B E C
BED
kolfinck fpeaks of an empiric, who cured melancholic and ma- niacal patients by only whipping and beating them, foils fla- gris iff verberibus. Rolf nek, in Ord. & Meth. Med. Sp. 1. 14. §. 3. c. 17. Cajl. Lex. Med. p. 741.' b.
Beating of the heart. Divers fyftems have been framed to account for the beating of the heart. Some have doubted whether it be mechanical, that is, deducible from any known laws or powers of nature. Vid. Ray, Wifd. of God. P. I. p. 45.
The French philofophers give an inftance of an extraordinary heating of the heart, fo ftrong and loud, that it might be heard to the diftance of ten paces '. The arteries have their pulfa- tions correfpondent to thofe of the heart, by which they are diftinguifhed from the veins, which have no pulfe ; tho' there are inftances alfo of beatings of the veins k , Hke thofe of the arteries. — [ j Mem. Acad. Scienc. 1704. p. 30. k Mem. Acad. Scienc. 1704. p. 218.]
Beating in the flanks, a diftemper to which black cattle are fubi'ect, and is an indication of a great inflammation in the bowels. Ruft. Diet.
BEATITUDE imports the ftipreme good, or the bigheft degree of happinefs human nature is fufceptible of; or the moft per- fect ftate of a rational being, wherein the foul has attained to the utmoft excellency and dignity it is framed for. Micreel. Lex. Philofoph. p. 209.
In which fenfe, it amounts to the fame with what we other wife call hlejjednefs and fovereign felicity ; by the Greeks £^«i- ftosttt ; and by the Latins furnmum bonum, beatttudo, and beati- tas. ^uinclil. Inft. Orat. 1. 8. c. 3. Jour des Scav. T. 67. P- 235.
Beatitude, among divines, denotes the beatific vifion, ortke fruition of God in a future life to all eternity.
Beatitude is alfo ufed in fpeaking of the thefes contained in Chrift's fermon on the mount, whereby he pronounces blefled the poor in fpirit, thofe that mourn, the meek, &c. Matth. c. 5. ver. 2, feq:
Beatitude was alfo a title antiently given to all bifhops ; but of later days reftrained to the pope. Schmul. Lex. p. 89. It appears to have been fometimes alfo given to laymen. Brijf. de Formul. p. 362. Schmid. loc. cit.
BEAVER, (Cycl.) m zoology. See Fiber.
BECAH or Bekah, a Jewifh coin, being half a fhekel. Cum- ber!. Ant. Jewifli Weight, c. 4. p. 138. See the article She- kel, Cycl.
In Dr. Arbuthnot's table of reductions, the bekah amounts to 1 3 i.j £ ; , in Dr. Prideaux's computation to r s. 6 d. Every lfraelite paid an hundred bekahs a head every year for the fupport of the temple. Calm. Diet.. Bibl. in voc.
BECALMING, in the fea-language, is when any thing keeps the wind off or away from a veflel. Botel. Sea Dial. 4. p. 187. Thus one fhip is faid to becalm another, when fhe comes up with her on the weather-fide : the like is faid of the fhore, when it keeps the wind away.
BECASSE, in natural tuftory, the woodcock. The French writers have alfo made this the name of a kind of ihell-fifh, of the genus of the purpura. They call this the woodcock-fhell, from the length of its beak. There are two fpecies of this, a prickly and a fmooth one.
The prickly kind is an extremely beautiful and elegant fliell. It is of a yellowifh. colour ; and its tail or beak (for the hinder extremity of the fhell, which runs out into an immoderate length, is fometimes called by the one, fometimes by the other of thefe names) is furnifhed with four rows of large and very long fpines : between the rows of thefe, there are alfo rows of fmall and fnort fpines. The body of the fliell is furrowed very deep, with a number of tranfverfe circular lines ; and both this and the clavicle are befet with feveral rows of long fpines. The fmooth betajfe, or woodcock-ftiell, is a very elegant fpecies, but much lefs fo than the other. It is of a yellowith colour, radiated with black and grey lines. It is all over deeply fur- rowed, and the ridges arc befet with tubercles, the clavicle is elevated, and the tail is extremely long, and hollowed into a fort of tube. The mouth of this, as well as of the other, is fmall and roundifh, and in this fpecies is of a light flefti-colour.
BECASSINE, in zoology, a name given by many to the tringa minor, or, as we commonly call it, the fand-piper. See the article S.MXD-piper.
BE.CCA, in the materia medica of the antients, a name o-iven to a fine kind of refm, collected from the turpentine and'maftic- trees of Greece and Syria, and mixed together for ufe. It was much efteemed formerly, and not only ufed in' the countrv where it was produced, but carried in great quantities to Mecca, and other parts of the Turkifh dominions, where it was valued at a very great rate. Diofcorides, however, tells us, that this refin fullered in the admixture; for that therefin collected pure from the turpentine-tree alone, was greatly pre- ferable to this mixt kind ; and in enumerating in another place the various refins, he ftill gives the fame preheminence to that of the turpentine-tree, faying, that it is the firft of all refins, and that the maftic is fecond to it. The Greeks called the turpentine and the maftic trees both by the fame name, fura ; and the Arabians formed out of that word their name dura, or daru, which they, m like manner, ufed to exprefs both, the turpentine and maftic-trees ; and thence the trees being fup-
pofed the fame, it is no wonder that their refins were mixed together in the collecting ; and the becca or mixt refin refultirw from this mixture could not but be efteemed the bell of all re- fins by thofe, who had never (cen the finer part of the mixture pure and alone.
