astronomer, born of a noble family at Knudstorp, a small lordship near Helsinborg, in Scania, or Schonen. His father's family being large, he was educated by an uncle, who made him eventually his heir, and intended, first, for the army, afterwards for the law. He had been, however, so surprised by the exactness with which he found an eclipse predicted, that nothing would content him but a close attention to astronomy. Hence, when sent, in 1562, to Leipsic as a law student, he spent his time chiefly in observing the heavens, and in acquiring that mathematical knowledge which was necessary to render his observations effective. After spending three years at Leipsic, most profitably as regarded his future astronomical fame, but with no advantage to his prospects as a lawyer, he was unexpectedly called back to Denmark by his uncle's death. He had already gained great credit by his proficiency in astronomy, but his relations looked upon such an acquisition with contempt, considering it merely as an idle waste of time, that might have been profitably employed in preparation for a lucrative profession. Brahe, therefore, soon left his native country in disgust, and proceeded on his travels through Germany and Italy. They produced him much improvement, and made him acquainted with several men of science; but his choleric disposition involved him in a duel with a fellow-countryman at Rostoc, which deprived him of part of his nose. His ingenuity contrived a mixture of gold, silver, and wax, and a mode of fastening it, so as to conceal pretty completely the unsightly loss. On returning to Copenhagen, in 1571, Tycho found one of his uncles, who appreciated him justly, and who provided him with a suitable retreat for the prosecution of his learned inquiries. His other kinsmen despised astronomers as heartily as ever, and he rendered their antipathies more inveterate by marrying a peasant's daughter. At length, worn out by their dislike, he was preparing to fix himself at Basle, when his native sovereign saw the discredit of allowing Denmark to lose the honour of his residence, and offered him the patronage that he had so richly earned. Frederic gave him the island of Huen as a residence, promising to erect upon it such buildings as his pursuits required, and conferred upon him a pension, with some preferments, which together produced an income of 3,000 crowns. This liberality being rendered more effective by Brahe's own con

siderable private resources, Huen became the seat of a noble astronomical establishment; and at his house there, which he called Uranienburg, or Castle of the Heavens, the great observer spent twenty interesting, useful years. His observatory, after a time, was placed in a detached building, which he called Stiernberg, or Mountain of the Stars. He did not live in this retreat, which his residence had rendered ever memorable, as a studious recluse: his house was open to the various distinguished visitors whom his rising fame attracted constantly to Huen. Among them was James VI. of Scotland, eventually James I. of England, who had come into Denmark, in 1590, to bring away his bride, and who, after a stay of eight days with Tycho, left him with various flattering marks of gratification. In 1592, the great astronomer was honoured by a visit from his own sovereign, eventually Christian IV., but at that time an ingenuous boy under fifteen. The young prince was delighted by all that he saw, but especially with a globe of gilt tin, revolving upon an axis, and exhibiting the motions of the heavenly bodies. This Tycho gave him, and he in return presented his illustrious host with a gold chain, and expressed himself unalterably his friend. Nevertheless, in 1596, he was prevailed upon to withdraw his favour completely from him, and even to deprive him of those pecuniary provisions which the former king had so judiciously conferred, and which had been so thoroughly deserved. For this reverse the great astronomer had probably to thank his own austere, satirical, irritable temper, which naturally peopled the court with his enemies. Being now unable to continue his establishment at Uranienburg, he removed to Copenhagen, and thence to Rostoc. He now received an invitation from the emperor Rodolph II., to whom he had dedicated a treatise on astronomy, and who had a taste for that science, and for others akin to it. Gladly accepting this overture, Tycho repaired, in 1599, to Prague. There his health in the following year declined, being injured by the intensity of his application, and fond regrets of Uranienburg. The immediate cause of his death was a strangury, occasioned by an imprudent retention at a nobleman's table, where he had drunk rather more than usual. He died October 24, 1601, and was buried magnificently in the great church of Prague, where was erected a noble monument to his memory. Although Tycho

Brahe was a man of very powerful understanding, and an accurate observer, he never could bring himself to embrace the simple and rational system of Copernicus, but framed an hypothesis of his own, called after him the Tychonic system, which is essentially that of Ptolemy, though framed to meet some objections. It was, however, so embarrassed and perplexed, that few admitted it. Tycho's life was written by Gassendi, in whose work, and other publications taken from it, may be seen a list of his publications. (Rees.)

