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I. at the battle of Marignan; and that prince afterwards insisted on being knighted by his hand, after the manner of the ancient knights. The chevalier Bayard defended Mezieres during six weeks against Charles V.'s army. In 1524, at the retreat of Rebec (the general Bonnivet having been wounded and obliged to quit the field), the conduct of the rear was committed to Bayard, who, though so much a stranger to the arts of a court that he never rose to the chief command, was always called, in time of real danger, to the posts of greatest difficulty and importance. He put himself at the head of the men at arms and animating them by his presence and example to sustain the whole shock of the enemy, he gained time for his countrymen to make good their retreat. But in this service he received a wound which he immediately perceived to be mortal; and being unable to continue on horseback, ordered an attendant to place him under a tree, with his face towards the enemy; then fixing his eyes on his sword, which he held up instead of a cross, he addressed his prayers to God; and in this posture calmly waited the approach of death. Bourbon, who led the foremost of the enemy's troops, found him in this situation, and expressing his regret and pity at the sight, Pity not me,' cried the high spirited chevalier, I die as a man of honor ought, in the discharge of my duty; they indeed are objects of pity, who fight against their king, their country, and their oath. The marquis of Pescara, passing soon after, manifested his admiration of Bayard's virtue, as well as his sorrow for his fate, with the generosity of a gallant enemy; and finding that he could not be removed with safety from that spot, ordered a tent to be pitched, and appointed proper persons to attend him. He died, notwithstanding their care, as his ancestors for several generations had done, in the field of battle. Pescara ordered his body to be embalmed, and sent to his relations; and such was the respect paid to military merit in that age, that the duke of Savoy commanded it to be received with royal honors in all the cities of his dominions.

BAYAS, a town at the foot of Mount Amanus, on the gulf of Issus (now of Scanderun), the key to the celebrated defile (the Pyla Amanicæ of the ancients), between it and Alexandretta (Scanderùn). The neighboring country is fertile, and the mountains, in summer time, a delightful retreat. It is exactly opposite the Ayàs, the ancient Ega, where the survey of the southern coast of Asia Minor, by captain Beaufort, in 1812, was unfortunately terminated. The Aghàs, in this and the neighbouring places, have long bid defiance to the authority of the Porte. See Beaufort's Karamania.

BAYAZID, or BAJAZID, a city of Turkish Armenia, in the pachalic of Erzerum, on the declivity of a mountain, the summit of which, as well as the whole of this place, is strongly fortified. It contains two churches, three mosques, and an ancient monastery called Karu Rilleesea, celebrated for its beautiful architecture. The inhabitants, who amount to about 30,000, are esteemed the most handsome and warlike people in Armenia. The majority are Turks. Distant fifty miles S. S. W. of Erivan, and 140 east of Er

zerum.

BAYEN (Peter), a celebrated French chemist, was born in 1725, at Chalons sur Marne. Having received a classical education, he studied pharmacy; and, during the seven years' war, was chief apothecary to the French army in Germany. He was afterwards employed in analysing the mineral waters of France, on completing which, he settled at Paris, where he pursued his chemical experiments with great reputation, till his death in 1801. He pursued a tedious but certain mode of analysing minerals, by exposing them, without being reduced to powder, to the action of sulphuric acid at the temperature of the atmosphere; after this action had continued for a length of time, he got by lixiviation the sulphates formed by the combination of the acid with the different component elements of the stone. He did not make use of the trituration of the stone to an impalpable powder, nor its fusion with caustic potash, which facilitate the action of acids, and which are used with so much advantage at present. The account he has publised of his analysis will, nevertheless, be instructive to the chemical student. His chemical tracts have been collected in 2 vols. 8vo.

