Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 02.djvu/755

BEDDOES. poetry, he left to his friend, T. F. Kelsall. In 1850 this friend published Death's Jest-Book, and in 1851 the collected poems of Beddoes, with an excellent memoir. Beddoes is chiefly known by this posthumous play, which is a tragedy conceived in the manner of Webster and Tourneur, the late Elizabethans, who dealt in the terror and pageantry of death. The blank verse is good, and scattered through the play are many songs recalling the ease and freshness of Shakespeare. Consult: Poetical Works (London, 1890) and Letters (London, 1894), both edited by Gosse.

BEDE, bed, or BÆDA, be'dk, surnamed (c. 673-735). The greatest name in the literature of Saxon England, and probably the most distinguished scholar of his age. The exact spot of his birth is a point in dispute among antiquarians, but is commonly believed to have been in what is now the parish of Monkton, near Wearmouth, in Durham. In his seventh year he entered the neighboring monastery of Saint Peter, at Wearmouth, where he was educated under the care of the Abbot Benedict Biscop, and his successor, Ceolfrith. His instructor in the Scriptures was Trumberht. After studying for a time at Wearmouth, Bede removed to the twin monastery of Jarrow, founded in 682; here he took deacon's orders in his nineteenth year, and was ordained priest in his thirtieth by John of Beverley, then Bishop of Hexham. In the shelter of his quiet and sacred retreat, Bede devoted himself to the pursuit of literature such as it was possible in those days. He studied Latin and Greek, and had at least some acquaintance with Hebrew, astronomy, and prosody. He wrote homilies, lives of saints, hymns, epigrams, works on chronology and grammar, and comments on the books of the Old and New Testaments. His own list of what he had written up to 731 is given in his Ecclesiastical History, and contains thirty-seven titles. His calm and gentle spirit, the humanizing character of his pursuits, and the holiness of his life, present a striking contrast to the violence and slaughter which prevailed in the whole island. To none is the beautiful language of Scripture more applicable — "a light shining in a dark place." When laboring under disease, and near the close of his life, he engaged in a translation of the Gospel of Saint John into Anglo-Saxon, and dictated his version to his pupils. He died May 26, 735, and was buried in the monastery of Jarrow; long afterwards (in the middle of the Eleventh Century) his bones were removed to Durham. His most valuable work is the Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum, in five books, to which we are indebted for much of our information on the history of England down to A.D. 731. Bede drew the materials for his work partly from Roman writers, but chiefly from native chronicles and biographies, records, and public documents, and oral and written communications from his contemporaries. King Alfred translated the work into Anglo-Saxon.

In chronology the labors of Bede were important, as he introduced the Dionysian reckoning of dates in his work, De Sex Ætatibus Mundi, which served as a basis for most of the mediæval chroniclers of leading events in the world's history. Among the many editions of Bede's history may be noticed: the sixth, published at Strassburg about 1500: much better editions by Smith (Cambridge, 1722); and one by Stevenson (London, 1838); more recent editions are those of Dr. Hussey (Oxford, 1846), Moberly (Oxford, 1869), and Dr. Giles in his edition of the whole works of Bede, with an English translation. There are at least thirty-four editions in all. Entire editions of Bede's writings have been published at Paris (1544-54); Basel (1563): and Cologne (1612 and 1688); London (1843-44); and Migne's Patrologiæ (Paris, 1844). English versions of his Ecclesiastical History have been published by Stapleton (1565); by Stevens (1723); by Hurst (1814); by Wilcock (1818); by Giles (1840); by Stevenson (1852); by Gidley (1870), etc. See publications of the Bohn Library. Consult: Gehle, De Bedæ Venerabilis Vita et Scriptis (Leyden, 1838); and, for his biography, G. F. Browne, The Venerable Bede (London, 1880).

BEDE, bed, The hero of a novel of the same name by George Eliot. He is a young carpenter, whose character is said to be partially drawn from that of the father of George Eliot.

BEDE, Cuthbert. See.

BEDEAU, be-do', (1804-63). A distinguished French general, born at Vertou, near Nantes. In the Belgian campaign of 1831-32 he was aide-de-camp to General Gérard. In 1836 he was sent to Algeria, as commandant of a battalion of the Foreign Legion. Here he acquired his military reputation. He took part in most of the operations by which the dominion of France was established over the natives, and rose to the rank of general of brigade. In 1847 he was for a short time Governor of Algeria, but was superseded by the Duc d'Aumale. When the Revolution of February broke out, Bedeau, who was in Paris on leave of absence, was commissioned by Marshal Bugeaud to suppress the insurrection. This he found it impossible to do. By the Provisional Government he was appointed minister of war, an office, however, which he immediately changed for the command of the city of Paris. He was elected to the Constituent Assembly, and was made vice-president of it, always voting with the Republican party. Along with Cavaignac, Lamoricière, and others, he was arrested on December 2, 1851, and went into exile. He died in Nantes.

BEDEGUAR, bed'e-giir (Fr., from Ar., Pers. bādāwar, a kind of white thorn or thistle). A large, roundish excrescence, or gall, sometimes called sweetbrier sponge, produced by the Rhodites rosæ, a gall-fly, on various species of rose. The excrescence is caused by a peculiar poisonous fluid injected by the fly into the plant-tissue; externally mossy, it contains the larvæ of the insect, and the juices of the plant, on which they feed. It was once popularly believed to produce sleep.

BEDELL', (1868—). An American physicist, born in Brooklyn, N. Y. He graduated at Yale in 1890, and afterwards took a scientific course at Cornell (1890-92), where he received the degrees of M.Sc. and Ph.D. In 1892 he became assistant professor of physics at Cornell. He has made valuable investigations in alternating current of electricity. He is the author of several works on electricity, and is the editor of the Physical Review.