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* BRENNUS. 463 BBEKA. taken prisoner, and drank himself to death in despair. BREN'TA (anciently, Lat. Brinta, or Brcti- tenia). A river of North Italy. It issues from Lake Caldonazzo in the Austrian Province of Tyrol, flows through the 8ugana Valley, then south through Venetia, finally turning eastward, and empties into the Gulf of Venice (.Map: Italy, V 2). It originally emptied at Fusina. but to prevent inundations the main stream was divert- ed at Dolo southward into the Gulf of Venice just below Chioggia; while the old channel has been transformed into a canal between Venice and Padua. lUhiw Bassano, where the Venetian plains begin, the river flows between dikes. The total length of the Brenta is 106 miles, of which 50 are navigable. BB.ENTANO, brenta'nd, Clemens (1778- 1842). A German novelist and poet. He was born in Ehrenbreitstein, studied in Jena, lived in Frankfort, Heidelberg. Vienna, and Berlin, and for a time at a cloister in Diilmen, near Miinster (1818). Thence he went to Regensburg, Munich, and Frankfort. He died in AschafFen- burg, July 28, 1842. Brentano's early comedies, among them Die lustigcii Musikantcii (1803) and Police de Leon ( 1804), show lyric ability and a peculiar wit, while the drama Uie Uriindung Prags (1815) is a fantastic and bizarre produc- tion of undeniable power. His best work is in short stories, particularly in his fairy stories. The simplicity of his Geschichte vom brai^en Kasperl (1817) and of Gockel, Hitikel und Gacke- leia (1838) is in pleasant contra.st to the mystic romanticism of some of his other work. His most enduring contribution to literature is the compilation, with Arnim, of German ballads in Des Knaben Wiinderhorn. He was an erratic member of a whimsically brilliant family. His grandmother, Sophie La Roche, had been a close friend of W'ieland; his mother, ilaximiliane, fig- ures in Goethe's life, as does his sister, Bettina von Arnim (q.v. ). BK.ENTANO, Fbanz (1838—). A German philosopher, bom in Marienberg. He was for a time a professor of philosophy in Wiirzburg, and from 1874 to 1880 in Vienna. His works com- prise Psychologic des Aristoteles (ilainz, 1867) ; Psychologic vom cmpirischen Staiidpiinkt (Leip- zig, 1879) ; and Xeue RJitsel (Vienna, 1878). BRENTANO, LoREXZ (1813-91). A German- American politician and editor, born in Jlann- heim. After study in Heidelberg and Freiburg, he began legal practice, entered public life, and in 1848 was elected to the National Assembly at Frankfort. In 1849 he was placed in control of the Provisional Government of Baden, but soon fell under suspicion among his fellow revolution- ists, and fled by way of Switzerland to America. He established Dcr Lriirhtturm, a. German anti- slavery journal, in Pottsville, Pa., and from 1862 to 1867 was editor-in-chief of the Illinois Staats- zeitung in Chicago. He was appointed to the American consulate at Dresden in 1872, and in 1876 was elected to Congress. As editor of the Staatazeitung, he greatly aided the Federal cause during the Civil War period. BRENTANO, Lv.io (1844—). A German political economist. He was bom in AschafTen- burg. Bavaria; studied at the universities of Dublin, HeidellK-rg. .Munich. Wiirzburg, and Giit- tingen, and with Ernst Engel, the statistician. made an investigation of the English trades- unions. He has been professor of political econo- my successively in "Brcslau (1873), Strassburg (1882), Vienna (1888), Ix^ipzig (1889), and Munich (1891). His more important publica- tions include Die Arbeitergildcn der Gegenwart, 2 vols. (1871); Das Arbeitsverhaltnis gemisa dcm heutigen Recht (1877); Der Arbeiterver- sicherungszioang, seine Voraiissetzungen und seine Folgen (1881) ; Veber das Vcrhiiltnis von Arheilslohn und Arbeitszeit zur Arbeit slcistung (2d ed., 1893) ; Agrarpolitik, VoL I. (1897). BRENT'FORD ('the ford on the Brent'). The county town of Middlesex, England, on the Brent, at its confluence with the Thames, 3 miles west-snuthwest of London, and where the Thames is crossed by a bridge leading to Kew. It consists chiefly of one long, irregular street. It has extensive manufactories, among them being gin-distilleries, breweries, soap-works, sawmills, etc. : and there are many market gar- dens in the vicinitv. Population, in ISOl, 13,- 738; in 1901, 15,171. Here Edmund Ironside defeated the Danes in 1016: and in 1642 the Royalists, under Prince Rupert, defeated the Parliamentarians, under Colonel Hollis. There are frequent allusions to it in English litera- ture. Consult Watts, "Old Brentfordtown," in the Art Journal (London, 1901). BRENTFORD, Two Kings of. The name given two of the cast in Buckingham's Rehearsal. Though individual, they seem to have a common identity, for they always enter at the same time and enact precisely the same part. They have become proverbial. BREN'TON, WixLiAM ( ? -1674). An American colonist, prominent in the early his- tory of Rhode Island. He emigrated from Eng- land to Massachusetts in 1633, but removed to Portsmouth, Rhode Island, five years later, and in 1639 assisted in the founding of Newport. He was deputy governor of Aquidneek from 1640 to 1647, and again from 1662 to 1665; was presi- dent of Providence Plantations from 1660 to 1602; and was Governor of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, under the new charter of 1663, from 1666 to 1669. BRENZ, brents, Joh. n (1499-1570). A German reformer. L'nder the influence of Lu- ther he reorganized his church at Hall, Suabia, but at the time of the Smalkaldie War. in 1546, he was obliged to flee to Wiirttemberg, He was appointed minister of the Collegiate Church of Stuttgart in 1553, and is said to have l)een the first exponent of the Reformaticm there. In the controversies between Zwingli and Lu- ther, he took the side of the latter, and with others wrote the famous Syngramma Siicvicuni (1525). He was a writer of great ability and jwpularity. One of his teachings was that the body of the Lord is everywhere present; hence his followers were called "Lljiquitarians.' BRERA, bra'ra {brera for brcda, from Lat. pradiuni. the estate, manor). The Palace of Science, I^etters, and Arts in Milan. It was erected by Ricchini for a Jesuit college in 1651. It contains a library of 300,000 volumes (founded in 1770), a collection of 50,000 coins, a mag- nificent collection of paintings (confined chiefly to Italian artists, however), an archa-ological museum, and a good collection of casts from