m and the revival of
letters; tried hard to unite the Churches of the East and the West;
joined the latter, and was made cardinal; too much of a Grecian to
recommend himself to the popehood, to which he was twice over nearly
elevated (1395-1472).

BESSEL, FRIEDRICH WILHELM, a Prussian astronomer of prominent
ability, born at Minden; professor of Mathematics at Koenigsberg, and
director of the Observatory; discovered--what was a great
achievement--the parallax of the fixed star 61 Cygne; his greatest work,
"Fundamenta Astronomiae," on which he spent 10 years, a marvel, like all
he did, of patient toil and painstaking accuracy (1784-1846).

BESSEMER, SIR HENRY, civil engineer and inventor, born at Charlton,
Herts; of his many inventions the chief is the process, named after him,
of converting pig-iron into steel at once by blowing a blast of air
through the iron while in fusion till everything extraneous is expelled,
and only a definite quantity of carbon is left in combination, a process
which has revolutionised the iron and steel trade all over the world,
leading, as has been calculated, to the production of thirty times as
much steel as before and at one-fifth of the cost per ton (1813-1898).

BESSEMER PROCESS. See BESSEMER.

BESSIERES, JEAN BAPTISTE, DUKE OF ISTRIA, marshal of France,
born at Languedoc, of humble parentage; rose from the ranks; a friend and
one of the ablest officers of Napoleon, and much esteemed by him;
distinguished himself in the Italian campaign, in Egypt, and at Marengo;
was shot at Luetzen the day before the battle (1768-1813).

BESSUS, a satrap of Bactria under Darius, who assassinated his
master after the battle of Arbela, but was delivered over by Alexander to
Darius's brother, by whom he was put to death, 328 B.C.

BESTIARY, a name given to a class of books treating of animals,
viewed allegorically.

BETHANY, village on E. of the Mount of Olives, abode of Lazarus and
his sisters.

BETHEL (i. e. house of God), a place 11 m. N. of Jerusalem, scene
of Jacob's dream, and famous in the history of the patriarchs.

BETHENCOURT, a Norman baron, in 1425 discovered and conquered the
Canaries, and held them as a fief of the crown of Castile.

BETHLEHEM (3), a village 6 m. S. of Jerusalem, the birthplace of
Jesus Christ and King David, with a convent containing the Church of the
Nativity; near it is the grotto where St. Jerome translated the Bible
into Latin.

BETHLE