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BONPLAND, AIME. 



BOPP, FRANZ. 



Handel, who gained a complete ascendancy and maintained it ; but 

 his rival continued on the establishment till 1727, though he produced 

 little, and then retired. After this he confined his services to the 

 Duchess of Maryborough, who had previously taken him into her 

 family, and settled ou him a pension of 5001. per annum. His impe- 

 rious temper did not long permit him to enjoy his good fortune ; aud 

 his dishonourable conduct in presenting to the Academy of Ancient 

 Music a madrigal as his own, though the composition of Lotti of 

 Venice, completed his downfall in this country, which he quitted in 

 1733. He then went to reside in Paris, where he wrote much sacred 

 music for the Chapelle-du-Roi, aud at the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle was 

 invited to Vienna by the emperor, to compose music for the rejoicings 

 on that occasion. 



The exact period of Bononcini's decease does not appear, but it is 

 supposed that he almost attained his 100th year. For the King's 

 Theatre he composed several operas, now entirely forgotten ; and in 

 1721 he published a volume of 'Cantate e Duetti," published by 

 subscription, and dedicated to George I. 



* BONPLAND, AIME, was born August 22, 1773, at La Rochelle, 

 iu the French department of Charente-Iufe'rieure, where his father 

 exercised the medical profession, and to which young Bonpland was 

 also de.-tined. He served as a surgeon during some years of the early 

 part of the revolution on board a French frigate. He afterwards went 

 to Paris in order to complete his studies in medicine, and became a 

 pupil of Corvisart, at whose residence he met with Alexander von 

 Humbuldt. An intimate friendship soon grew up between the two 

 young men, and they mutually assisted each other in their studies. 

 Humboldt at the same time was making preparations for an extensive 

 series of travels for scientific purposes, and asked Bonpland to accom- 

 pany him, a proposal which was immediately accepted. They sailed 

 from France in 1799, and landed in America, where they travelled 

 five years, chiefly in Mexico and among the Andes. Bonpland during 

 that period collected and dried more than 6000 plants previously un- 

 known to European botanists. Their travels were published under 

 the title of a ' Voyage aux Regions Equinoxiales du Nouveau Con- 

 tinent.' Bonpland presented his collection of dried plants to the 

 Museum d'HUtoire Naturelle. Napoleon granted him a pension, and 

 Josephine in 1804 appointed him superintendent of the gardens at 

 her residence of Malmaison. While iu this situation Bonpland 

 published a description of his collection of plants, 'Plantes Equi- 

 noxiales recueillies au Mexique, a 1'Ile de Cuba,' &c., 2 vols., folio, 

 with 220 copperplates, Paris, 1809-16; and about the same time a 

 ' Description des Plantes Rares de Navarre et de la Malmaison,' folio, 

 with 66 copperplates, Paris, 1813-17. He also published a 'Mono- 

 graphic des Melastornees,' with 120 plates, 2 vols. folio, Paris, 1809-16. 

 Josephine died in 1814, and Bonpland resigned his situation, though 

 requested by Prince Eugene to retain it. 



Bonpland had formed the resolution of returning to America, and 

 at the latter end of 1816 sailed from Havre, and landed at Buenos 

 Ayres, with a large collection of the useful plants and fruit-trees of 

 Europe. He waa received favourably by the government, and was 

 named professor of natural history, and he remained at Buenos Ayres 

 nearly five years. He then resolved to undertake a journey across 

 the desert of the Gran Chaco to the Andes, in order to continue his 

 examinations into the vegetable kingdom of that region. With this 

 intention he sailed up the river Parana, with suitable attendants, and 

 reached the territories which had been formerly occupied by the Spanish 

 Jesuit missions on the eastern bank of that river. Here it became 

 necessary, in order to cross the country, to obtain the sanction of 

 Francia, the dictator of Paraguay, and Bonpland gent a deputation to 

 him for that purpose. Instead however of acceding to his request, 

 Francia sent a body of troops by night across the Parana 1 , who attacked 

 the small body of unarmed men, killed some, and wounded others. 

 Thb took place on the 3rd of December 1821. Two days afterwards 

 Bonpland waa conveyed as a prisoner to the station assigned to him as 

 a place of residence, where he was compelled to remain more than nine 

 years under strict superintendence. At length, on the 2nd of February 

 1831, he was set at liberty. He then travelled towards tho southern 

 boundary of Brazil, and settled in the vicinity of the small town of 

 San Borja, near the eastern bank of the river Uruguay, where he hag 

 ever since resided. 



BOOTH, BARTON. This eminent actor was descended from an 

 ancient and honourable family, being the third son of John Booth, Esq., 

 a near relation of Henry Booth, earl of Warringtou, in Lancashire. 

 He was born in 1681, and educated at Westminster by the famous 

 Dr. Busby. Becoming at a very early age remarkable for the grace of 

 his action and the sweetness of his voice, he was selected to perform 

 the character of Pamphilus in the ' Andria' of Terence, at one of the 

 customary school exhibitions. The great applause he met with ou 

 this occasion was, by his own confession, the first spur to his theatrical 

 ambition ; and on being removed to Cambridge at the age of seventeen, 

 to the great annoyance of his parents, who hud intended him for the 

 Church, he r.m away from Trinity College, and joined a company of 

 strolling players. The misdeeds of one of the actors, while at Bury 

 in Suffolk, caused the dispersion of the company, and young Booth 

 n turned to London in great distress. He was speedily forghen, and 

 kindly received by his family ; but his stage-fever had by no means 

 abated, and in one of its fiercest paroxysms he engaged with a Mrs. 



