Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume II.djvu/456

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436 BEAVER HEAD cultivating the soil by free labor and civilizing the negroes. He left England April 13, 1792, with three ships and 275 white colonists, for Bulama island, on the W. coast of Africa. The expedition proved a failure. Within four months more than a third of the colonists had died by fever, and more than half the survivors returned to England. Beaver himself, though often pros- trated by fever, persevered in the enterprise ; but, unable to revive the spirit of the colonists, he departed with them for Sierra Leone, Nov. 29, 1793, and in May, 1794, reached England with only one of his original companions. The shareholders of the association, in spite of their losses, presented him with a gold medal for his disinterested and resolute conduct. He pub- lished a narrative of his experiences entitled " African Memoranda." Subsequently he dis- tinguished himself under Abercrombie in Egypt in 1801, and in the capture of the Isle of France in 1810. In 1813 he cruised in the Indian ocean in command of the frigate Nisus. BEAVER HEAD, a S. W. county of Montana territory, separated on the S. and W. from Idaho by the Eocky mountains and bounded N. by the Big Hole mountain; area, 4,250 sq. m. ; pop. in 1870, 722. Affluents of Jefferson river, one of the head streams of the Missouri, take their rise in this county. The surface is very mountainous. The county contains three quartz mills for the production of gold and a saw mill. Capital, Bannock. BEAVER INDIANS, a branch of the Chipe- wyans, belonging to the Athabascan family. They inhabit a beautiful district on the Peace river, and are allied with the Mauvais Monde. Their dialect differs somewhat from the Chipe- wyan. They are gay, improvident, and given to gambling. A tribe of the Algonquin family, called in early French accounts Amikouek or Beaver Indians, lay north of Manitouline island on the banks of Lake Huron. They were also called Nez Perces, a name subsequently given to an Oregon tribe. BEAVER ISLANDS, a group in Lake Michigan, near its N. extremity, and having one island of considerable extent (40 sq. m.), called Big Beaver. After their expulsion from Nauvoo, a dissenting branch of the Mormons established themselves there under Joseph Strang. BEAZLET, Samuel, an English architect and author, born in London in 1786, died at Tun- bridge castle, Kent, Oct. 12, 1851. He erected three great theatres in London, two in Dublin, and three in the provinces, besides remodelling several, and supplying drawings for theatres in India, Belgium, and Brazil. He wrote over a hundred dramas, and two novels, " The Rou6 " and "The Oxonians." BF.BEER1NE, or Bebeeria, an alkaloid, having the formula CssH^NO,, obtained from the be- beeru bark or bark of nectandra, Rodiei. This tree belongs to the family lauracea, and inhab- its Guiana and neighboring regions of South America. The alkaloid is also found in the luxus gempernirent or common box. The im- BEBUTOFF pure sulphate, which is commonly used, occurs in small dark brown translucent scales. It is supposed to resemble quinia in its properties, and has been used in the same class of diseases. In antiperiodic power it probably ranks among the vegetable bitters as next, though far infe- rior^to quinia. BEBIAN, Roth Ambroise Angnste, a French teacher of deaf mutes, born on the island of Guadeloupe in 1789, died there in 1834. He was the son of a merchant and the godson of the abbe Sicard, under whose direction he qualified himself for his task. He published in 1817 an Essai sur leg sour ds-mtt eta et sur le langage naturel, and afterward became a pro- fessor at the royal institution, where he excited so much jealousy by his zeal for reform that he was induced in 1825 to resign and return to Guadeloupe. Among his writings are : Mimo- yraphie, ou Essai d'ecriture mimique (1822), and Manuel d'emeignement pratique (1827). The academy awarded him a prize for his Eloge historique de Vable de Vfipee. BEBl'TOFF, Vasili Oslpovlfrh, prince, a Rus- sian soldier, born in 1792, died in Tiflis, March 22, 1858. His family, originally Armenians, acquired distinction in Georgia. He joined the army of the Caucasus in 1809, served in 1812 against the French, and subsequently took part in the subjugation of a part of Daghestan. In 1825-'7 he was governor of Imeretia, and in 1828 fought bravely against the Turks under Paskevitch ; and he was made major general for storming Akhaltzikh and holding that for- tress in March, 1829, for ten days, against supe- rior Turkish forces, until relieved by Muravieff. Appointed governor of the new Russian prov- ince of Armenia, he concluded in 1835 a boundary treaty with Persia, and was in 1838- '40 a member of the Transcaucasian administra- tion in Tiflis. In October, 1846, he defeated Shamyl; and in November, 1847, he became president of the Transcaucasian administrative council. On the outbreak of the Crimean war he was placed in command of the army of ob- servation on the frontier, and by routing the Turks near Kadiklar, Dec. 1, 1853, he prevent- ed their invasion of Russian Armenia. He achieved a decisive victory near Kuruk-Dereh, Aug. 5, 1854, over Zarif Pasha with 40,000 , men, an army more than twice as large as his own ; but failing to follow up his advantage, he was superseded in 1855 by Muravieff, and detailed for the covering of Georgia, where, on hearing of Omar Pasha's arrival in Mingrulia, he lost no time in forcing him to retreat. In 1856 he succeeded Muravieff as commander-in- chief until the arrival of Bariatinsky. He was made general of infantry in January, 1857. Two of his brothers fell on the battlefields of the Caucasus. His third brother, DAVID, fought under Paskevitch in Poland and Hungary, and before Silistria as commander of the Caucasian cavalry regiment, became lieutenant general in 1856, and was military commander of Warsaw from 1861 till his death there, March 23, 1807.