BERWICKSHIRE (32), a fertile Scottish county between the Lammermoors, inclusive, and the Tweed; is divided into the Merse, a richly fertile plain in the S., the Lammermoors, hilly and pastoral, dividing the Merse from Mid and East Lothian, and Lauderdale, of hill and dale, along the banks of the Leader; Greenlaw the county town.

BERZE`LIUS, JOHAN JAKOB, Baron, a celebrated Swedish chemist, one of the creators of modern chemistry; instituted the chemical notation by symbols based on the notion of equivalents; determined the equivalents of a great number of simple bodies, such as cerium and silenium; discovered silenium, and shared with Davy the honour of propounding the electro-chemical theory; he ranks next to Linnaeus as a man of science in Sweden (1779-1848).

BESANCON (57), capital of the dep. of Doubs, in France; a very strong place; fortified by Vauban; abounds in relics of Roman and mediaeval times; watchmaking a staple industry, employing some 15,000 of the inhabitants; manufactures also porcelain and carpets.

BESANT, MRS. ANNIE, nee WOOD, born in London; of Irish descent; married to an English clergyman, from whom she was legally separated; took a keen interest in social questions and secularism; drifted into theosophy, of which she is now an active propagandist; is an interesting woman, and has an interesting address as a lecturer; b. 1847.

BESANT, SIR WALTER, a man of letters, born at Portsmouth; eminent chiefly as a novelist of a healthily realistic type; wrote a number of novels jointly with James Rice, and is the author of “French Humourists,” as well as short stories; champion of the cause of Authors versus Publishers, and is chairman of the committee; b. 1838.

BESENVAL, BARON, a Swiss, commandant of Paris under Louis XVI.; a royalist stunned into a state of helpless dismay at the first outbreak of the Revolution in Paris; could do nothing in the face of it but run for his life (1722-1791).

BESIKA BAY, a bay on the Asiatic coast, near the mouth of the Dardanelles.

BESME, a Bohemian in the pay of the Duke of Guise; assassinated Coligny, and was himself killed by Berteauville, a Protestant gentleman, in 1571.

BESS, GOOD QUEEN, a familiar name of Queen Elizabeth.

BESSARA`BIA (1,688), a government in the SW. of Russia, between the Dniester and the Pruth; a cattle-breeding province; exports cattle, wool, and tallow.

BESSAR`ION, JOHN, cardinal, native of Trebizond; contributed by his zeal in Greek literature to the fall of scholasticism and the revival of letters; tried hard to unite the Churches of the East and the West; joined the latter, and was made cardinal; too much of a Grecian to recommend himself to the popehood, to which he was twice over nearly elevated (1395-1472).

BESSEL, FRIEDRICH WILHELM, a Prussian astronomer of prominent ability, born at Minden; professor of Mathematics at Koenigsberg, and director of the Observatory; discovered—­what was a great achievement—­the parallax of the fixed star 61 Cygne; his greatest work, “Fundamenta Astronomiae,” on which he spent 10 years, a marvel, like all he did, of patient toil and painstaking accuracy (1784-1846).