Page:Imperial Dictionary of Universal Biography Volume 1.pdf/878

BUX battle of Prague. Suwaroff made him governor of Varsovia, where, by his moderation, he deserved and obtained the lasting gratitude of the Poles. He commanded the left wing at the battle of Austerlitz, and in 1806 was nominated general-in-chief of the army sent against Napoleon. After the battle of Pultusk, the chief command was intrusted to Bennigsen, but Büxhowden resumed it after the battle of Friedland. In 1808 Büxhowden at the head of 18,000 men completed in two days the conquest of Friedland, and brought the campaign to a close on the banks of the Tornea, then the Russian frontier in Lapponia. He died at the castle of Lohden in Esthonia in 1811.—M. Q.  BUXTEHUDE,, a musician, was born most likely in 1635; he died at Lubeck, May 9, 1707. His father, Johann, was organist to the church of St. Olaus at Elsinore in Denmark, where, we may suppose, Dietrich was born. Some writers affirm that his father was his only musical instructor, but Hawkins states him to have been a pupil of Johann Thiel. In 1669 he was appointed organist to St. Mary's church, Lubeck, in the fulfilment of which office he gained his great celebrity as a player and composer. A comparatively small number only of his voluminous compositions have been published: these consist of several sacred cantatas; an ode on the independence of Lubeck; another on the death of the composer's father; seven suites de pieces, depicting the characters of the seven planets; fugues for the organ, and lighter pieces for voices as well as for instruments. The critics of near his own time speak of Buxtehude as the greatest organist and writer for his instrument that had ever existed, and eulogize his power of improvising on a canto fermo as marvellous. An interesting testimony of his extraordinary ability is the fact, that Bach walked from Anstadt to Lubeck, about the year 1705, to hear him play, and prolonged his stay for three months, for the sake of repeatedly witnessing his performance.—G. A. M.  BUXTON,, famous for his powers of calculation, was born in 1704 or 1705, at Elmton, near Chesterfield. Though his grandfather had been vicar, and his father schoolmaster of the parish, his education had been so completely neglected, that he was unable even to write. His general intellectual capacity, indeed, was of a very low order, but he could resolve with the greatest promptitude the most difficult arithmetical questions. It is said that on one occasion he was asked to state how many cubical eighths of an inch there are in a body whose three sides are respectively 23,145,789 yards, 5,642,732 yards, and 54,965 yards, and that amid all the distractions of the labours of 100 men, he gave the exact answer in little more than five hours. He walked up to London in 1754, for the purpose of gratifying a strong desire which he had to see the king, but unfortunately missed him. During his stay in the metropolis, he was taken to the Royal Society, and answered most satisfactorily various questions proposed to him by some of the members. He went to see Garrick in Richard III.; but during the performance he occupied himself entirely in counting the number of words spoken by each of the actors. He appears to have been either a small landowner or agricultural labourer. His death is supposed to have occurred when he was about sixty-two years of age.—J. T.  BUXTON,, Bart., the successor of Wilberforce as leader of the antislavery party in the house of commons, was born in 1786 at Castle Hedingham in Essex. His father was high sheriff of the county. He received his early education at the school of Dr. Charles Burney of Greenwich, and returned home to Essex when he was fourteen, without having attained to any great proficiency in learning. About this time he became acquainted with the family of Mr. John Gurney of Earlham Hall, near Norwich, father of the future philanthropist, Mrs. Elizabeth Fry. In 1803 Mr. Buxton entered as an undergraduate in Trinity college, Dublin, where he studied with great perseverance for four years, and highly distinguished himself. In May, 1807, he was married to Miss Hannah Gurney of Earlham, a union productive of much happiness. In 1811 he became partner in the brewing establishment of Messrs. Truman, Hanbury, & Co., in which his uncles were partners, and for the next seven years devoted himself almost entirely to the business. Mr. Buxton's career as a public man dates from 1816, when he addressed a large meeting convened at the Mansion-house to procure relief for the Spitalfields weavers, who were reduced to the utmost distress by the reaction in their trade consequent upon the termination of the French war. The subject of prison discipline was the next that engaged Mr. Buxton's