clergy and to nuns. His stay in Limerick was particularly successful, and he founded a religious confraternity of laymen which numbered 5000 members. Despite his arduous life as a priest, Bridgett found time to produce literary works of value, chiefly dealing with the history of the Reformation in England; among these are The Life of Blessed John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester (1888); The Life and Writings of Sir Thomas More (1890); History of the Eucharist in Great Britain (2 vols., 1881); Our Lady’s Dowry (1875, 3rd ed. 1890). He died at Clapham on the 17th of February 1899.
For a complete list of Bridgett’s works see The Life of Father Bridgett, by C. Ryder (London, 1906).
BRIDGEWATER, FRANCIS EGERTON, 3rd Duke of (1736–1803), the originator of British inland navigation, younger son of the 1st duke, was born on the 21st of May 1736. Scroop, 1st duke of Bridgewater (1681–1745), was the son of the 3rd earl of Bridgewater, and was created a duke in 1720; he was the great-grandson of John Egerton, 1st earl of Bridgewater (d. 1649; cr. 1617), whose name is associated with the production of Milton’s Comus; and the latter was the son of Sir Thomas Egerton (1540–1617), Queen Elizabeth’s lord keeper and James I.’s lord chancellor, who was created baron of Ellesmere in 1603, and in 1616 Viscount Brackley (q.v.).
Francis Egerton succeeded to the dukedom at the age of twelve on the death of his brother, the 2nd duke. As a child he was sickly and of such unpromising intellectual capacity that at one time the idea of cutting the entail was seriously entertained. Shortly after attaining his majority he became engaged to the beautiful duchess of Hamilton, but her refusal to give up the acquaintance of her sister, Lady Coventry, led to the breaking off of the match. Thereupon the duke broke up his London establishment, and retiring to his estate at Worsley, devoted himself to the making of canals. The navigable canal from Worsley to Manchester which he projected for the transport of the coal obtained on his estates was (with the exception of the Sankey canal) the first great undertaking of the kind executed in Great Britain in modern times. The construction of this remarkable work, with its famous aqueduct across the Irwell, was carried out by James Brindley, the celebrated engineer. The completion of this canal led the duke to undertake a still more ambitious work. In 1762 he obtained parliamentary powers to provide an improved waterway between Liverpool and Manchester by means of a canal. The difficulties encountered in the execution of the latter work were still more formidable than those of the Worsley canal, involving, as they did, the carrying of the canal over Sale Moor Moss. But the genius of Brindley, his engineer, proved superior to all obstacles, and though at one period of the undertaking the financial resources of the duke were almost exhausted, the work was carried to a triumphant conclusion. The untiring perseverance displayed by the duke in surmounting the various difficulties that retarded the accomplishment of his projects, together with the pecuniary restrictions he imposed on himself in order to supply the necessary capital (at one time he reduced his personal expenses to £400 a year), affords an instructive example of that energy and self-denial on which the success of great undertakings so much depends. Both these canals were completed when the duke was only thirty-six years of age, and the remainder of his life was spent in extending them and in improving his estates; and during the latter years of his life he derived a princely income from the success of his enterprise. Though a steady supporter of Pitt’s administration, he never took any prominent part in politics.
He died unmarried on the 8th of March 1803, when the ducal title became extinct, but the earldom of Bridgewater passed to a cousin, John William Egerton, who became 7th earl. By his will he devised his canals and estates on trust, under which his nephew, the marquess of Stafford (afterwards first duke of Sutherland), became the first beneficiary, and next his son Francis Leveson Gower (afterwards first earl of Ellesmere) and his issue. In order that the trust should last as long as possible, an extraordinary use was made of the legal rule that property may be settled for the duration of lives in being and twenty-one years after, by choosing a great number of persons connected with the duke and their living issue and adding to them the peers who had taken their seats in the House of Lords on or before the duke’s decease. Though the last of the peers died in 1857, one of the commoners survived till the 19th of October 1883, and consequently the trust did not expire till the 19th of October 1903, when the whole property passed under the undivided control of the earl of Ellesmere. The canals, however, had in 1872 been transferred to the Bridgewater Navigation Company, by whom they were sold in 1887 to the Manchester Ship Canal Company.
BRIDGEWATER, FRANCIS HENRY EGERTON, 8th Earl of (1756–1829), was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, and became fellow of All Souls in 1780, and F.R.S. in 1781. He held the rectories of Middle and Whitchurch in Shropshire, but the duties were performed by a proxy. He succeeded his brother (see above) in the earldom in 1823, and spent the latter part of his life in Paris. He was a fair scholar, and a zealous naturalist and antiquarian. When he died in February 1829 the earldom became extinct. He bequeathed to the British Museum the valuable Egerton MSS. dealing with the literature of France and Italy, and also £12,000. He also left £8000 at the disposal of the president of the Royal Society, to be paid to the author or authors who might be selected to write and publish 1000 copies of a treatise “On the Power, Wisdom and Goodness of God, as manifested in the Creation.” Mr Davies Gilbert, who then filled the office, selected eight persons, each to undertake a branch of this subject, and each to receive £1000 as his reward, together with any benefit that might accrue from the sale of his work, according to the will of the testator.
The Bridgewater treatises were published as follows:—1. The Adaptation of External Nature to the Moral and Intellectual Condition of Man, by Thomas Chalmers, D.D. 2. The Adaptation of External Nature to the Physical Condition of Man, by John Kidd, M.D. 3. Astronomy and General Physics considered with reference to Natural Theology, by William Whewell, D.D. 4. The Hand, its Mechanism and Vital Endowments as evincing Design, by Sir Charles Bell. 5. Animal and Vegetable Physiology considered with reference to Natural Theology, by Peter Mark Roget. 6. Geology and Mineralogy considered with reference to Natural Theology, by William Buckland, D.D. 7. The Habits and Instincts of Animals with reference to Natural Theology, by William Kirby. 8. Chemistry, Meteorology, and the Function of Digestion, considered with reference to Natural Theology, by William Prout, M.D. The works are of unequal merit; several of them took a high rank in apologetic literature. They first appeared during the years 1833 to 1840, and afterwards in Bohn’s Scientific Library.
BRIDGITTINES, an order of Augustinian canonesses founded by St Bridget of Sweden (q.v.) c. 1350, and approved by Urban V. in 1370. It was a “double order,” each convent having attached to it a small community of canons to act as chaplains, but under the government of the abbess. The order spread widely in Sweden and Norway, and played a remarkable part in promoting culture and literature in Scandinavia; to this is to be attributed the fact that the head house at Vastein, by Lake Vetter, was not suppressed till 1595. There were houses also in other lands, so that the total number amounted to 80. In England, the famous Bridgittine convent of Syon at Isleworth, Middlesex, was founded and royally endowed by Henry V. in 1415, and became one of the richest and most fashionable and influential nunneries in the country. It was among the few religious houses restored in Mary’s reign, when nearly twenty of the old community were re-established at Syon. On Elizabeth’s accession they migrated to the Low Countries, and thence, after many vicissitudes, to Rouen, and finally in 1594 to Lisbon. Here they remained, always recruiting their numbers from England, till 1861, when they returned to England. Syon House is now established at Chudleigh in Devon, the only English community that can boast an unbroken conventual existence since pre-Reformation times. Some six other Bridgittine convents exist on the Continent, but the order is now composed only of women.
See Helyot, Histoire des ordres religieux (1715), iv. c. 4; Max Heimbucher, Orden u. Kongregationen (1907), ii. § 83; Herzog-Hauck, Realencyklopädie (ed. 3), art. “Birgitta”; A. Hamilton in Dublin Review, 1888, “The Nuns of Syon.” (E. C. B.)
