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BALZAC, Jean Louis Guez de, a member of the French academy, born at Angoulême, in 1594, lived in Rome as agent of the cardinal de Lavalette, after two years established himself in Paris, and, by his talents, attracted the favorable notice of the cardinal Richelieu, who conferred upon him a salary of 2000 livres, with the title of a counsellor of state. He was considered as one of the greatest scholars and most eloquent men of his age in France; yet his numerous writings found severe critics. Among these, Goulu, general of the Feuillans (a monastic order, under the rule of St. Bernard), pushed his criticisms even to insult and abuse. This induced B. to leave Paris. He died in Angoulême, in 1654, in the 60th year of his age. Aiming at dignity of style, he fell into bombast, affectation and exaggeration, so that his works have gradually lost their reputation as taste has improved in purity. Nevertheless, we must do justice to the harmony of his periods, and acknowledge that he has done much towards the improvement of the French prose. He had studied the ancients, and his Latin poems, although without remarkable poetical merit, are pure, and free from the faults of his French writings. The most perfect of his works is, without doubt, a treatise upon Latin verse. The assertion of Voltaire and Laharpe, that he occupied himself more with words than with ideas, is too severe. A complete edition of his works appeared at Paris, in 1665, in two volumes, folio.

BAMBARRA; one of the largest and most powerful kingdoms of Central Africa; bounded N. by the Great Desert, W. by Kaarta, Mandingo and Ladamar, E. by Timbuctoo, and S. by Kong. It is traversed from W. to E. by the Niger, and is generally very fertile. The inhabitants are a mixture of Moors and Negroes. Among the towns are Sego, the capital, Jenne and Sansanding.

BAMBERG. This town, formerly the capital and place of residence of a bishop, whose see contained 1375 square miles and 200,000 inhabitants, now the seat of the provincial authorities of the Bavarian circle of the Upper Maine, and of an archbishop, has about 20,000 inhabitants. The prince of Neufchatel, Berthier, the son-inlaw of duke William of Bavaria, here threw himself from a window, in the palace of the latter, in 1815, on account of the new revolution in France. The cathedral church was built as early as 1110. The university there is also very ancient.

BAMBOO CANE. The bamboo cane (bambusa arundinacea) has a hollow, round, straight and shining stem, and sometimes grows to the length of 40 feet and upwards; has knots at the distance of 10 or 12 inches from each other, with thick, rough and hairy sheaths, alternate branches, and small, entire and spearshaped leaves. There is scarcely any plant so common in hot climates as this, and few are more extensively useful. It occurs within the tropical regions, both of the eastern and western hemispheres, throughout the East Indies and the greater part of China, in the West Indies and America. In temperate climates, it can only be cultivated in a hot-house; and its growth is so rapid, even there, that a strong shoot has been known to spring from the ground and attain the height of 20 feet in 6 weeks.-The inhabitants of many parts of India build their houses almost wholly of bamboo, and make all sorts of furniture with it in a very ingenious manner. They likewise form with it several kinds of utensils for their kitchens and tables; and from two pieces of bamboo, rubbed hard together, they produce fire. The masts of boats, boxes, baskets, and innumerable other articles, are made of bamboo. After having been bruised, steeped in water, and formed into a pulp, paper is manufactured from the sheaths and leaves. The stems are frequently bored, and used as pipes for conveying water; and the strongest serve to make the sticks or poles with which the slaves or servants carry those litters, so common in the East, called palanquins. The stems of the bamboo serve as the usual fence for gardens and other enclosures; and the leaves are generally put round the tea exported from China to Europe and America. Some of the Malays preserve the small and tender shoots in vinegar and pepper, to be eaten with their food. Many of the walking canes used in Europe and the U. States are formed of young bamboo shoots. The Chinese make a kind of frame-work of bamboo, by which they are enabled to float in water; and the Chinese merchants, when going on a voyage, always provide themselves with this simple apparatus to save their lives in case of shipwreck. It is formed by placing four bamboos horizontally across each other, so as to leave a square place in the middle for the body, and, when used, is slipped over the head, and secured by being tied to the waist.

