material being fixed in a float of cement about half or three-quarters of an inch thick. Roman mosaic is formed with cubes of marble of various colours pressed into the float. A less costly paving may be obtained by strewing irregularly-shaped marble chips over the floated surface: these are pressed into the cement with a plasterer’s hand float, and the whole is then rolled with an iron roller. This is called “terazzo mosaic.” In either the Roman or terazzo method any patterns or designs that are introduced are first worked in position, the ground-work being filled in afterwards. For the use of cement for paving see Plaster.
The principal publications on brickwork are as follows:—Rivington, Notes on Building Construction, vols. i. ii. iii.; Col. H. E. Seddon, Aide Memoir, vol. ii.; Specification; J. P. Allen, Building Construction; F. E. Kidder, Building Construction and Superintendence, part i. (1903); Longmans & Green, Building Construction; E. Dobson, Bricks and Tiles; Henry Adams, Building Construction; C. F. Mitchell, Building Construction, vols. i. ii.; E. Street, Brick and Marble Architecture in Italy. (J. Bt.)
BRICOLE (a French word of unknown origin), a military engine for casting heavy stones; also a term in tennis for a sidestroke rebounding off the wall of the court, corrupted into “brick-wall” from a supposed reference to the wall, and in billiards for a stroke off the cushion to make a cannon or hazard.
BRIDAINE (or Brydayne), JACQUES (1701–1767), French Roman Catholic preacher, was born at Chuslan in the department of Gard on the 21st of March 1701. He was educated at Avignon, first in the Jesuit college and afterwards at the Sulpician seminary of St Charles. Soon after his ordination to the priesthood in 1725, he joined the Missions Royales, organized to bring back to the Catholíc faith the Protestants of France. He gained their good-will and made many converts; and for over forty years he visited as a missionary preacher almost every town of central and southern France. In Paris, in 1744, his sermons created a deep impression by their eloquence and sincerity. He died at Roquemaure, near Avignon, on the 22nd of December 1767. He was the author of Cantiques spirituels (Montpelier, 1748, frequently reprinted, in use in most French churches); his sermons were published in 5 vols. at Avignon in 1823 (ed. Paris, 1861).
See Abbé G. Carron, Le Modèle des prêtres (1803).
BRIDE (a common Teutonic word, e.g. Goth. bruths, O.Eng. bryd, O.H.Ger. prût, Mod. Ger. Braut, Dut. bruid, possibly derived from the root bru-, cook, brew; from the med. latinized form bruta, in the sense of daughter-in-law, is derived the Fr. bru), the term used of a woman on her wedding-day, and applicable during the first year of wifehood. It appears in combination with many words, some of them obsolete. Thus “bridegroom” is the newly married man, and “bride-bell,” “bride-banquet” are old equivalents of wedding-bells, wedding-breakfast. “Bridal” (from Bride-ale), originally the wedding-feast itself, has grown into a general descriptive adjective, e.g. the bridal party, the bridal ceremony. The bride-cake had its origin in the Roman confarreatio, a form of marriage, the essential features of which were the eating by the couple of a cake made of salt, water and flour, and the holding by the bride of three wheat-ears, symbolical of plenty. Under Tiberius the cake-eating fell into disuse, but the wheat ears survived. In the middle ages they were either worn or carried by the bride. Eventually it became the custom for the young girls to assemble outside the church porch and throw grains of wheat over the bride, and afterwards a scramble for the grains took place. In time the wheat-grains came to be cooked into thin dry biscuits, which were broken over the bride’s head, as is the custom in Scotland to-day, an oatmeal cake being used. In Elizabeth’s reign these biscuits began to take the form of small rectangular cakes made of eggs, milk, sugar, currants and spices. Every wedding guest had one at least, and the whole collection were thrown at the bride the instant she crossed the threshold. Those which lighted on her head or shoulders were most prized by the scramblers. At last these cakes became amalgamated into a large one which took on its full glories of almond paste and ornaments during Charles II.’s time. But even to-day in rural parishes, e.g. north Notts, wheat is thrown over the bridal couple with the cry “Bread for life and pudding for ever,” expressive of a wish that the newly wed may be always affluent. The throwing of rice, a very ancient custom but one later than the wheat, is symbolical of the wish that the bridal may be fruitful. The bride-cup was the bowl or loving-cup in which the bridegroom pledged the bride, and she him. The custom of breaking this wine-cup, after the bridal couple had drained its contents, is common to both the Jews and the members of the Greek Church. The former dash it against the wall or on the ground, the latter tread it under foot. The phrase “bride-cup” was also sometimes used of the bowl of spiced wine prepared at night for the bridal couple. Bride-favours, anciently called bride-lace, were at first pieces of gold, silk or other lace, used to bind up the sprigs of rosemary formerly worn at weddings. These took later the form of bunches of ribbons, which were at last metamorphosed into rosettes. Bridegroom-men and bridesmaids had formerly important duties. The men were called bride-knights, and represented a survival of the primitive days of marriage by capture, when a man called his friends in to assist to “lift” the bride. Bridesmaids were usual in Saxon England. The senior of them had personally to attend the bride for some days before the wedding. The making of the bridal wreath, the decoration of the tables for the wedding feast, the dressing of the bride, were among her special tasks. In the same way the senior groomsman (the best man) was the personal attendant of the husband. The bride-wain, the wagon in which the bride was driven to her new home, gave its name to the weddings of any poor deserving couple, who drove a “wain” round the village, collecting small sums of money or articles of furniture towards their housekeeping. These were called bidding-weddings, or bid-ales, which were in the nature of “benefit” feasts. So general is still the custom of “bidding-weddings” in Wales, that printers usually keep the form of invitation in type. Sometimes as many as six hundred couples will walk in the bridal procession. The bride’s wreath is a Christian substitute for the gilt coronet all Jewish brides wore. The crowning of the bride is still observed by the Russians, and the Calvinists of Holland and Switzerland. The wearing of orange blossoms is said to have started with the Saracens, who regarded them as emblems of fecundity. It was introduced into Europe by the Crusaders. The bride’s veil is the modern form of the flammeum or large yellow veil which completely enveloped the Greek and Roman brides during the ceremony. Such a covering is still in use among the Jews and the Persians.
See Brand, Antiquities of Great Britain (Hazlitt’s ed., 1905); Rev J. Edward Vaux, Church Folklore (1894).
BRIDEWELL, a district of London between Fleet Street and the Thames, so called from the well of St Bride or St Bridget close by. From William the Conqueror’s time, a castle or Norman tower, long the occasional residence of the kings of England, stood there by the Fleet ditch. Henry VIII., Stow says, built there “a stately and beautiful house,” specially for the housing of the emperor Charles V. and his suite in 1525. During the hearing of the divorce suit by the Cardinals at Blackfriars, Henry and Catharine of Aragon lived there. In 1553 Edward VI. made it over to the city as a penitentiary, a house of correction for vagabonds and loose women; and it was formally taken possession of by the lord mayor and corporation in 1555. The greater part of the building was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666. New Bridewell, built in 1829, was pulled down in 1864. The term has become a synonym for any reformatory.
BRIDGE, a game of cards, developed out of the game of whist. The country of its origin is unknown. A similar game is said to have been played in Denmark in the middle of the 19th century. A game in all respects the same as bridge, except that in “no trumps” each trick counted ten instead of twelve, was played in England about 1884 under the name of Dutch whist. Some connect it with Turkey and Egypt under the name of “Khedive,” or with a Russian game called “Yeralash.” It was in Turkey that it first won a share of popular favour. Under the synonyms of “Biritch,” “Bridge,” or “Russian whist,” it found its way to the London clubs about 1894, from which date its popularity rapidly increased.
Ordinary Bridge.—Bridge, in its ordinary form, differs from