BECCIFAGO, in zoology, the name of a fmall bird, fcarce fo large as the common linnet, and with a very remarkable fhort body. Its head, neck, back, wings, and tail, are of a greenilh grey, and in fome of the birds of a greenifh brown. This may, perhaps, be owing to the difference of fex. Its long wing-feathers are of a mixt colour of black and green ; and the under feathers of the wings are yellowifh : the tail is two fingers breadth long, and not forked, and of a plain brown colour. It feeds on vegetables, berries, &£, and is common in the north of England, where it is called the pettychaps. Ray, Ornithol. p. 158.
BECK, a little river or brook, called alfo rivulet, or rill. Diet. Ruft. in voc.
According to Verftegan, the original word is beke, which pro- perly imports a fmall ftream of water iflliing from fome bourn or fprjng. Verjl. Reftit. Dec. Intell. c. 9. p. 222. Hence hell-becks, little brooks in the rough and wild mountains about Richmond near Lancafhire, fo called on account of their ghaftlinefs and depth. Ruft. Di£l. in voc. Beck is chiefly ufed among us in the compofition of names of places originally fituate on rivulets ; hence Welbeck, Bourn- beck, &c.
The Germans ufe back in the fame manner. Martiniere, Diet. Geogr. T. 2. p. 180.
BECTASSE, an order or fe£r. of religious among the Turks, denominated from their founder Beftajb, preacher to fultan Amurath.
All the Janizaries belonging to the Porte are of the religion of beclaffe, being even faid to have derived their origin from the founder of this {c&.
The habit of the beclajfe is white : on their heads they wear white caps of feveral pieces, with turbans of wool, twilled rope-fafhion. They obferve conftantly the hour of prayer, which they perform in their own ailemblies, and make frequent declarations of the unity of God. Rycaut. State Ottom. Emp. c. ig. p. 148.
BED (Cycl.)— Bed of jujlice, lit de jujlice, in the French laws, denotes a throne whereon the king is feated in parliament. Vid. Tillet. fur Ie Lit de Juftice, P. r. p. 255, feq. & P. 2, p. 67, feq. Trev. T. 3. p. 1495. voc. Lit de jujlice. In this fenfe, the king is faid to hold his lit de juftice, when he goes to the parliament of Paris, and holds a lblemn feffion, under a high canopy erected for the puipofe. The bed of jujlice is only held on affairs relating to the ftate ; on which occafion, all the officers of the parliament appear in, red robes ; at other times they wear black ones. Several au- thors have treated exprefty on the ceremonies of the bed of jujlice, Le Long, Bibl. Hift. §. IC825, feq. p. 563.
Bed of a gun is a piece of plank laid within the cheeks of the carriage, on the middle tranfum, for the breech of the gun to reft on. Guillet, Gent. Dift. P. 2.
Bed or Jlool of a mortar is a folid piece of oak, in form of a pa- rallelopiped, bigger or lefs, according to the dimenfions of the mortar, hollowed a little in the middle to receive the breech, and half the trunions.
On the fides of the bed are fixed the cheeks or brackets by four bolts of iron. Guillet, ibid.
In fhips, when the decks lie too low from the ports, fo that the carriages of the pieces, with the trucks, cannot mount the ordnance fufficiently, but that they lie too near the gun-wale ; the method is to make a falfe deck for fo much as the piece will require for her traverfing to raife it higher ; and this they call a bed. Manw. Seam. Di£l. p. 7.
Dining Bed, leclus tridinaris, or difcubitorius, that whereon the antients lay at meals.
Tlie dining or difcubitory beds were four or five feet hiwh. Three of thefe beds were ordinarily ranged by a fquare table (whence both the table, and the room where they eat, were called tri~ clinium) in fuch manner, that one of the fides of the table re- mained open, and acceilible to the waiters. Each bed would hold three or four, rarely five perfons. Mem. Acad. Infer. T. 2. p. 428, feq. Pitifc. Lex. Ant. T. 2. p. 448. Thefe beds were unknown before the fecond Punic war : the Romans, till then, fat down to cat pn plain wooden benches, in imitation of the heroes of Homer, or, as Varro exprefles it, after the manner of the Lacedaemonians and Cretans. Scipio Africanus firft made an innovation : he had brought from Car- thage fome of thefe little beds called punicani, or archaici a , be- ing of a wood common enough, very low, fluffed only with ftraw or hay, and covered with goats or fheeps (kins, hadinis - pelHbusJlrati. In reality, there was no great difference, as to delicacy, between thefe new beds and the antient benches; but the cuftom of frequent bathing, which began then to obtain, by foftening and relaxing the body, put men on trying to reft themfelves more commodioufly by lying along, than by fit- ting down. ^ For the ladies, it did not fcem at lirft confift- ent with their modefty to adopt the mode of lyino; ; accordingly they kept to the old cuftom all the time of the commonwealth ; but, from the firft Casfars, they eat on their teds. For the
youth,
