fortification and lies in the midst of a
district which can be readily laid under water. It has a fine quay,
town-hall and park. There are several Roman Catholic and Protestant
churches. The principal Protestant church is a Gothic building dating
from the end of the 13th century, with a fine tower, and a choir of
later date (1410). Among the many interesting monuments is the imposing
tomb of the stadtholder Count Engelbert II. of Nassau and his wife. This
is the work of Tomasino Vincenz of Bologna, who, though a pupil of
Raphael in painting, in sculpture followed Michelangelo, to whom the
work is sometimes ascribed. Since 1828 Breda has been the seat of a
royal military academy for all arms of the service. It also possesses a
Latin school, an arsenal, and a modern prison built on the isolated-cell
principle. The prison is in the form of a rotunda, 58 yds. in diameter,
and covered by a high dome. In the middle is the office of the
administration, and on the top of this a small watch-tower. Round the
walls of the rotunda are the cells, 208 in number, and arranged in four
tiers with balconies reached by iron staircases. Each cell measures 35
cub. yds., is provided with an electric bell communicating with the
warder in the tower, heated by hot-air pipes, and lighted by day through
a window on the outer wall of the rotunda, and from sunset till ten
o'clock by electric light. The industries of Breda comprise the
manufacture of linen and woollen goods, carpets, hats, beer and musical
instruments. In the neighbourhood of the town are the villages of
Ginneken and Prinsenhage, situated in the midst of pretty pine woods.
They form favourite places of excursion, and in the woods at Ginneken is
a Kneipp sanatorium.

_History._--Breda was in the 11th century a direct fief of the Holy
Roman Empire, its earliest known lord being Henry I. (1098-1125), in
whose family it continued, though, from the latter part of the 13th
century, in the female line, until Alix, heiress of Philip (d. 1323),
sold it to Brabant. In 1350 the fief was resold to John (Jan) of Polanen
(d. 1377), the heiress of whose line, Joanna (d. 1445), married
Engelbert of Nassau-Dillenburg (d. 1442). Henceforth it remained in the
house of Nassau, passing ultimately to William I. (1533-1584), the first
stadtholder of the Netherlands. Breda obtained municipal rights in 1252,
but was first surrounded with walls in 1534 by Count Henry of Nassau,
who also restored the old cas