BRAHE, (Peter, Count de,) a Swedish nobleman, born in the beginning of the seventeenth century. He employed the opportunities which his office of guardian, during the minority of Christina, and of Charles XI., afforded him, for the patriotic purpose of effecting improvements in the courts of justice, and of establishing institutions for the promotion of learning and industry. The university of Abo owes its foundation to him; and he collected from different countries the most valuable books and manuscripts. His disinterestedness was evinced by declining the elevated rank and honours which his sovereign designed to bestow upon him; and he died, in 1680, at a very advanced age. (Biog. Univ.)

BRAILLIER, (Peter,) an apothecary of Lyons, who published at Rouen, in 1557, a curious book, dedicated to Claude de Gouffier, entitled, Déclaration des Abus et Ignorance des Médecins. This was a smart attack upon a work of Sebastian Collin, who had previously published, Déclaration des Abus et Tromperies des Apothicaires, Tours, 1553, 8vo.

BRAINERD, (David,) a zealous and successful preacher and missionary to the American Indians, born at Haddam, Connecticut, in 1718. His father was an assistant of the colony, or a member of the council, who died when his son was about nine years of age. In 1739 he was admitted a member of Yale college, but he was expelled in 1742, in consequence of some expressions reflecting upon one of the professors. In the spring of 1742 he went to Ripton, to pursue the study of divinity under the direction of Mr. Mills, and at the end of July was licensed to preach by the association of ministers which met at Banbury. Soon after he began his theological studies, he was desirous of preaching to the heathen. In November, after he was licensed, he was invited to go to New York, and was examined by the correspondents of the so

ciety for the conversion of the native tribes, and was appointed by them a missionary to the Indians. He arrived on the first of April, 1743, at Kannameck, an Indian village in the woods between Stockbridge, in the state of Massachusetts, and Albany. He now began his labours at the age of twenty-five, and continued in this place about a year. At first he lived in a wigwam, among the Indians; but he afterwards built himself a cabin, that he might be alone when not employed in preaching and instructing the savages. He lay upon a bundle of straw, and his food was principally boiled corn, and hasty pudding. With a feeble body, and frequent illness, and great depression of mind, he was obliged to encounter many discouragements, and to submit to hardships, which would be almost insupportable by a much stronger constitution; but he persisted in his benevolent labours, animated by the hope of propagating the truths of the christian faith among the benighted objects of his important mission. When the Indians at Kannameck had agreed to remove to Stockbridge, and place themselves under the instruction of another teacher, Brainerd left them, and bent his attention towards the Delaware Indians.

He was appointed to the ministry at Newark, in New Jersey, by a presbytery, June 12, 1744. He soon afterwards went to the new field of his labours, near the forks of the Delaware, in Pennsylvania, and continued there a year, making two visits to the Indians on Susquehannah river. He again built himself a cabin for retirement; but here he had the happiness to find some white people, with whom he maintained religious intercourse and social worship. After the hardships of his abode in this place, with but little encouragement from the effect of his exertions, he visited the Indians at Crosweeksung, near Freehold, in New Jersey. In this village he met with remarkable success. In the summer of 1746, after a short absence, he again visited the Indians on the Susquehannah, and on his return in September, found himself worn out by the hardships of his journey. His health was so much impaired, that he was obliged to preach less frequently. Being advised, in the spring of 1747, to travel in New England, he went as far as Boston, and returned in July to Northampton, where, in the family of Jonathan Edwards, he passed the remainder of his days. He gradually declined, till October 9, 1747, he died, after suffering

