was the care of children left orphans by the epidemic. In 1856 she again travelled, and spent five years on the Continent and in Palestine. Her reminiscences of these countries have all been translated into English. On her return she settled at Arsta, where, with the exception of a visit to Germany, she spent the remaining years of her life. She died on the 31st December 1865. Miss Bremer has been called, and with justice, the Miss Austen of Sweden. Her novels have the purity, simplicity, and love of domestic life, which are characteristic of the English writer. She is, however, inferior to Miss Austen in construction of plot and in delineation of character. Some of her best works show slight traces of overstrained sentiment, and the situations are occasionally somewhat melo-dramatic. The Neighbours is the most popular and the best of her tales; it is an admirable picture of Swedish home life, showing at
times the quiet humour which is more prominent in The H— Family. All the works have been translated into German and English, and the greater number of them into French. In America they have circulated very widely, and have been extremely popular.
See Life, Letters, and Posthumous Works of F. Bremer, by her sister, translated by Milow, London, 1868.
BREMERHAVEN, a seaport town belonging to the free city of Bremen, on the right bank of the Weser at the mouth of the Gccst, in 53 32 N. lat. and 8 34 E. long. It is built on a piece of ground surrendered to Bremen in 1827 by Hanover, and increased by treaty with Prussia in 18G9. The port was opened in 1830, and there are now, besides an excellent harbour, four large wet docks, five dry docks, hydraulic cranes, and lines of railway running along the quays. The entrance is free from ice nearly all the year round, even when the other ports of the neighbouring coasts are closed, and vessels drawing 22 feet can enter safely. The town is rapidly extending and will soon be united with Geestcmiinde. Among its public buildings the most remarkable is the great hospitium for emigrants, erected in 1830, which can accommodate 2500 persons. The Hanoverian fort and batteries, which formerly protected the town, have been removed, and their place is supplied by similar works farther down. The population, which in 1850 was only 3500, amounted in 1871 to 10,596.
BRENNUS, the name given in history to two kings cr chiefs of the Celtic Gauls, probably not an appellative, but a title, the Cymric " Lrenhin " ? king. (Dr Pritchard thinks it more probably the equivalent of the Welsh proper name " Bran") The first Brennus crossed the Apennines into Italy, at the head of 70,000 of the tribe of Gauls known as Senones, and ravaged Etruria, 391 B.C. Some envoys from Rome, sent to watch their movements, were said to have taken an active part in a skirmish before the walls of Clusium ; and the Gauls, failing to obtain the surrender of these men, marched at once for Rome. A Roman army of about 40,000 men was hastily despatched to meet them, and took up a position on the banks of the little river Allia, within twelve miles of the city. Here Brennus attacked and defeated them with great slaughter ; and if he had pressed on at once, Rome would have lain n.t his mercy ; for the greater part of the beaten artny had placed the Tiber between themselves and the conquerors. But the Gauls lingered on the field of battle, mutilating the dead, and drinking to excess. The Romans gained time to occupy and provision the Capitol, though they had not force sufficient to defend their walls ; their women and children were sent off to Veii ; and when on the third day the Gauls marched in and took possession, they found the city occupied only by those aged patricians who had held high office in the state, Too old to be of service in the little garrison, and too proud to fly, they had all solemnly devoted themselves to death, and sat each in the porch of his house, in full official robes, awaiting the invaders. For a while these withheld their hands from them, out of awe and reverence ; but the ruder passions soon prevailed, and they were all slaughtered. The city was sacked and burnt ; but the Capitol itself withstood a siege of more than six months, saved from surprise on one occasion only by the wakefulness of the sacred geese and the courage of Marcus Manlius. (See Manius.) At last the Gauls consented to accept a ransom of a thousand pounds of gold. As it was being weighed out the Roman tribune complained of some unfairness. Brennus at once threw his heavy sword into the scale j and when asked the meaning of the act, replied that it meant " Yen vidis " " the weakest must go to the wall." The Gauls returned home with their plunder, leaving Rome in a condition from which she took long to recover. A later legend, most probably an inven tion, represents Camillus as having suddenly appeared with an avenging army at the moment when the gold was being weighed, and having defeated and cut to pieces Brennus and all his host (Livy, v. 49).
The second Celtic chief who bears the name of Brennus in history is said to have been one of the leaders of an inroad made by the Gauls from the east of the Adriatic into Thrace and Macedonia, 280 B.C., when they defeated and slew Ptolemy Ceraunus, then king of Macedonia. Whether Brennus took part in this first invasion or not is uncertain ; but its success, and the rich spoils brought home, led him to urge his countrymen to a second expedition, when he marched with an army of 150,000 foot and G0,000 horse through Macedonia, defeating such forces as were brought against him, and passing thence into Thessaly, ravaging as he went, until he reached the historic pass of Thermopylae To this point the united forces of the Northern Greeks Athenians, Phocians, Boeotians, and ^Etolians had fallen back ; and here the Greeks a second time held their foreign invaders in check for many days, and a second time had their rear turned, owing to the treachery of some of the natives, by the same path which had been discovered to the Persians two hundred years before. Their land force, however, succeeded in getting on board the Athenian fleet, which was lying off the shore to co-operate with them. Brennus and his Gauls marched on to attack Delphi, of whose sacred treasures they had heard much. But the little force which the Delphians and their neighbours had collected about 4000 men favoured by the strength of their position, made a gallant and successful defence. With or without the help of Apollo, who is said to have come to the aid of his sanctuary, they rolled down rocks upon the close ranks of their enemies as they crowded into the defile, and showered missiles on them from their vantage ground. A thunderstorm, with hail and intense cold, increased their confusion, and when Brennus himself was wounded they took to flight, pursued by the Greeks all the way back to Thermopylae. Brennus killed himself, " unable to endure the pain of his wounds. " says Justin ; more probably determined not to return home defeated. Few of the invading force eventually escaped.
was born at Frankfort-on-the-Maine in 1777. His sister Elizabeth was the well-known Bettina von Arnim, Goethe s correspondent. He studied at Jena, and afterwards resided in Heidelberg, Vienna, and Berlin, leading a somewhat restless and unsettled life. In 1818 his disgust with all mundane affairs reached such a height that he withdrew from ordinary life and lived in the strictest seclusion at Diilmen. This continued for six years ; the latter part of his life he spent in Ratisbon, Frankfort, and Munich. He died at Aschaffenburg 28th July 1842. Brentano belongs to the romantic school of German poetry, and his works,
like all others of that class, are marked by excess of