BASSANIO, the lover of Portia in the “Merchant of Venice.”

BASSANO, a town in Italy, on the Brenta, 30 m.  NW. of Padua; printing the chief industry.

BASSANO, DUC DE, an intriguing French diplomatist in the interest of Bonaparte, and his steadfast auxiliary to the last (1763-1839).

BASSANO, JACOPO DA PONTE, an eminent Italian painter, chiefly of country scenes, though the “Nativity” at his native town, Bassano, shows his ability in the treatment of higher themes (1510-1592).

BASSOMPIERRE, FRANCOIS DE, a marshal of France, born in Lorraine; entered military life under Henry IV., was a gallant soldier, and one of the most brilliant wits of his time; took part in the siege of Rochelle; incurred the displeasure of Richelieu; was imprisoned by his order twelve years in the Bastille; wrote his Memoirs there; was liberated on the death of Richelieu; his Memoirs contain a lively description of his contemporaries, the manners of the time, his own intrigues, no less than those of his friends and enemies (1579-1646).

BASSORAH (40), a port in Asiatic Turkey, on the Shatt-el-Arab; a place of great commercial importance when Bagdad was the seat of the caliphate; for a time sank into insignificance, but has of late revived.

BASTI`A (22), a town in NE.  Corsica, the most commercial in the island, and once the capital; was founded by the Genoese in 1383, and taken by the French in 1553; exports wine, oil, fruits, &c.

BASTIAN, ADOLF, an eminent ethnologist, born at Bremen; travelled over and surveyed, in the interest of his science, all quarters of the globe, and recorded the fruits of his survey in his numerous works, no fewer than thirty in number, beginning with “Der Mensch in der Geschichte,” in three vols.; conducts, along with Virchow and R. Hartman, the Zeitschrift fuer Ethnologie; b. 1826.

BASTIAN, DR. H. C., a physiologist, born at Truro; a materialist in his theory of life; a zealous advocate of the doctrine of spontaneous generation; b. 1837.

BASTIAT, FREDERIC, an eminent political economist, born at Bayonne; a disciple of Cobden’s; a great advocate of Free Trade; wrote on behalf of it and against Protection, “Sophismes Economiques”; a zealous Anti-Socialist, and wrote against Socialism (1801-1850).

BASTIDE, JULES, French Radical writer, born in Paris; took part in the Revolution of 1848, and became Minister of Foreign Affairs (1800-1879).

BASTILLE (lit. the Building), a State prison in Paris, built originally as a fortress of defence to the city, by order of Charles V., between 1369 and 1382, but used as a place of imprisonment from the first; a square structure, with towers and dungeons for the incarceration of the prisoners, the whole surrounded by a moat, and accessible only by drawbridges; “tyranny’s stronghold”; attacked by a mob on 14th July 1789; taken chiefly by noise; overturned, as “the city of Jericho, by miraculous sound”; demolished, and the key of it sent to Washington; the taking of it was the first event in the Revolution.  See Carlyle’s “French Revolution” for the description of the fall of it.