highly esteemed. He wrote also many other learned pieces, and died in 1248. BACON (Roger), a Franciscan friar of surprising genius and learning; born near Ilchester in Somersetshire, in 1214. He studied first at Oxford, and afterwards at Paris, which, in those times, was esteemed the centre of literature. Here he made so rapid a progress in the sciences, that he was esteemed the glory of that university, and much caressed by several of his countrymen, particularly Robert Grouthead, afterwards bishop of Lincoln, his friend and patron. About 1240 he returned to Oxford, and, assuming the Franciscan habit, prosecuted experimental philosophy, with unremitting ardor. In this pursuit, in experiments, instruments, and in scarce books, he tells us, he spent, in the space of twenty years, no less than £2000, which was given him by some of the heads of the university. But such extraordinary talents, and his astonishing progress in sciences, which, in that ignorant age, were totally unknown to the rest of mankind, whilst they raised the admiration of the more intelligent few, could not fail to excite the envy and malice of his illiterate fraternity; who found no difficulty in propagating the notion of Bacon's dealing with the devil. Under this pretence, he was restrained from reading lectures; his writings were confined to his convent; and, in 1278, he himself was imprisoned in his cell. At this time he was sixty-four years of age. Nevertheless, being permitted the use of his books, he went on in the rational pursuit of knowledge, corrected his former labors, and wrote several curious pieces. When he had been ten years in confinement, Jerome de Ascoli being elected pope, Bacon solicited his holiness to be released; and towards the end of that pope's reign, obtained his liberty. He spent the remainder of his life in the college of his order, where he died in 1294, in the eightieth year of his age, and was buried in the Franciscan church. Such are the few particulars, which the most diligent researches have been able to discover concerning this very great man; who, like a single bright star in a dark hemisphere, shone forth in an age of ignorance and superstition, the light and glory of his country. His works are: 1. Epistola fratris Rogeri Baconis, de Secretis Operibus Artis et Naturæ, et de Nullitate Magiæ. Paris, 1542, 4to. Basil, 1593, 8vo. 2. Opus Majus. Lond. 1733, fol. published by Dr. Jebb. 3. Thesaurus Chenicus. Francf. 1603, 1620. This was probably the editor's title; but it contains several of our author's treatises on this subject. There are said to remain in different libraries several manuscripts of his not yet published. BACON (Sir Nathaniel), K. B. and an excellent painter, was a younger son of Sir Nicholas, and half brother to the great Francis Bacon. He studied painting in Italy; but his manner and coloring approaches nearer to the style of the Flemish school. Mr. Walpole observes, that at Culford, where he lived, are preserved some of his works; and at Gorhambury, his father's seat, is a large picture by him in oil, of a cook-maid with a dead fowl, admirably painted. In the same house is a whole length of him, by himself, drawn on paper, his sword and pallet hung up, and a half length of his mother by him. BACON (Sir Nicholas), lord keeper of the great seal in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, was born at Chislehurst in Kent, 1510, and educated at Cambridge; after which he travelled into France, and visited Paris. On his return, he settled in Gray's Inn, and quickly distinguished himself so much, that on the dissolution of the monastery of St. Edmund's Bury, in Suffolk, he had a grant from king Henry VIII. of several manors. Two years after he was made attorney in the court of Wards, a place both of honor and profit. In this office he was continued by Edward VI. and in 1552 he was elected treasurer of Gray's Inn. His great moderation and consummate prudence preserved him through the dangerous reign of queen Mary. In the very dawn of that of Elizabeth he was knighted; and in 1558, the great seal of England being taken from archbishop Heath, was delivered to him with the title of lord keeper, and he was made one of the queen's privy council. He had a considerable share in the settling of religion: as a statesman he was remarkable for a clear head and deep counsels: but his great parts and high preferment were far from raising him in his own opinion, as appears from the modest answer he gave queen Elizabeth, when she told him his house at Red-grave was too little for him: 'Not so, madam,' returned he, 'your majesty has made me too great for my house.' After having held the great seal more than twenty years, this able statesman and faithful counsellor met with his death by falling asleep in his room with a window open, and the current of fresh air blowing in upon him. He awoke very ill, and was immediately removed into his bed-chamber, where he died in a few days, i. e. on the 26th of February, 1578-9. He was buried in St. Paul's, where a monument was erected to him, which was destroyed by the fire in 1666. Sir Nicholas was the first lord keeper that ranked