attention; he inspected Newgate and other jails in conjunction with Mrs. Fry, Mr. Peter Bedford, and others, and published, as the result of his labours, an "Inquiry into Prison Discipline," a valuable work, full of facts carefully and clearly arranged, with shrewd and ingenious practical inferences. In 1818 Mr. Buxton was returned as member of parliament for Weymouth, after a contested election. As he was diligent in his attendance on his parliamentary duties, and though no orator, was clear in his arrangement of facts, always regarding his subject from a moral and religious point of view, he became a very influential member. In 1822, at the earnest solicitation of Mr. Wilberforce, he joined the abolition party, and became one of their secret committee. In 1825 the declining health of Mr. Wilberforce obliged him to retire from parliament, and the leadership of the antislavery party devolved upon Mr. Buxton, whose systematic energy and fearless pertinacity well fitted him for the eight years' struggle that was needed to complete the work of emancipation. In 1827 Mr. Buxton's exertions and anxieties brought on an attack of apoplexy, from which he slowly recovered, to return to his work with deepened religious feelings of devotion to it. From this time until the final passage of the bill for the "total abolition of colonial slavery" in August, 1833, Mr. Buxton's exertions were unwearied, and he consented to the "apprenticeship" and "compensation" clauses, contrary to the feelings of many of his coadjutors, in order to avert an insurrection in the colonies from any further delay of the long looked-for hour of freedom. In 1837 Mr. Buxton lost his seat in parliament, where, without possessing very shining or very profound abilities, he had ably and honestly laboured for nearly twenty years. In 1838 he devoted himself to the preparation of a work on "The Slave Trade and its Remedy." He spent the last few years of his life improving his estates and assisting the poor in the vicinity of Northrepps Hall, Norfolk, where he died in 1845.—R. M., S.  BUXTORF,, born at Camen in Westphalia in 1564; died in 1629. He was son of a Calvinist minister. After studying some time at Marburg and Herborn, the fame of Beza brought him to hear his lectures at Bâle, where, after a course of travel, he became professor of Hebrew. He was offered professorial chairs at Leyden and at Taumen; but his value was felt by Bâle, and they increased his appointments for the purpose of retaining him. Several works on Hebrew and Chaldaic learning were published by Buxtorf in German and in Latin, and he left several in manuscript, some of which were edited by his son, who pursued the same class of studies, and held a Hebrew professorship in the same university where his father had so long taught. The patriarch of the tribe left seven children—five sons and two daughters.—J. A., D.  BUXTORF, ), grandson of the preceding, born at Bâle in 1645; died in 1704. He succeeded his father in the chair of Hebrew at Bâle, and was distinguished for his knowledge of oriental languages. He published translations of several rabbinical works, and he also compiled a collection of proverbs and sententious maxims of morality from Jewish writers of all ages, which is entitled "Florilegium Hebraicum." He died of asthma, without following the example of his fathers in leaving a son to inherit his throne.—J. A., D.  BUXTORF, . The date of birth is not stated; he died in 1732. He succeeded his uncle, the preceding, in the Hebrew professorship at Bâle. Among his scholarly accomplishments, John the fourth had acquired the character of a skilful artisan in the fabrication of Latin verses.—J. A., D.  BYLOT or BYLETH,, an English seaman, bore an active share in the efforts made for the discovery of a north-west passage to the Indies in the early years of the seventeenth century. He was one of the companions of Hudson on that unfortunate navigator's fourth and disastrous voyage in 1610, and accompanied Sir Thomas Button in his expedition of 1612. (See .) Bylot was again employed, under Captain Gibbons, in the renewed effort of discovery made in the same direction in 1614; and in each of the two following years he acted as master of the vessel in which Baffin, in the capacity of pilot, made his important discoveries. These voyages of 1615 and 1616, made by Bylot and Baffin, are described elsewhere.—W. H. <section end="878H" /> <section begin="878Zcontin" />BYNG,, Viscount Torrington, a distinguished British admiral, was born in 1663. At the age of fifteen he entered the navy as a volunteer. After serving with distinction in various subordinate situations, and taking part in the battles of Beachy-Head and La Hogue, he was in 1703 made rear-admiral <section end="878Zcontin" />