BAMBOUK, or BAMBUC; a town in Africa, and capital of a kingdom of the same

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name, between the Faleme and Senegal rivers; lon. 9° 30′ W.; lat. 13° 25 N. The country is situated between 12° 30′ and 14° 15 N. lat.; about 36 leagues from N. to S., and 28 in breadth, and said to contain about 60,000 inhabitants. It is composed chiefly of lofty, naked and barren mountains, and its wealth consists entirely in its mineral productions. These are gold (which is abundant), silver, iron, tin, lead and loadstone. The most remarkable animals are a species of asses, extremely white (which the inhabitants will not allow to be sent out of the country), white foxes and the giraffe. The little which is known of this state is derived from a Frenchman named Compagnon, who resided there a year and a half, in the beginning of the last century. (Labat, Afrique Occidentale, iv. 5.)

BAN, in ancient jurisprudence; a declaration of outlawry, of which we have recently had an instance in the proclamation issued against Napoleon after his return from Elba.-Ban, in political law, is equivalent to excommunication in ecclesiastical. The emperor of Germany had the right to declare a member of the empire under the ban, and to dispose of his feud. The ban, like the excommunication, forbids every one to have intercourse with the person proscribed, or to give him food or shelter. Very often, however, the sentence was repealed, and the party restored to all his rights and privileges.-Ban, in military affairs, is an order, given by beating the drum or sounding the trumpet, requiring the strict observance of discipline, or announcing the appointment of an officer, &c.

plantain. The Spaniards have a superstitious dislike to cut this fruit across; they always slice it from end to end, because, in the former case, the section presents an imaginary resemblance to the instrument of our Savior's crucifixion. The banana is sometimes fried in slices as fritters. If the pulp of this fruit be squeezed through a fine sieve, it may be formed into small loaves, which, after having been properly dried, may be kept for a great length of time.

BANCA, an island belonging to the Netherlands, near Sumatra, one of the vassal states of Palembang, containing 60,000 inhabitants, among them 25,000 Chinese, is known on account of its tin mines, worked by the Dutch East India company (the annual profit of which, to the Dutch, is estimated at 150,000£), and its pearl fishery, which is also productive on the shores of the group of Solo islands, north-east from Borneo. The tin of Banca is pure and easily obtained. The southeasterly part of Banca has not yet been examined. The Banca islands, in 2° 22′ S. lat., and 105° 41′ E. lon., afford shelter from S. W. by S. to N. W., with a good supply of water and fuel.

BANDA ISLANDS; a group of islands belonging to the Netherlands, in the Eastern ocean, lying E. of the Celebes; so called from Banda, the principal of them; lon. 130° 37′ E.; lat. 4° 12′ S. They contain but 5763 inhabitants, though they are said formerly to have contained 15,000. Their chief produce is nutmegs, of which they are competent to supply the want to the rest of the world. The whole quantity produced on these islands cannot be acBAN (bannus). This name is given to curately stated. The annual sales are said the governors of Dalmatia, Sclavonia, formerly to have amounted to 350,000 Croatia, placed at the head of civil and pounds of nutmegs and 100,000 pounds military affairs in these countries. Ban of mace. When, however, they were signifies, in the Sclavonian tongue, a taken by the English, in 1796, the half master. A province, over which a ban- year's crop was found to be little more nus was placed, is called bannat. At than 80,000 pounds of nutmegs and about present, the only ban is that of Croatia, who 24,000 pounds of mace. The trees in all has the third place among the secular the other islands were carefully extirpated nobles of Hungary. Before him come the by command of the Dutch; and the whole palatinus regni and the judex curiæ. trade of those where the growth is cherished is a complete monopoly.—The names of the islands are Banda, or Lantor; Puloway, or Poolaway; Pulo Run, or Poolaron; Neira, Gunong Assi, or Guanapee Rosyngen; Pulo Prampon, Pulo Suanjée Capal, and Nylacky. The inhabitants are in alliance with the Dutch East India company.-These islands can never be expected to yield any advantage beside that derived from the spice trade. Entirely cut off from the other parts of