as lord chancellor. He was twice married; by his first wife he had three sons and three daughters; and by his second, two sons, Anthony and Francis. Sir Nicholas left several manuscripts, which have never been printed. BACON (John), an ingenious sculptor, born in Southwark in 1740. He very early manifested an inclination for drawing, which was encouraged by binding him as an apprentice to a manufacturer of china, at Lambeth, when about fifteen years of age. Here a considerable part of his employment was to paint on porcelain, in which he improved himself so much, in forming small ornamental pieces, that within two years all the models of the manufactory were committed to him. This situation also afforded him an opportunity of seeing various models executed by other artists, which were sent to a neighbouring pottery to be burnt. In 1758 he obtained a premium from the society for the encouragement of the arts, for a small figure of Peace, after the manner of the antique; and eight different promiums afterwards for other figures. Before his apprenticeship was out, he formed a design of making statues in artificial stone, which he afterwards perfected, and which is still carried on in a manufactory in the New Road, with suc cess. He first began to work in marble about 1763, and soon invented an instrument for transferring the form of the model to the marble (getting out the points as artists call it), which other sculptors have since adopted. In 1769 he received the first gold medal bestowed by the Royal Society, and next year was chosen an associate. The exhibition of his statue of Mars greatly increased his reputation; and Dr. Markham, since archbishop of York, employed him to make a bust of the king, to be placed in the hall of Christ Church College, Oxford. While he was modelling this bust, his majesty asked him 'if he had ever been out of the kingdom;' and receiving an answer in the negative, said, 'I am glad of it, you will be the greater honor to it.' By the execution of this work he obtained the royal patronage, and was employed to form another for the University of Gottingen. In 1777 he was engaged in preparing a model of a monument, to be erected in Guy's hospital to the memory of the founder, which he executed in such a manner, as recommended him to that of Lord Chatham, at Guildhall. In 1778 he became a royal academician, and finished a handsome monument to the memory of Mrs. Draper, which is in Bristol cathedral. From this period, his works are so numerous, that we can only mention a few of the principal:-Two groups for the top of Somerset-house; a statue of Judge Blackstone, for All Soul's College, Oxford; another of Henry VI. for Eton College; Lord Chatham's monument in Westminster Abbey; and Dr. Johnson's and Mr. Howard's in St. Paul's cathedral. He died of an inflammation in his bowels, in 1799, and left a widow and eight children. He was a man of most excellent character, and of his religious principles, let the inscription which he ordered to be placed over his grave testify: 'What I was as an artist, seemed to me of some importance while I lived; but what I really was, as a believer in Christ Jesus is the only thing of importance to me now.' Mr. Bacon also possessed respectable literary talents. BA CON, n. s. probably from baken, that is, dried flesh. The flesh of a hog salted and dried. No wine ne drank she, neyther white ne red, When it had stabbed or broke a head, Chaucer. Hudibras. High o'er the hearth a chine of bacon hung, Dryden. BACON, the flesh of swine, salted, dried, and generally, in this country, smoked. It is a considerable article of commerce: we shall describe the most approved methods of preserving it; viz. that adopted in Somersetshire. The last three months of the year are selected as best adapted for curing bacon here. When a hog is killed for bacon, the sides are laid in large wooden troughs, and sprinkled all over with bay salt; thus they are left for twenty-four hours, to drain away the blood and the superfluous juices. After this first preparation, they should be taken out, wiped very dry, and the drainings thrown away. Next some fresh bay-salt, well heated it. a large iron frying-pan, is to be rubbed over the meat, until it has absorbed a sufficient quantity, and this friction repeated four successive days, while the meat is turned only every other day. If large hogs are killed, the flitches should be kept in brine for three weeks, and, during that period, turned ten times, then taken out, and thoroughly dried in the usual manner; for, unless they be thus managed, it is impossible to preserve them in a sweet state, nor will their flavor be equal to those properly cured. As the preservation of the salt used in this process, when carried on to a great extent, may be an object of economy, the following method may be adopted for recovering the saline matter contained in these drainings, or in any other brine; it was communicated by a person who had seen it practised on the continent, where culinary salt is sold at a considerable price. He first added such a quantity of boiling-water, to the brine or drainings, as was sufficient to dissolve