in 1746. In the following year he retired to his estate of Antermony in Scotland, where he spent the remainder of his life. He died in 1780. His travels, published at Glasgow, in 2 vols. 4to, 1763, were speedily translated
into French, and widely circulated in Europe.BELL, John, anatomist and surgeon, was born at Edinburgh, 12th May 1763. He had the merit of being the first in Scotland who applied with success the science of anatomy to practical surgery. While still a young man he established, in the face of much opposition, an anatomical theatre in Surgeon Square, where he attracted large audiences by his admirable lectures on anatomy, physiology, and surgery, in which he was assisted by his younger brother Charles. After his exclusion from the infirmary (to which reference has been made in the notice of Sir Charles Bell), he ceased to lecture, and devoted his time to study and practice. He died at Rome in 1820, while on a tour in Italy for the benefit of his health. To great skill in his profession he united high and varied mental abilities and extensive learning.
His principal works are : Anatomy of the Human Body, 3 vols. 8vo, 1793-1802 ; Discourses on the Nature mid Cure of Wounds, 2 vols. 8vo, 1793-95 ; Principles of Surgery, 3 vols. 8vo, 1801 ; and several volumes of Engravings illustrative of Human Ana tomy. His Observations on Italy were published by his widow in 1825.
BELL, Robert, editor of the Annotated Edition of the British Poets, was an Irishman by birth and education, but a Londoner by a long residence of nearly forty years. He was born at Cork in 1800, and was educated at Trinity College, Dublin. With the tasks of a subordinate in a Government office at Dublin he combined literary pursuits, editing a political journal and contributing to periodicals. In 1828 he settled in London, and literature was thence forward the business of his life. As journalist he edited the Atlas for several years ; and afterwards the Monthly Chronicle, Mirror, and Home News. Of his early under takings the more important were the volumes which he compiled for Lardner s Cabinet Cyclopaedia, including the Lives of British Admirals, in continuation of Southey s work ; Lives of British Poets ; a History of Russia ; and the continuation of Sir James Mackintosh s History of England. He made himself favourably known as a novelist by The Ladder of Gold and Hearts and Altars. Among his other works are a Life of Canning, Wayside Pictures in France, Belgium, and Germany, three five-act comedies, and a volume entitled Memorials of the Civil War, based on the Fairfax Correspondence. He earned a higher place and a more enduring reputation by his Annotated Edition of the British Poets, of which the first volume appeared in 1854. The series was carried through twenty-nine volumes. The works of each poet are prefaced by a carefully-prepared memoir, and accompanied by explanatory and illustrative notes, of a really helpful and often indispensable kind. In his earlier years Bell had taken a leading part in founding the Dublin Historical Society. In the course of his London life he became an active director of the Royal Literary Fund. He was also chosen F.S.A. In private life he was highly esteemed and warmly loved for his open- heartedness, his genial temper, and his generous readiness to give aid to fellow-workers who might be in need. He died in London, at the age of sixty-seven, April 12, 1867.
BELLA, Stefano de la, engraver, was born at Florence in 1610. He was apprenticed to a goldsmith; but some prints of Callot having fallen into his hands, he began to turn his attention entirely towards engraving, and studied the art under Canta Gallina, who had also been the instruc tor of Callot. By the liberality of Lorenzo de Medici he was enabled to spend three years in study at Rome. In 1642 he went to Paris, where Cardinal Richelieu engaged him to go to Arras and make drawings of the siejre and taking of that town by the royal army. After residing a considerable time at Paris he returned to Florence, where he obtained a pension from the grand duke, whose son, Cosmo, he instructed in drawing. He died in 1664. His productions were very numerous, amounting to over 1400 separate pieces.
BELLADONNA, Dwale, or Deadly Nightshade (Atropa Belladonna), a tall bushy herb of the natural order Solanaceca, growing to a height of 4 or 5 feet, having leaves of a dull green colour, with a black shining berry fruit about the size of a cherry, and a large tapering root. The plant is a native of Central and South Europe, extending into Asia, and it is also found in waste places and hedge rows of Britain, though it is a doubtful native. The entire plant is highly poisonous, and accidents not unfrequently occur through children and unwary persons eating the attractive-looking fruit. Its leaves and roots are largely used in medicine, on which account the plant is cultivated, chiefly in South Germany, Switzerland, and France. Both roots and leaves contain the poisonous alkaloid atropia, but in practice the roots only are employed for its extrac tion. The proportions in which atropia is present in the roots range between 6 and 25, the roots of young plants being always richest in the alkaloid. The percentage found in leaves is much more uniform, being about - 47, and extracts and tinctures of the leaves are therefore of much more constant strength than if prepared from roots. Preparations of belladonna and atropia are used in medi cine as anodynes in local nervous pains, atropia being frequently hypodermically injected but rarely taken inter nally. They are also of great value in ophthalmic practice on account of their peculiar property of producing dilata tion of the pupil, either when painted around or dropped into the eye. Belladonna is also used as an antispasmodic in hooping-cough and spasmodic coughs generally, and for various other medicinal purposes. A remarkable anta gonism between the physiological action of atropia and the alkaloid of the calabar bean has been experiment ally worked out by Dr Thomas R. Fraser (Trans. Roy. Soc. Ed., 1870-1). To a more limited extent also an anta gonism between atropia and morphia and other alkaloids has been established ; and the researches on these sub stances, and on the mutual action of alkaloids generally, have been continued in experiments conducted by Dr J. G. M Kendrick, reported to the British Medical Associa tion in 1874.
BELLAI, or Bellay, Guillaume du, lord of Langey, a French general, who signalized himself in the service of Francis I., was born at Glatigny in 1491. He was con sidered the ablest captain of the time, and his great abilities as a negotiator occasioned the remark of the Emperor Charles V., that " Langey s pen had fought more against him than all the lances in France." He was sent in 1537 as viceroy into Piedmont, where he took several towns from the imperialists. His address in penetrating into the most secret designs of the enemy was extraordinary, and he spared no expense for that end. He was extremely active in influencing some of the universities of France to give a judgment agreeable to the desires of Henry VIII., when that prince wished to divorce his queen in order to marry Anne Boleyn. Langey composed several works, the most remarkable of which was the history of his own times (Memoires, 1753, 7 vols.) He died in 1543, and was buried in the church of Mans, where a noble monument was erected to his memory.
baker, but his abilities were discovered by a clergyman named De Water, who exerted himself in the boy s behalf,
and obtained sufficient assistance to send him, in 1782, to