BANANA. The banana is a valuable plant (musa sapientium) which grows in the West Indies and other tropical countries, and has leaves about six feet in length and a foot broad in the middle, and fruit four or five inches long, and about the shape of the cucumber. When ripe, the banana is a very agreeable fruit, with a soft and luscious pulp, and is frequently introduced in desserts in the West Indies, but never eaten green, like the

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India, and deprived of all commerce, save a trifling bartering with the indigent natives of the south-eastern and south-western islands, they are even destitute of the means of subsistence for their own inhabitants, and must be supplied with every necessary from abroad, as nature, which has lavishly bestowed upon them articles of luxury, has denied them those of immediate necessity. Banda is likewise accounted a most unhealthy place, especially at the chief settlement of Neira. Some attribute this circumstance to the neighborhood of the volcano, in the island of Gunong Api, and others to a deleterious quality in the water.

BANDA ORIENTAL. This tract of country has fixed public attention, as the subject of an obstinate war between Brazil and the United Provinces of La Plata, and seems destined, by its geographical position, to possess much importance hereafter. It is situated between the eastern bank of the river Uruguay and the ocean, and between the river La Plata on the south and the Sierra do Topas on the north (which separates it from Brazil), and receives its name from its position with respect to the Uruguay. It is fertile and healthy, and, although checked in its prosperity by political misfortunes, had gained a white population of 80,000 souls. Having been originally settled by a Spanish colony from Buenos Ayres, it fell under the authority of Spain, but came, at length, to be the occasion of contention with Portugal. Both nations prized it; Spain, as giving her the control of both sides of the river La Plata; Portugal, as necessary to the free and secure navigation of the immense interior of Brazil; and each nation asserted a claim to a territory of so much consequence. During the long wars between Portugal and Spain, relative to the various boundaries of their vast possessions in South America, the Banda Oriental was overrun and wasted, sometimes by one and sometimes by the other, and their respective pretensions were differently regulated by successive treaties. In 1777, Portugal was forced to consent to the line of the Sierra do Topas, but afterwards seized on the district of the Missions, which she consented to restore, in 1804, as the price of the Portuguese fortress of Olivenza, held by Spain. When the revolution commenced, the Orientalists naturally sided with the government of Buenos Ayres; but whether they merely acted in concert with the latter, or acknowledged a dependance, does not appear. Certain it is

that they soon made themselves independent of Buenos Ayres, under the guidance of Artigas, in consequence of a victory gained by him over the Buenos Ayreans, in 1815, at Gaubiju. But, soon afterwards, the Brazilians, pretending to fear that Artigas would propagate his revolutionary doctrines in Brazil, attacked him, broke up his forces, and compelled him to fly into Paraguay.-Brazil continued to hold military possession of the country, although resisted by the inhabitants, until 1822, when they were induced, ostensibly by persuasion, but really by intimidation, to send delegates to a convention at their capital, Monte Video, and to consent to be annexed to Brazil, by the name of the Cis-Platine province, which don Pedro claims as a voluntary union of the people with the empire of Brazil. When Brazil separated from Portugal, in 1822, the Orientalists joined a party of the army which declared for Portugal, and, on the submission of these troops, called upon Buenos Ayres for aid. Assistance was given them in arms, money and men, but not ostensibly by the congress, until their leaders, Lavalleja and Fructuoso Rivera, had shut up the Brazilians in Monte Video, and a provisional government, organized in the town of Florida, formally declared the Banda Oriental to be reunited to Buenos Ayres. The standard of independence was raised by Fructuoso Rivera, April 27th, 1826; and, as he was immediately aided, by Lavalleja, with forces organized in Buenos Ayres, this may be considered as the actual commencement of the war. Oct. 12, Lavalleja gained the victory of Sarandi, and the republic no longer hesitated to assume a quarrel, which began to wear a prosperous aspect. But no formal declaration of war was issued until that of Pedro, dated Dec. 30th, 1826, which entered into an elaborate exposition of the alleged rights of Brazil. The war has been alike prejudicial to both countries. While Pedro blockaded Buenos Ayres, the cruisers of the latter cut up the commerce of Brazil; and while both parties contributed to waste the Banda Oriental, the Orientalists carried similar devastation into the Brazilian province of Rio Grande. But neither party possessed adequate resources to strike a decisive blow; and the solicitations of Great Britain, who, like other neutral nations, suffered by the war, at length brought about a peace, which was signed at Rio, Aug. 28th, 1828, and, in substance, provided that the Banda Oriental should

become an independent state, under the mutual guarantee of the two contracting parties. Thus the war, after completely exhausting both Brazil and Buenos Ayres, ended in a drawn game as to the subject of the contest.

