Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume II.djvu/442

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422 BEAR LAKE BEATON painting, and about 1850 opened a studio at Buffalo, N. Y., where he soon after began to devote himself exclusively to genre and animal painting. After acquiring a considerable local reputation he visited Europe in 1858-'60, and in the latter year settled in New York. He is noted for the production of a series of works conceived in a vein of grotesque humor, in which bears, apes, and other animals enact scenes from the drama of human life. Promi- nent among these are his " Bears on a Bend- er," " Court of Justice," " Dance of Silenus," "Bear Dance," and "Watchers." In some of his pictures the comic element predominates ; others are almost entirely satirical. BEAR LIKE, Great, a body of water in North America, between lat. 65 and 67 N. and Ion. 117 and 123 W., 200 ft. above the sea, irreg- ular in shape, with an area estimated at about 14,000 sq. m. Its extreme length is about 150 in., and greatest breadth 120 m. Its chief sup- ply is from the Dease river ; its outlet is Bear Lake river. The lake water, which is very clear, and appears of a light blue color, has been sounded to the depth of 270 ft. without bottom, and abounds in fish, particularly the herring-salmon. The second land expedition under Franklin, in 1825, wintered at the S. W. extremity of the lake, and built Fort Franklin, afterward one of the Hudson Bay company's stations. Simpson, Richardson, and others, journeying from Canada to the Arctic ocean, have passed this point. The lake, which is 4 S. and 23 W. of the magnetic pole, as deter- mined by Ross in 1831, is the basin of a water- shed 400 m. in diameter. BEAR LAKE RIVER, the outlet at the S. W. extremity of Bear lake, runs S. W. 70 m. and joins Mackenzie river in lat. 64 59' N., about 500 m. from the mouth of that river in the Arctic ocean. The breadth of Bear Lake river is not less than 450 ft. except at a point 35 m. from the lake, where " the Rapid " descends 3 m. through high rock walls. The depth of the stream is from one to three fath- oms, and the current is 6 m. an hour. It re- ceives in its course several small branches. BEAR MOUNTAIN, in the N. E. corner of Dau- phin co., Penn., 750 ft. high, is near a valley of the same name, having rich deposits of anthracite coal, and belongs to the first or southern coal district of Pennsylvania. BEARN, formerly a province of S. W. France, bordering on Spain, now forming the eastern and larger part of the department of Basses- Pyren6es. It is mountainous and well watered, and excellently adapted for raising cattle and horses. The name is derived from its primi- tive inhabitants, the Beneharni. The bulk of the present population is of Basque descent, still speaking the Basque tongue, and under- standing very little French ; the people are en- ergetic, industrious, and freedom-loving. Beam was a part of ancient Aquitania, and fell into the hands of the Visigoths, and afterward of the Franks. Its first feudal possessor, Centul- 1ns, is mentioned in the 9th century, and his descendants ruled it to the close of the 13th century, when it came into possession of the counts of Foix by marriage, and by the female line of this house into the hands of the kings of Navarre, by the last of whom, Henry IV., it was united with France, tin nigh the act of an- nexation was not finally accomplished till 1620. BEAR RIVER. I. A stream in Utah territory, 400 m. long, which rises in a spur of the Rocky mountains about 75 m. E. of Salt Lake City, flows first N. W. into Idaho territory, where it makes a sharp bend and returns by a S. S. W. course into Utah, and falls into Great Salt lake. At the bend of the river in Idaho, about 45 m. from Lewis river, are the Beer and Steamboat springs, highly impregnated with magnesia and other mineral substances. The valley, which is 6,000 ft. above the sea, through most of its extent is narrow, but portions of it - are described by Fremont as extremely pictu- resque. II. A river in California, which rises on the W. slope of the Sierra Nevada, runs V. and S., forming the boundary for some distance between Yuba and Placer counties, and unites with Feather river, 31 m. below Marysville. BEAS, or Be; pasha (anc. the upper Hyphasig), a river of the Punjaub, in western India. It rises in the Himalaya mountains, 13,200 ft. above the level of the sea, and flows into the Sutlej at Endreesa, lat. 31 10' and Ion. 75 4'. Its length is about 250 m. In the winter it is fordable in most places, but in summer has been known to be 740 yards wide and have a swift current at a distance of 20 m. from its confluence with the Sutlej. BEASLEY, Frederick, an American divine, born near Edenton, N. C., in 1777, died at Elizabeth- town, N. J., Nov. 2, 1845. In 1801 he was ordained deacon in the Episcopal church, and j was successively rector in Albany, N. Y., and i in Baltimore, Md. He was from 1813 to 1828 professor of moral philosophy in the university of Pennsylvania, and published in defence of the philosophy of Locke a "Search of Truth in the Science of the Human Mind " (1822). After retiring from the university he took charge of a church in Trenton, N. J., where he wrote an answer to the doctrinal views of Dr. Channing. From 1836 he lived in retire- ment at Elizabethtown. BEATIFICATION, in the Roman Catholic church, an act of the pope whereby a deceased person is declared blessed previous to being canonized as a saint. The person must have had a reputation for sanctity and supernatural gifts, and before the decree is pronounced a long and minute investigation is made into his or her merits, and this cannot be completed till 50 years after death. In early times the decree of beatification was pronounced by bishops, but in 1170 that right was reserved to the holy see by Alexander III., and has been held by it ever since. BEATON, Beton, Beatonn, or Bfthune, David, a Scottish statesman and ecclesiastic, born in