Critical and Historical Essays. Volume 1

BABINGTON, Anthony, an English Catholic, executed in 1586 for plotting to assassinate Elizabeth. Everard Digby was concerned in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605.

Babington, an English Catholic executed in 1586 for plotting to assassinate Elizabeth under the instruction of a Jesuit named Ballard.

Ballard. See Babington.

Barbariccia and Draghignazzo, the fiends who torment the lost with hooks in the lake of boiling pitch in Malebolge, the eighth circle in Dante’s Inferno.

Baretti, Giuseppe, an Italian lexiographer who came to London, was patronised by Johnson and became Secretary of the Royal Academy.

Barillon, the French Ambassador in England.

Barnard, Sir John, an eminent London merchant, and Lord Mayor (1685-1764).

Barras, a member of the Jacobin (q. v.) club; he put an end to Robespierre’s Reign of Terror and was a member of the Directory till Napoleon abolished it (d. 1829).

Batavian liberties, Batavia is an old name for Holland; the Celtic tribe known as Batavii once dwelt there.

Bath, Lord, William Pulteney, Sir R. Walpole’s opponent, and author of a few magazine articles (1684-1764).

Belisarius, Justinian’s great general, who successively repulsed the Persians, Vandals, Goths, and Huns, but who, tradition says, was left to become a beggar (d. 565).

Benevolences, royal demands from individuals not sanctioned by Parliament and supposed to be given willingly; declared illegal by the Bill of Rights, 1689.

Bentinck, Lord William, the Governor. General (1828-1835) under whom suttee was abolished, internal communications opened up, and education considerably furthered.

Bentivoglio, Cardinal, a disciple of Galileo, and one of the Inquisitors who signed his condemnation (1579-1641).

Berkeley and Pomfret, where Edward II. and Richard II. respectively met their deaths.

Bernier, a French traveller who wandered over India, 1656-1668.

Blues, The, Royal Horse Guards.

Board of Control, a body responsible to the Ministry with an authoritative parliamentary head established by Pitt’s India Bill (1784).

Bobadil, the braggart hero in Johnson’s Every Man in his Humour,

Bolingbroke, Viscount, Tory Minister under Anne; brought about the Peace of Utrecht, 1713. His genius and daring were undoubted, but as a party leader he failed utterly.

Bolivar, the Washington of South America, who freed Venezuela, Colombia, and Bolivia from Spain (1783-1830).

Bonner, Bishop of London, served “Bloody” Mary’s anti-Protestant zeal, died in the Marshalsea Prison under Elizabeth.

Bonslas, a Maratha tribe not finally subdued till 1817.

Bradshaw, President of the Court that condemned Charles I.

Braganza, House of, the reigning family of Portugal; Charles II married Catherine of Braganza in 1662.

Breda, Peace of, July 21, 1667. Breda is in North Brabant, Holland.

Brissotines, those moderate republicans in the French Revolution who are often known as the Girondists.

Broghill, Lord, better known as Rope Boyle, author of Parthenissa, etc.

Brooks’s, the great Whig Club in St. James’s Street amongst whose members were Burke, Sheridan, Fox, and Garrick.

Brothers, Richard, a fanatic who held that the English were the lost ten tribes of Israel(1757-1824).

Browne’s Estimate (of the Manners and Principles of the Times), the author was a clergyman noted also for his defence of utilitarianism in answer to Shaftesbury (Lecky, Hist. Eng. in 18th Cent., ii, 89 f.).

Brutus, i. The reputed expeller of the last King of Rome; ii. One of Caesar’s murderers.

Bulicame, the seventh circle in the Inferno, the place of all the violent.

Buller, Sir Francis, English judge, author of Introduction to the Law of Trials at Nisi Prius (1745-1800).

Burger, Gottfried, German poet (1748-1794), author of the fine ballad “The Wild Huntsman.”

Burgoyne, afterwards the General in command of the British troops whose surrender at Saratoga practically settled the American War of Independence.

Burlington, Lord, Richard Boyle, an enthusiastic architect of the Italian school (1695-1753).

Button, Henry, a Puritan divine, pilloried, mutilated, and imprisoned by the Star Chamber (1578-1648).

Busiris, a mythological King of Egypt who used to sacrifice one foreigner yearly in the hope of ending a prolonged famine.

Buxar, between Patna and Benares, where Major Munro defeated Sujah Dowlah and Meer Cossim in 1765.

CALAS, Jean, a tradesman of Toulouse, done to death on the wheel in 1762 on the false charge of murdering his son to prevent his becoming a Romanist. Voltaire took his case up and vindicated his memory.

Camden, Lord, the Chief Justice of the Common Pleas who declared general warrants illegal and released Wilkes in 1763.

Capel, Lord Arthur, at first sided with the Parliament, but afterwards joined the King; executed for attempting to escape from Colchester in 1649.

Caracci, Annibal, an Italian painter of the Elizabethan age.

Carlton House, the residence of George IV. when Prince of Wales.

Cartoons, the, the famous designs by Raphael, originally intended for tapestry.

Cato, Addison’s play, produced in 1713.

Cavendish, Lord, first Duke of Devonshire (d. 1707). He gave evidence in favour of Russell and tried to secure his escape.

Cesare Borgia, son of Pope Alexander VI. and brother of Lucrezia, whose infamous ability, cruelty, and treachery he even surpassed.

Chandernagora, on the Hooghly twenty miles from Calcutta. Pondicherry, in the Carnatic (i.e. the S.E. coast of India) is still a French possession.