commanded the 2nd army of the West, and though defeated at Mogilev (23rd July), rejoined the main army under Barclay, and led the left wing at Borodino (7th Sept.), where he received a mortal wound. A monument was erected in his honour by the tsar Nicholas I. on the battlefield of Borodino.
BAGSHOT BEDS, in geology, a series of sands and clays of shallow-water origin, some being fresh-water, some marine. They belong to the upper Eocene formation of the London and Hampshire basins (England), and derive their name from Bagshot Heath in Surrey; but they are also well developed in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. The following divisions are generally accepted:—
| Upper | Bagshot | Beds | Barton sand, and Barton clay. |
| Middle | ,, | ,, | Bracklesham beds. |
| Lower | ,, | ,, | Bournemouth beds, Alum Bay beds, and Bovey Tracey beds (?). |
The lower division consists of pale-yellow, current-bedded sand and loam, with layers of pipeclay and occasional beds of flint pebbles. In the London basin, wherever the junction of the Bagshot beds with the London clay is exposed, it is clear that no sharp line can be drawn between these formations. The Lower Bagshot beds may be observed at Brentwood, Billericay and Highbeech in Essex; outliers, capping hills of London clay, occur at Hampstead, Highgate and Harrow. In Surrey considerable tracts of London clay are covered by heath-bearing Lower Bagshot beds, as at Weybridge, Aldershot, Woking, &c. The “Ramsdell clay,” N.W. of Basingstoke, belongs to this formation. In the Isle of Wight the lower division is well exposed at Alum Bay (660 ft.) and White Cliff Bay (140 ft.); here it consists of unfossiliferous sands (white, yellow, brown, crimson and every intermediate shade), and clays with layers of lignite and ferruginous sandstone. Similar beds are visible at Bournemouth, and in the neighbourhood of Poole, Wareham, Corfe and Studland.
The leaf-bearing clays of Alum Bay and Bournemouth are well known, and have yielded a large and interesting series of plant remains, including Eucalyptus, Caesalpinia, Populus, Platanus, Sequoia, Aralia, Polypodium, Osmunda, Nipadites and many others. The sands and clays of Bovey Tracey (see Bovey Beds) are probably of the same age. The clays of this formation are of great value for pottery manufacture; they are extensively mined in the vicinity of Wareham and Corfe, whence they are shipped from Poole and are consequently known as “Poole clays”; similarly, “Teignmouth clay” is obtained from the Bovey beds. Alum was formerly obtained from the clays of Alum Bay; and the lignites have been used as fuel near Corfe and at Bovey.
The Bracklesham beds (“q.v.”) are sometimes classed with the overlying Barton clay as Middle Bagshot. In the London basin the Barton beds are unknown. In Surrey and Berkshire the Bracklesham beds are from 20 to 50 ft. thick; in Alum Bay they are 100 ft., with beds of lignite in the lower portion; and about here they are sharply marked off from the Barton clay by a bed of conglomerate formed of flint pebbles. The Upper Bagshot beds, Barton sand and Barton clay, are from 140 to 200 ft. thick in the Isle of Wight.
The Agglestone (or Haggerstone) rock and Puckstone rock, near Studland in Dorsetshire, are formed of large indurated masses of the Lower Bagshot beds that have resisted the weather; Creechbarrow near Corfe is another striking feature due to the same beds. Many of the sarsen stones or greywethers of S.E. England have been derived from Bagshot strata.
See Memoirs of the Geological Survey (England):—“Geology of the Isle of Wight,” new edition (1889); “The Geology of London and Part of the Thames Valley,” vol. i. (1889); and “The Geology of the Country around Bournemouth” (1898).