all the particles of the salt. This solution he then placed in either an iron or earthen vessel, over a fire, which, by boiling, forced all the feculent animal particles to the top, so that they were carefully removed by a perforated ladle. After the liquid had become clear, it was set aside for twenty-four hours, in a cool place, that the coloring matter might subside. But, as the combination it had formed with the boiled liquor was very tenacious, he contrived two different ways of separating it: 1. A solution of alum in water, one pint to an ounce of that substance was gradually dropt into the cold liquor, in the proportion of a table-spoonful of the former to every gallon of the latter; and the whole allowed to stand for several hours; or, 2. If time and circumstances would permit, he filtered the liquor by means of long flannel slips, cut longitudinally by the web, but previously soaked in another strong and perfectly clear solution of salt; these slips were so immersed into the colored fluid that the projecting external end reached another vessel, which had been placed much lower than that containing the brine, or drainings. When these particulars were properly attended to, the absorbed liquor became almost colorless, and pellucid. Having thus procured a clear liquid solution, nothing more was required than to evaporate it to dryness, in order to reproduce the salt in its original granulated form. process may be imitated without any difficulty, and at very little expense. Dr. Willich, from whose Domestic Encyclopædia we now quote, says, the second method of discharging the color is preferable; as by this no alum will be required, which only contaminates the salt. This BACON, THE SERVICE OF THE, a custom, mentioned by our old historians and law-writers; as well as in the Spectator, as held in the manor of Whichenacre in Staffordshire, and in the priory of Dunnow in Essex. In the former of these places, by an ancient grant of the lord, a flitch of bacon, with half a quarter of wheat, was to be given to every married couple who could swear that having been married a year and a day, they would never within that time have once ex- BACON, a town of Persia, in the province of BACON'S ISLAND, a small island in the Chi- BACONGEN, a town on the west coast of the island of Sumatra. Long. 6° 58′ E., lat. 2° 52′ N. BACONO, a river of the Caraccas, South America. It runs in the mountains near Truxillo, and serves as a line of demarcation to the provinces of Varinas and Venezuela. Thence passing through the plains, it enters the Guanare, which discharges its waters into the Portugueza. There is a settlement of the same name near its source. BACONTHORPE, or BACONDORP (John), styled the resolute doctor, a learned monk, bom in the thirteenth century at Baconsthorp, in Norfolk. He spent the early part of his life in the convent of Blackney, near Walsingham; whence he removed to Oxford, and thence to Paris; where he obtained degrees in divinity and law, and was esteemed the principal of the Averroists. In 1329 he returned to England, and was chosen twelfth provincial of the English Carmelites. In 1333 he was sent for to Rome; where, we are told, he first maintained the pope's sovereign authority in cases of divorce, but that he afterwards retracted his opinion. He died in London in 1346, with the character of a monk of genius and learning. He wrote, 1. Commentaria seu Quæstiones super Quatuor Libros Sententiarum; and 2. Compendium Legis Christi, et quodlibeta: both which underwent several editions at Paris, Milan, and Cremona. Leland, Bale, and Pits, mention a number of his works never published. BACOPA, in botany, a genus of plants of the class pentandria, and order monogynia. Its generic characters are CAL. perianth, one-leaved : COR. one-petalled: STAM. filaments, five; antheræ, sagittate: PIST. germ, ovate; style short; stigma, headed: PER. capsule, one-celled; seeds, very many. The only species is the B. aquatica, native of Cayenne. Linn. Spec. Plant. BACOUE (Leo), a French divine of the seHe was first of the Protestventeenth century. ant persuasion, but afterwards changed to the Roman Catholic faith, turned Franciscan, and was made bishop of Pamiers. He was author of a Latin poem on the education of a prince. He died in 1694, in his ninety-fourth year. BACRAG, the same with Baccharach wine. BACRAS, a town of Sennaar, in Africa, twenty-five miles east of Sennaar. BACRE, a small town in the territory of Sierra Leone. Long. 12° 11′ W., lat. 8° 40′ N. BACTISHUA (George Ebn), a Christian physician at the court of the caliph Almansor who sent him as a present 3000 dinars, with three beautiful girls to supply the place of his wife, who was old: Bactishua sent them back, observing that his religion forbad him to have more than one woman for his wife. BACTRIA, or BACTRIANA, now Chorassan, or Khorasan, an ancient kingdom of Asia, bounded on the west by Margiana, on the north by the Oxus, on the south by Mount Paropismus, and on the east by the Asiatic Scythia and the country of the Massagetæ. It was a large, fruitful, and well-peopled country; containing, according to Ammianus Marcellinus, 1000 