, from which he never deviates; and that the steady adherence of the Supreme Spirit to these rules is what constitutes the reality of things to his creatures; and so effectually distinguishes the ideas perceived by sense from such as are the work of the mind itself or of dreams, that there is no more danger of confounding them together on this hypothesis than on that of the existence of matter. He was born at Kilcrin, Ireland, in 1684; became fellow of Trinity college, Dublin, in 1707; travelled in Italy as far as Leghorn, in 1713 and 1714, and, at a later period, accompanied Mr. Ashe, son of the bishop of Clogher, on a tour through Italy, Sicily and France. In 1721, he was appointed chaplain to the lord lieutenant of Ireland, the duke of Grafton. He appeared with much ap plause as an author before he was 20 years old. His works on philosophy and mathematics (among which his Theory of Vision, published in 1709, is the most brilliant proof of the author's acuteness) procured him a wide-spread fame. By a legacy of Mrs. Vanhomrigh, the celebrated Vanessa, who has become so generally known through her love to Swift, his fortune was considerably increased. In 1724, he was promoted to the deanery of Derry, and resigned his fellowship He now published his Proposals for the Conversion of the American Savages to Christianity by the Establishment of a College in the Bermuda Islands. The project was very favorably received, and persons of the first rank raised considerable sums by subscription to aid it; and B., having resigned his preferment, set sail for Rhode Island, with several other persons of similar views, to make arrangements for carrying on his college. The assistance of parliament, which had been promised, not being afforded, his undertaking miscarried, after he had spent seven years and a considerable part of his fortune in his efforts to accomplish it. He afterward wrote numerous philosophical, religious and politico-economical works. Towards his 60th year, he was attacked by a nervous colic, which he attempted to cure by the use of tar-water, whereby he was induced to publish two treatises on the utility of this water. He died suddenly at Oxford, in 1753. B. is said to have been acquainted with almost all branches of human