excruciating agony. Brainerd was a man of vigorous mental powers. While he was endowed with a quick discernment and ready invention, with a strong memory and natural eloquence, he also possessed, in an uncommon degree, the sagacity, penetration, and soundness of judgment which distinguish the man of talents from him who subsists entirely upon the learning of others. His knowledge was extensive; and he added to his other attainments an intimate acquaintance with human nature, gained not only by observing others, but by carefully noticing the operations of his own mind. As he was of a sociable disposition, and would adapt himself with great ease to the different capacities, tempers, and circumstances of those with whom he conversed, he was remarkably fitted to communicate instruction. He was very free, and entertaining, and useful in his ordinary discourse; and he was also an able disputant. As a preacher he was perspicuous and instructive, forcible, close, and pathetic. He abhorred an affected boisterousness in the pulpit, and yet he could not tolerate a cold delivery, when the subject of discourse was such as should warm the heart, and produce an earnestness of manner. His knowledge of theology was very accurate and extensive.

President Edwards, whose opinion of his character and abilities was founded upon an intimate acquaintance with him, says, that "he never knew his equal, of his age and standing, for clear, accurate notions of the nature and essence of true religion, and its distinctions from its various false appearances." He with stood every doctrine which seemed to verge towards Antinomianism, particularly the sentiments of those who thought that faith consists in believing that Christ died for them in particular, and who founded their love of God, not upon the excellence of his character, but upon the previous impression that they were the objects of his favour, and should assuredly be saved. He rebuffed the pride and presumption of laymen, who thrust themselves forth as public teachers, and decried human learning, and a learned ministry. He denounced the spirit which generally influenced the separatists through the country; and he was entirely opposed to that religion which is fond of noise and show, and delighted to publish its experiences and privileges. After the termination of a year's fruitless mission at Kannameck, where he had suffered the

greatest hardships, he was invited to become the minister of East Hampton, one of the best parishes on Long Island. But though he was not insensible to the pleasures of a quiet and fixed abode among religious friends, in the midst of the comforts and conveniences of life, yet, without the desire of fame, he preferred the dangers and sufferings of a new mission among savages. He published a narrative of his labours at Kannameck; and his journal, or an Account of the Rise and Progress of a remarkable Work of Grace amongst a number of Indians in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, with some General Remarks, 1746. This work, which is very interesting, and which displays the piety and talents of the author, was published by the commissioners of the Society in Scotland. His life, written by President Edwards, is compiled chiefly from his own diary. Annexed to it are some of his letters and miscellaneous writings. A new edition of his Memoirs was published in 1822, by Sereno Edwards Dwight, concluding his journal. Mr. Edwards had omitted the already printed journals, which had been published in two parts; the first, from June 19, to Nov. 4, 1745, entitled Mirabilia Dei inter Indicos; the second, from Nov. 24, 1745, to June 19, 1746, with the title, Divine Grace Displayed, &c. These journals Mr. Dwight has incorporated in a regular chronological series with the rest of the diary, as alone given by Edwards. (Brainerd's Life. His Journal. Edwards's Funeral Serm. Middleton's Biog. Evang. iv. 262-264. Assembly's Miss. Mag. ii. 449-452. Boston Recorder, 1824. p. 196.)

BRAINTHWAIT, (William,) born about the middle of the sixteenth century. He was fellow of Emmanuel college, Cambridge, then master of Gonville and Caius college, and was one of the forty-seven divines commissioned by James I. to prepare the present authorized translation of the Bible. The portion assigned to Dr. Brainthwait and six coadjutors was the Apocrypha. His assistants were, Drs. Duport, Radclyffe, Downes, Boyse, and Messrs. Ward. (Fuller's Ch. Hist.)

BRAITHWAIT, (John,) author of an account of the political events which, upon the death of the emperor Muley Ishmael, took place in the empire of Morocco in 1727, and in the following year. His work, which was published in London in 1729, attracted much notice on its first appearance, and was soon

translated into Dutch, German, and French. The writer was an eye-witness of the most important events related by him, being connected with the British embassy, and has interspersed very interesting details respecting the political, social, and natural history of the country. BRAKEL, (John de,) a brave naval officer in the Dutch service, born in 1618. He first served in the squadron under De Ruyter, and gave distinguished proofs of his skill and gallantry in the action which took place between the Dutch and English fleets, August 4, 1666. For this service he was rewarded with the command of one of the ships that composed the squadron dispatched by the States of Holland against Chatham. Here also he distinguished himself, forcing a passage up the river in spite of the most formidable obstructions, and in the face of a tremendous fire, which was kept up incessantly from the ships and batteries. For this service, in which he succeeded in destroying a part of the English navy, he and his associates were honourably recompensed. But De Brakel's crowning achievement was his gallant action against the combined fleets of Great Britain and France in 1672. In this engagement, bravely slighting all meaner combatants, he grappled at once with the leading ship of the enemy, commanded by Montague, earl of Sandwich. The struggle that ensued has few parallels in naval annals. The English and Dutch fought with equal fury; and De Brakel's vessel, which was the smaller of the two, would have been sunk in the heat of the contest, if timely succour had not arrived. The enemy's ship, however, took fire, and Montague leaped overboard and was drowned. De Brakel distinguished himself in several subsequent engagements with the English; and when peace took place he was employed in cruising in the Mediterranean, for the purpose of suppressing the corsairs employed by the piratical states upon its shores. But the breaking out of the war between Holland and France, in 1690, called him home, and he fell in the first engagement, in which the enemy's fleet was victorious. His remains were carried to Holland, and were buried in the church of St. Laurence, at Rotterdam.

BRAKENBERG, (Reinier,) a landscape painter, born at Haerlem, in 1649. He was a pupil of Mommers. Some biographers say that Bernard Schendel also gave him lessons. From some of his works it would seem that he took

Adrian Van Ostade as his model. There is considerable ingenuity in the composition of his pictures, which must have been painted with facility, although they have the appearance of being highly finished. He understood perfectly the management of chiaroscuro; but he could not have studied from nature, as the drawing of his figures is very incorrect.

BRALION, (Nicholas de,) born about the beginning of the seventeenth century. He was a native of France, but was sent in 1625 to Rome, where, during a residence of several years, he applied himself to the study of the history of the ceremonial of the papal church, and to an inquiry into the state of ancient and modern Rome. The result of his investigation respecting the latter subject he has given in a work entitled, La Curiosité de l'Une et de l'Autre Rome, with engravings, 3 vols, 8vo. Ruinart is said to have made considerable use, in his Disquisitio Historica de Pallio, of Bralion's work entitled, Pallium Archiepiscopale, Paris, 1648, 8vo. He died in 1672.

BRAMAH, (Joseph,) well-known for his ingenious improvements in mechanics, was born in 1749, at Stainborough, in Yorkshire. Even in his childhood he discovered the germs of that inclination for mechanical pursuits, which led him, in spite of the untoward circumstances in which his earliest years were passed, to devote himself to the improvement or invention of useful machinery. He is said, when a boy, to have made for his amusement two violoncellos, and to have formed a violin with incessant labour out of a solid block of wood. His parents, who were in moderate circumstances, gave him only such an education as might fit him for agricultural occupations; but these he was obliged to abandon by a lameness, which disqualified him for that mode of life, and he was then bound apprentice to a carpenter; and when he had served his time, he came to London, and was engaged by an eminent cabinet-maker. He was now soon enabled to commence business on his own account, and by his improvements in the construction of water-closets, pipes, and pumps, he laid the foundation of his fame and fortune. These inventions were speedily followed by that upon which his reputation mainly rests

the improvement which he introduced in the construction of locks. For this invention, the fruit of earnest application, he procured a patent. His next step was

the introduction of an important improvement in hydraulic machinery, by producing a rotative motion, through a variation of the form of the piston and cylinder; and for this likewise he obtained a patent. In 1796 he took out a patent for a most ingenious application of the hydrostatic paradox-the uniform pressure of fluids in every direction. It may here be mentioned, as an example of the force exerted by the application of this singularly ingenious contrivance, that three hundred of the largest trees were torn up by the roots in Holt forest, in Hampshire, by its means alone, managed by two men only. The numerous purposes to which this most ingenious contrivance may be applied attest its singular utility: one of these is the planing of boards or timber, for the effecting of which purpose he erected at the Arsenal at Woolwich a machine which acts with incredible rapidity, exactness, and economy. In 1807 Mr. Bramah was employed by the directors of the Bank of England to devise a mechanical contrivance for expeditiously printing the numbers and date lines upon their notes. This he effected with remarkable ingenuity and success. For some time previous to his death, which took place in 1815, and was occasioned by a severe cold brought on by over-exertion during the progress of the above-mentioned experiments at Holt Forest, he was engaged in erecting on his premises by the side of the Thames large machinery for sawing stones and deals, constructed upon the principle of his hydro-mechanical invention. He published A Dissertation on the Construction of Locks, 8vo, and a Letter on the subject of the Cause of Boulton and Watt against Hornblower and Maberley, for an infringement of a Patent, 8vo. (New Monthly Mag. 1815.)

BRAMANTE D'URBINO, or DONATO LAZZARI, (but better known under the former name), a celebrated architect and painter, uncle of Raphael, born in the duchy of Urbino in 1444. His genius for the arts discovered itself at a very early age; but his parents being in humble circumstances, his progress in his favourite pursuit was much retarded. Being placed under the celebrated Frà Bartolomeo, he pursued his studies with diligence and success; he painted portraits and sacred and profane history in distemper and fresco; and when in Milan, in 1470, he devoted himself to the study of the noble productions of Leonardo da Vinci. But a predi

lection for architecture soon led him to adopt it as his profession; and in order to perfect himself in this pursuit, he travelled through Lombardy, and thence to Rome, where, with great devotion, he applied himself to the study of the remains of antiquity in that city and in the neighbourhood. Availing himself of the talent acquired by his studies under Frà Bartolomeo, he painted some frescoes at St.John Lateran, which, however, have been since destroyed. On leaving Rome, he went to Naples, where the cardinal Caraffa soon appreciated his abilities as an architect, and employed him in the construction of the cloisters of the convent della Pace, at Rome, and in some modifications of the interior of the church; which bears evident traces of his genius, although to what extent is not known; but it is to be presumed that at all events the nave was altered by him, as his nephew Raphael painted the spandrils of the arches. Vasari notices that the success of this first effort opened a brilliant career for our architect, as it procured him the patronage of Alexander VI.

The predominating principle of Bramante's idea of architecture in the Giraud and Cancelleria palaces, two of the finest palatial buildings of Rome, is breadth. He has therefore laid down in these compositions a great mass. To diversify this he has introduced slightly projecting orders with pilasters, the details and proportions of which hardly vary. These features produce an incongruous medley of nobility and meanness, dry in effect, hard in detail, yet as a whole very imposing. These works confirmed the reputation of Bramante, who was rich in ideas and ready in execution; an architect peculiarly fitted for Julius II., then pope, who was as prompt to suggest noble works as Bramante was to execute them. In fact, it has been a happy circumstance for the fine arts, that the papal tiara did not follow the law of succession; for each occupant of St. Peter's chair has been anxious to mark his brief career by some noble work, which should leave the impress of his character, and hand down to posterity a memorial of his reign. The Vatican palace was then an incongruous mass; and to carry out the pope's views, Bramante converted a shapeless, irregular, and unsightly space, lying between the straggling buildings of the papal residence, into a noble court, surrounded by lofty galleries, three stories high, enriched with open arcades; a grand flight of steps led from the lower