BANDELLO, Matteo, a novelist, born, about 1480, at Castelnuovo di Scrivia, studied at Rome and Naples, and applied himself almost exclusively to polite literature. He was, in his youth, a Dominican monk at Castelnuovo. He seems to have lived some years in Mantua, where Pirro Gonzaga and Camilla Bentivoglio intrusted to him the education of their daughter. He afterwards resided at Milan, until, after the battle of Pavia, the Spaniards banished him thence as a partisan of France. Upon this he went first to Ludovico Gonzaga, then to Cesare Fregoso, who had left the Venetian for the French service, and lived with the latter, in Piedmont, till the conclusion of the truce between the belligerent powers, and then followed him to France. After the death of his protector, he resided at Agen, with the family of the deceased, and, in 1550, was appointed bishop of that city. He left the administration of his diocese to the bishop of Grasse, and employed himself, at the advanced age of 70, in the completion of his novels, of which he published three volumes in 1554; a fourth was published in 1573, after his death. Camillo Franceschini also published his novels at Venice, in 1566, 4to. B. published, at Agen, in 1545, Canti XI delle Lodi della S. Lucrezia Gonzaga di Ganzuela e del Vero Amore, col Tempio di Pudicitia, and also two other poems; altogether of but little value. Other poems of his, found in manuscript at Turin, were printed by Costa, in 1816, under the title of Rime di Matteo Bandello. The novels of B. are distinguished by a natural simplicity, a rapid narration, and periods at once short and harmonious; but their contents are frequently impure. This reproach applies more to him than to Boccaccio, that he loves to dwell on wanton scenes, and to paint them in lively colors to the imagination.

BANDE NOIRE. When the revolution in France had rendered superfluous much ecclesiastical property, also many castles and residences of the emigrant and resident nobility, by the abolition of trusts and entails, and by the equal division of property among the children of these families, nothing was more natural than that, with the increase of population, societies should be formed to purchase 46

VOL. I.

the edifices which had thus become useless (churches, chapels, abbeys, monasteries, bishops' residences, parsonages, Gothic castles, with their prisons and other appurtenances, hunting lodges, watch-towers, &c.), and pull them down, just as the merchants of Amsterdam, on the decline of their prosperity, allowed the villas about that commercial city to be pulled down, or sold in order to be pulled down, by the slopers, so called. To many this seems a barbarous custom. In Germany, also, after the great secularization of cathedrals and monasteries, associa tions were formed, particularly of the Jews, who, with profit to themselves, bought the buildings which had become unnecessary, pulled them down, and sold the materials, as well as the state's domains, which had been alienated in large lots, and were now disposed of by them in small portions. The bande noire enriched itself from the sale of the materials for building, from the felling of wood in the parks, and from the disposal of land for gardens, meadows and fields. The public, too, were benefited at the same time. In places where this has frequently happened, the countryman dwells more comfortably, and is richer, than in many other quarters; for example, in the Pyrenees, and particularly in the southerly part of France.

BANDETTINI, Theresa, an improvisatrice, born at Lucca, about 1756, received a careful education, but was obliged (her family having lost their property) to go upon the stage. She made her first appearance in Florence, and was unsuccessful. This, united to her love for polite literature, led her to the most assiduous study of the poets. As she was one day listening to an improvisatore of Verona, her own genius broke forth in a splendid poetical panegyric on the poet. Encouraged by him, she devoted herself entirely to this beautiful art. Her originality, her fervid imagination, and the truth and harmony of her expression, soon gained for her a distinguished celebrity. She was enabled to abandon the stage, and travel through Italy; and she enjoyed the honor of being chosen a member of several academies. One of her most celebrated poems was that which she delivered, in 1794, impromptu, before the prince Lambertini, at Bologna, on the death of Marie Antoinette of France. In 1813, wearied with travelling, she returned to her native city, where she lived retired on her small property. She published Ode tre (Lucca, 4), of which the first celebrates

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Nelson's victory at Aboukir, the second Suwaroff's victories in Italy, and the third the victories of the archduke Charles in Germany. She also gave to the world, under the name of Amarilli Etrusca, Saggio di Versi Estemporanei (published, in Pisa, by Bodoni), among which the poem on Petrarch's interview with Laura, in the church, is particularly distinguished, and places her by the side of Rossi.