cities, though of these only a few are particularly mentioned; of which, that formerly called Maracanda, now Samarcand, is the most considerable. Of the history of this country we know but little. Authors agree that it was subdued first by the Assyrians, afterwards by Cyrus, and then by Alexander the Great. Afterwards it remained subject to Seleucus Nicator and his successors, till the time of Antiochus Theos; when Theodotus, from governor of that province, became king, and strengthened himself so effectually in his kingdom, while Antiochus was engaged in a war with Ptolemy Philadelphus, king of Egypt, that he could never afterwards dispossess him of his acquisitions. His posterity enjoyed the kingdom for some time, till they were driven out by the Scythians, who possessed Bactria during the reigns of Adrian, Antoninus Pius, &c. The Scythians were in their turn driven out by the Huns and Turks, and these often conquered by the Saracens and Tartars; although they were in possession of this country, in the time of Ladis laus IV. king of Hungary. BACTRIANS, the inhabitants of Bactria. In ancient times they differed little in their manners from the Nomades; and being near neighbours of the Scythians, who were a very warlike people, the Bactrian soldiers were reckoned the best in the world. Their appearance was very savage; they being of an enormous stature, having rough beards, and long hair hanging down their shoulders. Some authors assert that they kept dogs on purpose to devour such as arrived at extreme old age, or who were exhausted by long sickness. They add, that for all their fierceness, the Bactrian husbands were such dupes to their wives, that they durst not complain of them even for conjugal infidelity, to which it seems the latter were very much addicted. BACTRIANUS, in zoology, a species of the camel. Its ge BACTRIS, in botany, a genus of plants of the class monoecia, order hexandria. neric characters are CAL. spathe universal, oneleaved: COR. one-petalled: STAM. filaments, six; antheræ, oblong: PIST. germ, ovate; style, very short; stigma, headed: PER. drupe, coriaceous, seed-nut, roundish. The species are, 1. B. minor fructibus, &c. seu cocos (quincensis) acueata, &c. a shrub, native of South America. 2. B. major fructu, &c. seu fructus exoticus, a shrub, native of South America. BACTRIS, in entomology, a species of bruchus. BACTROPERATÆ, from ßaктрov, a staff, and pa, a bag; an ancient appellation given to philosophers by way of contempt, denoting a man with a staff and a budget. It seems to be of this sect that Paschasius Radbertus speaks, under the corrupt names of Baccoperitæ, or Bacchionita, whom he describes as philosophers who, by way of contempt for earthly things, kept nothing but a dish to drink out of; and that one of this order seeing a peasant scooping up the water in his hand, threw away his cup as a superfluity. BACULARES, a sect of Anabaptists, so called, as holding it unlawful to bear a sword, or any other arms, besides a staff. BACULARIUS, in writers of the middle age, an ecclesiatical apparitor or verger: who carries a staff, baculus, in his hand, as an ensign of his office. BACULE, in fortification, a kind of portcullis, or gate, made like a pit-fall with a counterpoise, and supported by two great stakes. It is usually made before the corps du guard, near the gate of a place. BACULI. See BACILLI. BACULI STI. PAULI, batoons of St. Paul, a kind of figured stones, of the same substance with those resembling the bristles of some American echini, called by Dr. Plott, lapides Judaica. BACULO'METRY, n. s. From baculus, Lat. and μerpov. The art of measuring distances by one or more staves. BACULOMETRY. See GEOMETRY. BACULOSUS ECCLESIASTICUS, in some ancient laws, is used for a bishop, or abbot, dignified with the pastoral staff, or crozier. BACULUS DIVINATORIUS, OF VIRGULA DIVINA. See BAGUETTE DIVINATOIRE. BACURIUS, or BATURIUS, king of the Iberians, a people on the side of the Caspian sea. One day being hunting, he lost sight of his company, through a great storm and sudden darkness; upon which he vowed to the God of his christian slave, that if he were delivered, he would worship him alone: the day breaking up immediately, he is said to have made good his promise, and became the apostle of his country. BAD', adj. BAD'LY, adv. Quoad, Dut.; Sax. baed; Ger. bös; probably connected BAD'NESS, n.s. with the Lat. pejus, worse, and the Heb. bosch. Comparative worse; superlative worst. Bad respects moral and physical qualities indiscriminately; whatever offends the taste and sentiments of a rational being, is bad; food is bad when it disagrees with the constitution; the air is bad which has any thing in it disagreeable to the senses or hurtful to the body; books are bad which only inflame the imagination and the passions. In one word, bad is equally descriptive of mental, moral, and corporeal disease, and implies misfortune or delinquency, only from its application. Badly means in the manner of bad. It is always annexed to the action; but never to the quality of things. "Tis good; though music oft hath such a charm, To make bad good, and good provoke to harm. |