BAHADUR KHEL, an Indian salt-mine in the Kohat district of the North-West Frontier Province, in the range of hills south of the village of Bahadur Khel between Kohat and Bannu. For a space of 4 m. in length by a quarter of a mile in breadth there exists an exposed mass of rock-salt with several large hillocks of salt on either side. The quarries extend over an area 1 m. long by half a mile broad, and the salt is hewn out in large blocks with picks and wedges. The Indian government formerly maintained a large preventive establishment for the preservation of the revenue, but it was withdrawn in 1898. Consumption of Kohat salt is restricted, on account of its paying less duty, to the tracts lying to the north of the Indus and to the frontier tribes. In 1903 the rate was fixed at R.112 per maund, against R.2 for the rest of India. The mines are under the control of the Northern India Salt Department.
BAHADUR SHAH I., a Mogul emperor of Hindustan, A.D. 1707–1712, the son and successor of Aurangzeb. At the time of the latter’s death his eldest surviving son, Prince Muazim, was governor of Kabul, and in his absence the next brother, Azam Shah, assumed the functions of royalty. Muazim came down from Kabul, and with characteristic magnanimity offered to share the empire with his brother. Azam would not accept the proposal and was defeated and slain on the plains of Agra. Muazim then ascended the throne under the title of Bahadur Shah. He was a man of 64 and died five years later. During his lifetime the empire was already falling to pieces before the inroads of the Sikhs and Mahrattas, and through internal dissensions.
BAHADUR SHAH II., the last of the Mogul emperors of Hindustan, 1837–1857. He was a titular emperor only, since from the time of the defeat of Shah Alam at Buxar in 1764 all real power had resided with the East India Company; but all proclamations were still worded under “The King’s Realm and the Company’s rule.” His sole importance is due to the use made of his name during the Mutiny of 1857. Always feeble in character, he was at that time old, and, from the first, was wholly at the mercy of the mutinous soldiery in Delhi, who were controlled by a council called the Barah Topi, or Twelve Heads. His papers, seized after the fall of Delhi, are full of senile complaint of the disrespect and discourtesy which he suffered from them. At the time of the assault he fled to the Tomb of Humayun, 6 m. from Delhi, where he was captured by Major Hodson. In January 1858 he was brought to trial for rebellion and for complicity in the murder of Europeans. The trial lasted more than two months. The substance of the king’s defence was that he had been a mere instrument in the hands of the mutineers. On the 29th of March he was found guilty and sentenced to imprisonment for life. He was transported to Rangoon, and died there on the 7th of November 1862.
BAHAMAS (Lucayos), an archipelago of the British West Indies. It is estimated to consist of 29 islands, 661 cays and 2387 rocks, and extends along a line from Florida on the north-west to Haiti on the south-east, between Cuba and the open Atlantic, over a distance of about 630 m., from 80° 50′ to 72° 50′ W., and 22° 25′ to 26° 40′ N. The total land area is estimated at 5450 sq. m., of which the main islands occupy 4424 sq. m., and the population was 43,521 in 1881 and 53,735 in 1901. Some 12,000 of these are whites, the remainder coloured. The main islands and groups, beginning from the north-west, are as follows: Little and Great Abaco, with Great Bahama to the west; Eleuthera (a name probably corrupted from the Spanish Isla de Tierra), Cat, Watling, or Guanahani, and Rum Cay on the outer line towards the open ocean, with New Providence, the Exuma chain and Long Island forming an inner line to the west, and still farther west Andros (named from Sir Edmund Andros, governor of Massachusetts, &c., at the close of the 17th century; often spoken of as one island, but actually divided into several by narrow straits); and finally the Crooked Islands, Mayaguana and Inagua. The Turks and Caicos islands continue the outer line, and belong geographically to the archipelago, but not politically. The surrounding seas are shallow for the most part, but there are three well-defined channels—the Florida or New Bahama channel, between the north-western islands and Florida, followed by the Gulf Stream, the Providence channels (north-east and north-west) from which a depression known as the Tongue of Ocean extends southward along the east side of Andros, and the Old Bahama channel, between the archipelago and Cuba. The Andros islands have a length of 95 m. and an area of 1600 sq. m.; Great Abaco is 70 m. long and its area is 680 sq. m.; Great Inagua is 34 m. long with an area of 530 sq. m.,
