do about Nothing_ (1600). BENEDICT
[BELLEFONTAINE], the wealthiest farmer of Grand Pre, in Acadia, father
of Evangeline ("the pride of the village"). He was a stalwart man
of seventy, hale as an oak, but his hair was white as snow. Colonel
Winslow in 1713 informed the villagers of Grand Pre that the French
had formally ceded their village to the English, that George II. now
confiscated all their lands, houses, and cattle, and that the people,
amounting to nearly 2000, were to be "exiled into other lands
without delay." The people assembled on the sea-shore; old Benedict
Bellefontaine sat to rest himself, and fell dead in a fit. The old
priest buried him in the sand, and the exiles left their village homes
forever.--Longfellow, _Evangeline_ (1849).

BEN'ENGEL'I (_Cid Hamet_), the hypothetical Moorish chronicler from
whom Cervantes pretends he derived the account of the adventures of
don Quixote.

The Spanish commentators ... have discovered that _cid Hamet
Benengeli_ is after all no more than an Arabic version of the name
of Cervantes himself. _Hamet_ is a Moorish prefix, and _Benengeli_
signifies "son of a stag," in Spanish _Cervanteno._--Lockhart.

_Benengeli_ (_Cid Hamet_), Thomas Babington lord Macaulay. His
signature in his _Fragment of an Ancient Romance_ (1826). (See Cid,
etc.)

BENEV'OLUS, in Cowper's _Task_, is John Courtney Throckmorton, of
Weston Underwood.

BENJAMIN PENGUILLAN. _The Pioneers_, by J. F. Cooper. A servant in the
family of Judge Temple. His sobriquet is "Ben Pump." (1823.)

BENJIE _(Little)_, or Benjamin Colthred, a spy employed by Cristal
Nixon, the agent of Redgauntlet.--Sir W. Scott, _Redgauntlet_ (time,
George III.).

BEN'NET _(Brother)_, a monk at St. Mary's convent.--Sir W. Scott, _The
Monastery_ (time, Elizabeth).

_Ben'net (Mrs.)_, a demure, intriguing woman in _Amelia_, a novel by
Fielding (1751).

BEN'OITON _(Madame)_, a woman who has been the ruin of the family by
neglect. In the "famille Benoiton" the constant question was "_Ou
est Madame?_" and the invariable answer "_Elle est sortie_" At the
_denouement_ the question was asked again, and the answer was varied
thus, "Madam has been at home, but is gone out again."--_La Famille
Benoiton_.

BEN'SHEE, the domestic spirit or demon of certain Irish families. The
benshee takes an interest in the prosperity of the family to which
it is attached, and intimates to it approaching disaster or death by
wailings or shrieks. Th