BAYER (John), a German lawyer and astronomer of the latter part of the sixteenth and be ginning of the seventeenth century, but in wit particular year or place he was born, is not certainly known: however, his name will be ever memorable in the annals of astronomy, on account of his excellent work, published in 1603, under the title of Uranometria, being a complete celestial atlas, or large folio charts of all the constellations, with a nomenclature collected from all the tables of astronomy, ancient and modern. By mears of the Greek letters, which he used as marks of their relative magnitudes, the stars of the heavens may, with as great facility, be distinguished and referred to, as the several places of the earth, are by means of geographical tables; and our celestial globes and atlasses have ever since retained this method. Astronomers, in speaking of any star in the constellation, denote it by saying it is marked by Bayer, a, or ß, or y, &c. He greatly improved and augmented this work by subquent study. At length, in 1627, it was re-published under a new title, viz. Cœlum Stellatum Christianum, i. e. the Christian Stellated Heaven, or the Starry Heavens Christianised; in th edition the Heathen names and characters, or figures of the constellations, were rejected, arothers taken from the scriptures, were inservi in their stead, an innovation, however, too gTUL for general reception. In later editions of Is work (in those of 1654 and 1661), the ancil figures and names were restored.

BAYER (Theophilus Sigfred), a learned phis loger and antiquarian, born at Kongsberg 1694, applied himself successfully to the study of the eastern languages, particularly the Cnese, of which he acquired a great knowledge When about twenty-three years of age, he was appointed librarian at Konigsberg. In 1726 m accepted of an invitation to Petersburgh, and wa there made professor of Greek and Roman *** quities. In 1730, he published a very curr and learned work, entitled Museum Si 2 vols. 8vo. He died at Petersburgh in 172

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BAYEUX, a considerable town of France (the Beducassum and Bajoce, of ancient geography), in the department of Calvados, and late province of Normandy. It was formerly the capital of Bessin, and is still a bishop's see, whose jurisdiction extends over all the department. The cathedral church is accounted one of the finest in France, and contains a celebrated piece of tapestry, representing the conquest of England by William I., supposed to have been the work of his queen Matilda. It consists of a web of linen, 442 feet in length, and about two feet in breadth. It is situated on the river Aure, four miles from the English Channel; and carries on a good trade in corn, cattle, hemp, and butter, as well as in its own manufactures of lace, camblets, stockings, and leather. Inhabitants about 10,000. BAYEUX (George), an advocate at Caen, who obtained the prize from the academy at Rouen for a poem on Filial Piety. He translated the Fasti of Ovid, on which he added valuable notes, printed in 4 vols. 8vo. He wrote also Reflections on the Reign of Trajan, 4to. He was, however, unfortunate, and having been imprisoned at Orleans, fell in the massacre which took place there in 1792.

BAYLA, or BELA, a town of Persia, capital of the district of Lus, in the province of Mekran. It is situated on the north-east banks of the river Pooralie, and about a third of it is surrounded by a good mud wall. It consists of above 2000 mud and wood houses, of which 250 or 300 are inhabited by Hindoos, who are well treated here. Bayla is, on the whole, a neat town, the residence of the jam, or chief of Lus, who seems dependent on the khan of Kelat. His durbar, or hall of audience, is a very ordinary apartment. The cemetery of the jam and his family contains several curious tombs, ornamented with black and white pebbles, arranged in short quotations from the koran, and encircled with wreaths of the same substance, which produce a pleasing effect. Distant 293 miles north of Kelat.

BAYLE (Peter), author of the Historical and Critical Dictionary, was born November 18, 1657, at Carlat, in France, where his father John Bayle was a protestant minister. In 1666 he went to the protestant university at Puylaurens, and in 1669 removed to that of Toulouse, whither protestants at that time frequently sent their children to avail themselves of the learning of the Jesuits; but here, to the great grief of his father, he embraced the Romish religion; being, however, soon sensible of his error, he left that university, and went to study at Geneva. After this he was chosen professor of philosophy at Sedan; but that protestant university being suppressed by Louis XIV. in 1687, he was obliged to leave the city, and was soon after chosen professor of philosophy and history at Rotterdam, with a salary of about £45 a year. In 1682 appeared his Letter concerning Comets. And Father Maimbourg having published his History of Calvinism, wherein he endeavours to draw upon the protestants the contempt and resentment of the catholics, Mr. Bayle wrote a piece to confute it. The reputation which he had now acquired, induced the States of Friezland, in 1684, to offer him a professorship in their univerVOL. III.