Mins to perform at Bartholomew Fair, where he achieved such renown 

 that Betterton heard of him, aud was prevented engaging him for 

 Drury Lane only by the fear of offending the noble family to which 

 he was related. Shortly afterwards Booth formed an acquaintance 

 with Ashbury, the manager of the Dublin theatre, who chanced to be 

 ia London, and with him he went to Ireland in June 1693. His first 

 appearance in Dublin was in the part of Oronoko, aud his success, 

 decided from the commencement, continued for two years increasing 

 daily, when he determined to return to England ; and having by letter 

 reconciled himself a second time with his family, he obtained from 

 Lord Fitzharding a recommendation to Mr. Betterton, who with great 

 candour and kindness engaged and assisted him to the extent of his 

 power. In 1701 Mr. Booth made his first bow iu the Theatre-Royal, 

 Drury 'Lane, in the character of Maximus, in Lord Rochester's 

 ' Valentinian." His reception was enthusiastic, and he quickly estab- 

 lished himself in public favour as second only to his friend and 

 instructor Betterton. In 1712, on the production of Mr. Addison'a 

 ' Cato,' Mr. Booth performed the principal character, aud was compli- 

 mented by the Tories, who presented him with fifty guineas, collected 

 in the boxes during the performance, "as a slight acknowledgment of 

 his honest opposition to a perpetual dictator, and his dying so bravely 

 in the cause of liberty." The managers of the theatre also presented 

 him with an equal sum, in consideration of the great success his talents 

 had secured to the play ; and shortly afterwards Queen Anne, at the 

 request of Lord Bolingbroke, granted a special licence, recalling all 

 former ones, and nominating Mr. Booth joint manager with Wilks, 

 Gibber, and Dogget. 



In 1727 Booth was attacked by a violent fever, from the effects of 

 which he never perfectly recovered. In 1729 he was prevailed on to 

 play, for seven nights only, in ' The Double Falsehood,' and they were 

 his last performances. After four years' distressing alienation of 

 mind, he expired, May 10, 1733, in the fifty- third year of his age. 

 Mr. Booth was twice married : first in 1704, to a daughter of Sir 

 William Barkham of Norfolk, Bart., who died in 1710; and secondly, 

 in 1719, to Miss Hester Santiow, or Saintlow, a celebrated, beautiful 

 and wealthy actress, who survived him ; he had no children by either 

 wife. 



Booth's masterpiece as an actor is said by Gibber to have been 

 Othello, but his favourite part was the far less important one of the 

 Ghost in ' Hamlet,' a performance, according to Macklin, which has 

 never been imitated successfully. His tone, manner, and gait were 

 so solemn and unearthly, that the audience appeared to be under the 

 impression that a positive spectre stood before them. The soles of 

 his shoes were covered with felt so as to make no noise upon the 

 stage, which he glided more than walked over, thus completing the 

 illusion. So much was Booth in favour with the rich and noble of 

 his day, that though he had no equipage of his own, there was not a 

 nobleman in the kingdom, says Chetwood, who had so many sets of 

 horses at his command. The chariot and-six of some one or another 

 was sure to be waiting for him every night to take him, after the 

 play, to Windsor, where the court was then kept, and to bring him 

 back the following day in time for the theatre. 



BOPP, FRANZ, a distinguished linguist, was born in 1791, at 

 Mainz, now included iu the grand-duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt, but 

 then an electorate. Bopp'a scientific education was commenced at 

 Aschaffenburg, whither his parents had accompanied the court of the 

 elector, and which was then the capital of a small principality belong- 

 ing to the electorate of Mainz. Stimulated by the personal encourage- 

 ment and writings of Windischmann, Bopp began to study the 

 oriental languages at an early age. In 1812 he removed to Paris, 

 where he had the good fortune to secure the friendship of Chczy, 

 Sylvestre de Sacy, and A. W. von Schlegel, and to obtain their assist- 

 ance in the prosecution of his favourite studies. With some email 

 assistance from the King of Bavaria, he remained about five years iu 

 Paris, and then removed to London, to Giittingen, and finally to 

 Berlin, where he was appointed professor of Sanscrit and the oriental 

 languages to the university, a situation which he has ever since con- 

 tinued to fill with the highest reputation. The investigations of Bopp 

 have been chiefly directed to comparative grammar, a science which 

 has been called into existence by the study of Sanscrit. His first 

 work was edited by Windischmaun, and was published at Frankfort- 

 on-the-Maiu in 181G, ' Ueber die Conjugation-System der Sanscrit 

 Sprache in Vergleich, rnit der Persischer und Germauischeu ' (' The 

 Conjugation-System of the Sanscrit Language compared with tho 

 Persian and German'). His great work is the ' Vergleichende Grarn- 

 matik des Sanscrit, Zend, Griechischen, Lateinischen, Lithuauiachen, 

 Altslawischen, Gotiischen, und Deutscheu ' (' Comparative Grammar 

 of the Sanscrit, Zend, Greek, Latin, Lithuanian, Old-Sclavish, Gothic, 

 and German Languages'), 4to, Berlin, 1833. He had previously pub- 

 lished a ' