"Natural History of Cornwall," a valuable and still interesting work; and in 1766, having presented his collections to the Asmnolean museum at Oxford, Borlase received the honorary degree of doctor of laws. He died in 1772. Besides the works above referred to, Borlase published several papers in the "Philosophical Transactions," and also prepared paraphrases of Job and the books of Solomon, but rather for his own amusement than with a view to publication. He also maintained an extensive correspondence with many of the scientific and literary men of his time, including the poet Pope, whom he furnished with the greater part of the materials for his celebrated grotto at Twickenham.—W. S. D.
BORN, Bertran or Bertrand de, born at the chateau of Hautefort in Perigord. The precise date of his birth is not known; but he appears as an important actor in the political history of France and England towards the close of the twelfth century. In 1185, when Henry, the youngest son of Henry II. of England, was contending with Richard Cœur de Lion for the duchy of Aquitaine, Bertran supported the claims of Henry, and a spirited sirvente of his remains, in which he seeks to animate to action Henry's supporters. Richard is victorious in the contest, and Bertran is the last to yield. Hautefort is besieged and taken, but the same power of song which led
" The great Emathian conqueror to spare
The house of Pindarus, when temple and tower
Went to the ground,"
now saved the troubadour, and requited Richard. A sirvente records his generosity. Prince Henry dies, and we have another and a very beautiful poem from Bertran. Immediately after his son's funeral. King Henry II. visited with his vengeance the people of Aquitaine. He besieged Hautefort, Bertran's chateau, which he took, and thought to have razed to the ground. The father remembered Bertran's love for his son, and relented. The crusades were now the subject of every man's thoughts, and such excitement as Bertran's strains could supply was not wanting, but in a tone which seems slightly satirical. The poet says he cannot think of going to the wars himself, as he sees that counts, dukes, and kings, have always something to interfere with their going. The poet, too, has his excuses for delay, one of the best of which is a lady, "belle et blonde," whom he cannot leave. The wars in France between Philip Auguste and Cœur de Lion were a source of delight to Bertran, who loved war, and especially war when kings were the parties engaged. Till Richard's death he had this enjoyment, and his sirventes were regarded as among the things which rendered peace impossible. On Richard's death, and the accession of John to the throne of England, we lose sight of Bertran. He is said to have become a Cistercian monk. When or where he died is not recorded; but there is a record of his son having performed homage for his castle of Hautefort to the king of France in the year 1212. This has been regarded, perhaps too hastily, as a proof of the father's natural death before the time of such ceremony. If the fate of Bertran de Born on earth be doubtful, we have the indisputable authority of a poet for his fortunes in the other world. Dante, we are told in the twenty-eighth canto of the Inferno, passing into the gulf where the authors of heresies and the sowers of discord are punished, sees a headless trunk pacing sadly onward—one of a group, of which Mahomet was the chief. The trunk held in his hand his severed head, which served as a lantern to light his steps as he came towards Dante. He thrust the head near enough for the poet to be told by it, that this was his (Bertran's) punishment for seeking to disunite the children of Henry II. from their father. It was just retribution, the poet tells us, that head and trunk should, in his own person, be dissevered.—J. A., D.
BORN, Ferdinand Gottlob, born in 1785 at Leipzig, where he afterwards became professor of philosophy, author of several philosophical treatises, but best known by his Latin translation of Kant's works, 3 vols. 8vo; Leipzig, 1796-98.
BORN, Ignaz von, one of the greatest mineralogists of any age, a contemporary of Werner, was born at Karlsburg in Siebenbürgen, on the 26th December, 1742, and received his early education in Hermannstadt and Vienna. For sixteen months he was attached to the jesuits; but the spirit of the order soon becoming obnoxious to him, he quitted the society and studied law in Prague. He then travelled through Germany, Holland, the Netherlands, and France, and on his return to his native country devoted the whole powers of his mind to the study of mineralogy, natural history, and the science of mining. In June 1770 having become an assessor in the mining council at Prague, he undertook a mineralogical journey through Hungary and Siebenbürgen, in which he was nearly becoming a sacrifice to his desire of knowledge. By remaining too long in the lead mines of Banijo he contracted a chronic complaint which troubled him for the rest of his life. The results of this journey were given in a letter to the celebrated mineralogist, J. J. Ferber, and published by him in 1774. Soon after his return he received the post of mining councillor; but this his illness compelled him to relinquish, and he passed the next four years of his life in pain on his hereditary estate of Alt Jedlitsch. Even during this period, however, the activity of his mind was by no means impaired. His works prepared at this time placed him in the first rank of European mineralogists. We may mention especially his "Lithophylacium Bornianum, seu index fossilium, quæ collegit, in classes et ordines digessit Ign. de Born," Pragæ, 1772-75, in two volumes, containing a description of his mineralogical cabinet, with many new species, arranged in accordance with Cronstedt's method. On the publication of this work von Born was elected a member of several foreign academies. On his return to Prague, after his partial recovery, he became one of the founders of the society for the advancement of mathematics, and national and natural history, and in 1776 was called to Vienna by the command of the Empress Maria Theresa to arrange the imperial cabinets of natural history. The result of his labours in the imperial museum was his great work, entitled "Index rerum naturalium Musei Cæs. Vindobonæ," P. I. published at Vienna in 1778, and reprinted in 1780, under the title of "Testacea Musei Cæs. Vindob., quæ jussu Mariæ Theresiæ disposuit et descripsit Ign. a Born." This fine work obtained for its author the appointment of councillor of state in Vienna; and as he had now his permanent residence in that city, he was soon surrounded by a society of men of the highest qualifications. His hereditary property gradually melted away in the expenses of scientific investigations, or in assisting others in their endeavours, and at his death on the 24th July, 1791, his family were left with nothing. Of the improvements introduced by Born in mining operations, the most important was his new method of amalgamation, which was immediately introduced into all the Austrian states, by the command of the Emperor Joseph II. Of his scientific writings, we may mention, besides those already referred to, a treatise, "Ueber das anquicken der gold und silberhaltigen Erze," &c., published at Vienna in 1786; his "Bergbaukunde," Leipzig, 1789, edited in conjunction with von Trebra; and "Catalogue méthodique et raisonné de la collection de Fossiles de Mademoiselle Eleonare de Raab," published at Vienna in 1790. Ignaz von Born was also celebrated for his wit, and some of his humorous writings have enjoyed a great reputation. Amongst these is a satirical tale, called the "Staats-Perücke," published at Vienna in 1772 without his name or sanction; and he was also one of the authors of the celebrated "Monachologia, or natural history of monks," originally published at Vienna in Latin in 1783, and subsequently translated into many languages.—W. S. D.
BOROWSKI, Ludwig Ernst von, a German divine, was born at Königsberg, June 17, 1740, and died November 10, 1831. He attained to the highest honours that were ever conferred upon a German protestant divine. In 1816 he was nominated evangelical bishop, and in 1829 archbishop of Prussia Proper. He even received the highest Prussian order, that of the black eagle. His writings were few, and of slight importance.—K. E.
* BORRER, William, F.R.S., F.L.S., of Henfield, Sussex, a celebrated English botanist, has devoted much attention to lichens and other cryptogamic plants. Along with Dawson Turner, he printed a work on British lichens, and he has contributed many botanical papers to the Linnæan Society.—J. H. B.
BORRI, in Latin BURRUS, Giuseppe Francesco, an Italian chemist, quack, and heretic, born at Milan in 1627. He was educated at Rome in a seminary of the jesuits, and while holding some office in the Vatican was a diligent student of medicine and chemistry; but his debaucheries having brought him into trouble with the authorities of the city, he was obliged to retire into an ecclesiastical establishment, where he exchanged his profligate habits, and began to disseminate new views touching the mystery of the Trinity, &c., for those of a devotee. Not-