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sity; but he wrote them a letter of thanks, and declined the offer. This same year he began to publish his Nouvelles de la republique des Lettres. In 1686 he was drawn into a dispute with the famous Christina queen of Sweden. His Journal for April had noticed a printed letter, supposed to have been written by her Swedish majesty to Chevalier de Terlon, wherein she condemns the persecution of the protestants in France; and had observed, that her tolerant spirit was a remainder of protestantism.' This produced a letter to the philosopher, from that singular woman, in which she says, 'You express so much respect and affection for me, that I pardon you sincerely; and I would have you know, that nothing gave me offence but that remainder of protestantism, of which you accused me. I am very delicate upon that head, because nobody can suspect me of it, without lessening my glory, and injuring me in the most sensible manner. My fortune, my blood, and even my life, are entirely devoted to the service of the church; but I flatter nobody, and will never speak any thing but the truth.' Mr. Bayle replied in a subsequent number of his work, to that princess's entire satisfaction. The persecution which the protestants at this time suffered in France affected Mr. Bayle extremely. He made occasionally some reflections on their sufferings in his journal; and some time afterwards he published his Commentaire Philosophique upon these words, Compel them to come in;' and in the year 1690 appeared his famous Avis aux Refugiez, &c. which so excited the anger of M. Jurieu, that he charged the author with being a traitor against the state. Bayle retorted with the utmost severity, and Jurieu replied with equal bitterness; till at last the magistracy of Amsterdam enjoined the controversialists not to publish any thing against each other before it had been examined by Mr. Boyer, the pensionary of Rotterdam. In Nov. 1690, Bayle advertised a Scheme for a Critical Dictionary. The public not approving his first plan, he threw it into a different form; and the first volume was published in August, 1695, the second in October following. The work at last was extremely well received by the public; but it engaged him in fresh disputes, particularly with M. Jurieu and the Abbé Renaudot. Jurieu endeavoured to engage the ecclesiastical assemblies to condemn the dictionary; and presented it to the senate sitting at Delft, but they took no notice of the affair. The consistory of Rotterdam granted Mr. Bayle a hearing; and after having heard his answers to their remarks, declared themselves satisfied. Jurieu made another attempt with the consistory in 1698; and so far prevailed with them, that they exhorted Mr. Bayle to be more cautious with regard to his principles in the second enlarged edition of his dictionary, which was published in 1702. Bayle was a most indefatigable writer. In one of his letters to Maizeaux, he says, that since his twentieth year, he hardly remembers to have had any leisure. His intense application contributed to impair his constitution, and to increase a pulmonary disorder which had cut off several of his family. Judging it to be mortal he would take no remedies. He died the twenty-eighth of De

2 Y

cember, 1706, after he had been writing the greatest part of the day. Voltaire says of the Critical Dictionary it is the first work of the kind in which a man may learn to think;' and remarks, that the decree of the parliament of Toulouse, when it declared his will valid in France, notwithstanding the rigor of the laws,' added, that such a man could not be considered as a foreigner.' Bayle, however, has been more correctly characterised as a sophist rather than a philosopher. With great powers of distinguishing truth from falsehood, he pushed enquiry into universal doubt, and remained in doubt because he thought indifferentism to truth a virtue, and therefore cultivated it. In private life he is said to have been an unassuming and temperate man; but his writings abound with the bigotry of scepticism, and contain not a few uncharitable insinuations against that religious zeal which he never felt moreover, he is notoriously indelicate, and seems as if laboring to atone for distracting by debauching the tyro's mind. Lord Lyttleton finely expostulates with him under the assumed character of Mr. Locke, in his Dialogues of e Dead, vol. ii. Dialogue 24. p. 315. You have endeavoured,' says this excellent writer, and with some degree of success, to shake those foundations, on which the whole moral world, and the great fabric of social happiness, entirely rest; how could you, as a philosopher, in the sober hours of reflection, answer for this to your conscience, even supposing you had doubts of the truth of a system, which gives to virtue its sweetest hope, to impenitent vice its greatest fears, and to true penitence its best consolations; which restrains even the least approaches to guilt, and yet makes those allowances for the infirmities of our nature, which the stoic pride denied to it, but which its real imperfection, and the goodness of its infinitely benevolent Creator, so evidently require?'