BANDIT (Ital. bandito); originally an exile, then a hired murderer. This name was given to the assassins (see Ishmaelites) of Italy. At the present time, in Italy, bandit and robber are almost synonymous. They form a kind of society of themselves, which is subjected to strict laws, and lives in open or secret war with the civil authorities, and are a disgraceful proof of its weakness, no Italian government having succeeded in extirpating them. The strict measures which the papal government adopted, in 1820, against persons who should harbor bandits and robbers, have indeed destroyed their lurking-places; but the villains who were formerly settled are now become vagabonds. Those, however, who infest the environs of Naples, are the peasants of the country, who, besides being engaged in agriculture, employ themselves in robbery and murder. The fear of capital punishment is ineffectual to deter them from these crimes. Peter the Calabrian, the most terrible among these robbers, in 1812, named himself, in imitation of the titles of Napoleon, "emperor of the mountains," "king of the woods," "protector of the conscribed," and "mediator of the highways from Florence to Naples." The government of Ferdinand I was compelled to make a compact with this bandit. One of the robbers entered the royal service, as a captain, in 1818, and engaged to take captive his former comrades. More lately, adventurers of all kinds have joined them. These bandits are to be distinguished from other robbers, who are called malviventi; and the Austrian troops, which occupied Naples, were obliged to send large detachments to repress them. It is remarkable, in these robbers, that they only attack travellers on the highways. This also is true of those who exact from strangers and natives a sum of money for protection, and give them in return a letter of security; which, a short time ago, was the case in Sicily, where the bandits dwell in the greatest numbers in the Val Demone. Here the prince of Villa Franca declared himself, from political and other views,

their protector: he gave them a livery, and treated them with much confidence, which they never abused; for even among them there is a certain romantic sense of honor derived from the middle ages. They keep their promises inviolate, and often take better care of the security of a place intrusted to them than the public authorities.

BANER, also BANNIER, John (in English, always written Baner), a Swedish general in the thirty years' war, descended from an old noble family of Sweden, was born in 1596. When a child, he fell from the castle of Hörnings-holm, four stories high, without being injured. Gustavus Adolphus, who valued him very much, early prophesied that he was destined for greatness. He made his first campaigns in Poland and Russia, and accompanied his king to Germany. After the death of Gustavus, in 1632, he had the chief command over 16,000 men, and was the terror of the enemy. He obtained the greatest glory by his victory at Wittstock, in 1636, over the imperial and Saxon troops; and it was also owing to his activity, that, after the battle of Nordlingen, the affairs of Sweden gradually improved. He died at Halberstadt, in 1641, under 45 years of age, and was suspected to have been poisoned. In him Sweden lost her ablest general, and the imperial troops their most dangerous enemy. B. was careful to engage in no enterprise without a reasonable probability of success. He knew how to avoid danger with dexterity, and to escape from a superior force. During his command, 30,000 of the enemy were killed, and 600 standards taken, on different occasions. He was always found at the head of his men, and maintained good discipline. He wanted patience for sieges. He has been accused of pride and severity. The pleasures of the table and of love occupied all the leisure time which his employments allowed him, and probably immoderate indulgence in them was the real poison which brought on his death. He was three times married.

BANGOR; a post-town and capital of the county of Penobscot, in Maine, on the W. side of Penobscot river, at the head of the tide and of navigation; 52 miles N. of Owl's-head, at the mouth of Penobscot bay; 68 miles N. E. of Augusta; lat. 44° 45′ N.; lon.68° 45′ W.: population, in 1820, 1221; in 1825, 2002. Its situation is pleasant, and very advantageous for commerce. It is a flourishing town, and contains a theological seminary with two professors, a court-house,

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