BAYLY (Lewis), author of the Practice of Piety. He was born at Caermarthen in Wales, educated at Oxford, made minister of Evesham in Worcestershire, about 1611, became chaplain to king James, and was promoted to the see of Bangor in 1616. His celebrated book was dedicated to Charles, prince of Wales; in 1734 it had reached the fifty-ninth edition. He died in

1632.

BAYNES (John), an English lawyer, born at Middleham, in Yorkshire, in 1758. He received the first part of his education at Richmond school, and afterwards went to Trinity College, Cambridge, from whence he removed to Gray's Inn. He became a member of the Constitutional Society, and wrote a number of anonymous pieces, chiefly political, in prose and verse. There has also been attributed to him an Archæological Letter on the subject of the poems printed by Chatterton under the name of Rowley, addressed to dean Milles. He proposed the repubication of lord Coke's tracts, a design prevented by his death in 1787.

BAYNES (Sir Thomas), an English physician, born about 1622, was educated at Christ's College, Cambridge, where he applied to the study of physic. He afterwards became professor of music at Gresham College; and travelled with

Sir John Finch to Italy and Constantinople. He died at Constantinople in 1681, much lamented by his companion, who survived him but a short time. They left between them £4000 to Christ's College.

BAYONET, v. & n. Fr. bayonette. A short sword or dagger fixed at the end of a musket, by which the foot hold off the horse, so called because the first bayonets were made at Bayonne, in France.

One of the black spots is long and slender, and resembles a dagger or bayonet. Woodward. You send troops to sabre and bayonet us into submission. Burke.

Not a single head Was spared-three thousand Moslems perish'd here, And sixteen bayonets pierced the seraskier. Byrom

You should but give few cartridges to such Troops as are meant to march with greatest glory on. When matters must be carried by the touch Of the bright bayonet, and they all should hurry on, They sometimes, with a hankering for existence, Keep merely firing at a foolish distance.

The town was entered: first one column made

Its sanguinary way good-then another.
The reeking bayonet and the flashing blade
Clashed 'gainst the scimitar,

BAYONETS were formerly made with a round handle fitted to the bore of a firelock, and to be fixed there after the soldier had fired; but they are now made with iron handles and rings, that go over the muzzle, and are screwed fast, so that the soldier fires with his bayonet on the muzzle of his piece, and is ready at once to act This use of the bayonet fastened on the muzzle was a great improvement, first introduced by the French; to which, according to M. Folard, they owed a great part of their victories for some time afterwards; and to the neglect of this, in sueceeding wars, and trusting to their fire, the same author attributes most of the losses they sustained. Of late the bayonet has come into very general use; and some battles have been won by it without firing a shot. It was much encouraged by Frederick the Great, who caused an inch and a half to be added to the length of the Prussian bayonet.

A French writer, in a work entitled L'Essai général de la Tactique, has proposed a method of exercising soldiers in a species of fencing or tilting with this weapon. But, as another very sensible author, Mauvillon, in his Essai sur l'Influence de la Poudre à Canon dans l'Art de la Guerre Moderne, justly asks, how can any man tilt or fence with so cumbrous an instrument and so difficult to be handled, as the firelock? It seems probable that great advantage may be ob tained by a person who has been taught to re such a weapon scientifically, when contending with an individual; but the niceties of parrying are not applicable to the charge in line; a firm grasp and a quick and steady thrust are what s required.

BAYONNA, a well-built town of the province of Galicia, in Spain, situated on a small bay of the Atlantic. It contains a collegiate church, a Franciscan convent, and a hospital; and is defended by a castle, with a governer, and a small garrison. The inhabitants obtam

the soil barren, but it still affords good pasturage, and black cattle of a superior breed and sheep are reared here. The lower division, Unterland, is flat, and in some parts sandy; but affords much fertile soil, and good crops of grain and tobacco. The last is sent in great quantities to Hamburgh and Bremen. Bayreuth is not destitute of minerals; iron and marble are found in Oberland; flax also constitutes a considerable production here, in spinning and working which into linen as well as into lace, a large portion of the population is employed. At the peace of Tilsit, Buonaparte appropriated this principality and annexed it to the kingdom of Bavaria in 1810. The upper division is included in the Circle of the Maine, the lower in that of the Rezat.

BAYREUTH, or BAREITH, the capital, is situated near the Maine, and is a handsome town with broad and regular streets, entered by six gates. Among the public buildings which deserve notice, are the old and new castles, the A convents and churches, the barracks, the mint, and the gymnasium. Its chief manufactures are It is cloth, earthenware, and tobacco-pipes. about fifty miles north of Augsburg, in N. lat. 49° 54′, and E. long. 11° 17'

their livelihood by fishing. The Bay of Bayonna
forms part of the Gulf of Vigo, nine miles south-
west of Vigo, and twelve north-west of Tuy.
BAYONNA ISLES, or ISLAS DE SEYAS DE BAY-
ONA ET D'ESTELAS, two small islands, with a
number of insular rocks, situated in the Atlantic,
at the entrance of the Bay of Bayonna, off the
coast of Galicia, in Spain. They were called by
the ancients Insulæ Deorum, or the Isles of the
Gods, and lie six miles N. N. W. of Bayonna.
BAYONNE, a rich, populous, and flourishing
commercial town of France, in the department
of the Lower Pyrenees. It is seated near the
mouth of the Adour, which forms a good har-
bour, and is divided into three parts: the great
town on this side the Nive; the little town be-
tween the Nive and the Adour; and the suburbs
of St. Esprit, chiefly inhabited by Jews, beyond
this last river. A citadel, constructed by Vauban,
on the top of an eminence in the suburb, com-
mands both the harbour and the town, which
are further defended by small redoubts.
wooden drawbridge, which allows vessels to pass,
and where a small toll is levied, connects the
suburbs with the town. The ancient cathedral
is remarkable for the height of the nave, and the
delicacy of the pillars which support it. The
quay is an elegant and frequented promenade;
but the most beautiful part of the city is the Place
de Grammont. The bishop was formerly suf-
fragan of the archbishop of Auch; he is now
under the archbishop of Toulouse, and exercises
jurisdiction over three departments, those of the
Upper and Lower Pyrenees and of the Landes.
Bayonne, before the revolution, was the seat of a
provincial tax-office, and court of justice. At pre-
sent it is the largest though not the chief town of
the Lower Pyrenees, and the head of the most west-
ern arrondissement, which consists of seven can-
tons, and contains 70,000 inhabitants. An extensive
commerce is carried on here with Spain, in which
French and foreign goods are given in exchange
for wood, iron, fruit, and the precious metals. The
principal of the maritime trade is the cod and
whale fishery; in these branches from thirty to
forty ships of 250 tons average, were lately em-
ployed. Masts and other wood for ship-build-
ing, brought from the Pyrenees, are exported to
Brest and other ports of France. Hams, wines,
and chocolate, are exported in great quantities to
various parts. The military weapon called the
bayonet was invented here in the seventeenth
century. The language of the people is the an-
cient Biscayan or Basque. Forty-four miles
W. N. W. of Pau, and 518 S.S. W. of Paris.
Long. 1° 24′ W., lat. 43° 29′ N. Inhabitants

about 13,000.

BAYONNE BAY, or LA MER DES BASQUES, a part of the Bay of Biscay washing the shores of the district of Labour in the south of France.

BAYREUTH, or BAREITH, a principality of Germany, formerly included in the Circle of Franconia; now forming a part of the kingdom of Bavaria. It is bounded by the Upper Palatinate and Bohemia on the east, and by the territories of Nuremberg and Anspach south. Its extent is estimated at 1760 square miles, and its Oberland is a population at 200,000 souls. hilly region the climate is cold, and much of

BAYS, in antiquity. See BAY.

BAYZE, BAYS, or BAIZE, was first introduced into England, with says, serges, &c. by the Flemings; who, being persecuted by the duke of Alva for their religion, fled hither about the fifth of queen Elizabeth's reign; and had afterwards peculiar privileges granted them by act of parliament 12 Charles II. 1660. The exportation of bayze was formerly much more considerable than now, the French having learnt to imitate it. The English bayze, however, is still in request in Spain and Portugal, and even in Italy.

BAY'ZE. See BAIZE.
BAZA, or BAÇA, a town of Spain.
BAÇA.

BAZA, HOYA DE, See BAÇA.
BAZAAR, n. s.

See

Persian buzzar, the market, now written bazaar, in the commercial language of the East Indies. A constant market; a kind of covered market.

This noble city (Cashan) is in compass not less than York or Norwich, about four thousand families being accounted in her. The houses are fairly built. The buzzar is spacious and uniform, furnished with silks, damasks, and carpets of silk.

Sir T. Herbert's Travels, (edit. 1677 p.) 223. BAZAR, BAZAAR, or BASAR, a denomination originally given by the Turks and Persians to a kind of exchange, or places where their finest stuffs and

miscellaneous wares are sold. These are also called bezesteins. The word is of Arabic origin, where it denotes sale, or exchange of goods. Some of the eastern bazars are open, like the market-places in Europe, and serve for the same uses, particularly for the sale of the bulky commmodities. Others are covered with lofty ceilings, or domes, pierced to give light; and in these the jewellers and other dealers in rich wares, have their shops. The bazar of Ispahan is one of the finest places in Persia; yet, notwithstanding its magnificence, it is excelled by the hazar of Tauris, which is the largest that is known, having several times held 2Y 2

30,000 men ranged in order of battle. At Constantinople there are an old and new bazar, which are large square buildings, covered with domes, and sustained by arches and pilasters; the former chiefly for arms, harness, and the like; the latter for goldsmiths, jewellers, furriers, and all sorts of manufactures. See ALEPPO.

BAZAS, a town of France, in the department of the Gironde, and late province of Guienne. It is built on a rock, and lies thirty miles southeast of Bourdeaux. Inhabitants about 5000. It was formerly the bishop's see of a very extensive diocese.

BAZAT, or BAZA, in commerce, a long finespun cotton, which comes from Jerusalem, whence it is also called Jerusalem cotton.

BAZEEGURS, a tribe of Indians, inhabiting different parts of Hindoostan, and recognised by several appellations, as Bazeegurs, Panchperees, Kunjura, or Nuts; they follow a mode of life distinguishing them from the Hindoos, and abstain from intermixing their families with them. The name Bazeegur is said to signify a juggler, and some etymologists find a derivation of conjuror from kunjura. They are found partly in wandering tribes, and partly adhering to fixed residences.

The Bazeegurs are divided into seven castes, Charee, Athbhyeea, Bynsa, Purbuttee, Kalkoor, Dorkinee, and Gurgwar; but all the castes intermarry. Their own historical traditions trace their descent from four brothers, who, finding it difficult to provide for their followers, resolved to separate, and direct their course respectively to each quarter of the world; in consequence of which, one of them, named Sa, arrived in Bengal, from Gazeepour or Allahabad. His first abode was at Hoogly, and having governed his tribe peaceably during many years, he died at Uncourpoor. Sa left three sons who succeeded each other, and the succession regularly passed through several generations, and to Munbhungee, about fifteen or twenty years ago. At that time, some of the castes considered a woman called Toota as their chief; but the power ascribed to her seems merely nominal. Munbhungee, however, would not suffer any of Toota's people to remain in the territory occupied by his sect; and the latter were equally jealous of the former.

The features of the Bazeegurs do not decidedly differ from those of other tribes around them. Some of their women are reputed beautiful, and are by no means scrupulous in forming temporary alliances. They are Mahommedans in food and apparel; some traversing the country as Mahommedan Fakeers: a particular association among them has been accused of sacrificing human victims. Those called Panchperees seem to venerate a female deity, Kali, probably the sanguinary goddess of the Hindoos. The Bazeegurs, properly so called, are circumcised, and have priests to officiate at their marriages and funerals, but their knowledge of the system of Mahomet is very imperfect. They seem to acknowledge an omnipotent being, and believe that all nature is animated by one universal spirit, to which the soul, as a portion of it, will after death be united.

The marriage ceremony among them begins

by the bridegroom repairing to the hut of his elect, and calling aloud for her to be delivered to him. A near relation, guarding the door, resists his entrance, and pushes him away, while he is the object of taunts and jocularity; at last the bride is brought forward. Both now receive the exhortation of a priest to practise mutual kindness, and the bridegroom, marking the bride's face with ochre, declares her his wedded wife, and she, on her part, does the same in return. The little fingers of their hands are now joined, and a scene of merriment commences from which the bride alone is spared. This consists chiefly in the progress to intoxication, for these people are addicted to the most immoderate use of spirits; and after copious libations, a cavalcade is formed of the whole party, which moves on to the hut of the bridegroom. Several enigmatical ceremonies are performed before the door; the mother of the bridegroom advances with a sieve containing rice, paint, and grass, with which the foreheads of the couple are touched, after being waved around them; and the bride is led into the house, before which there stands a small fresh branch of the mangoe tree in an earthen pot of water. In the evening the bride is conducted to her own hut, when the sober friends of the parties retire; but the majority, and generally with the bridegroom among them, pass the night in a state of insensibility on some neighbouring plain.

The chief occupation of both the male and female Bazeegurs consists in feats of address and agility to amuse the public. The former are very athletic, and the women are taught a species of lascivious dancing. The men are also jugglers, tumblers, &c. The people of each set, or dramatis persona, go out under a sirdar, or manager of a company, for a definite period, generally a year; but no person can establish a set of actors without permission from the Nardar Boutah, or chief of the Bazeegurs, who receives a proportion of the profits. Each of five sets at Calcutta has a subordinate sirdar or ruler. These sirdars and the chief, apparently constitute a court for the trial of infringements of these regulations; and if, on application of the tongue to a piece of red-hot iron, a suspected person be burnt, he is declared guilty of a fraud, which is expiated by a fine, or by the additional punishment of having his nose rubbed on the ground. The fine being paid, it affords a new opportunity for gratifying the strong propensity implanted in these people for ardent liquors. Sometimes differences are the subject of reference to a larger assembly; where, before commencing the business, both plaintiff and defendant must provide a quantity of spirits proportioned to the importance of the case; the party non-suited bears the whole expense, and the assembly is regaled with the beverage produced.

Some of the females practise physic, and cupping, and perform a kind of tattooing on the skin of the Hindoos of their own sex. The men, besides their usual occupations, collect medicinal herbs, and a certain bud, the latter is dried, and the former prepared by their wives as curatives, especially of female complaints: thus they find employment in the towns, in such vocations, or by the sale of trinkets, though both afford but a

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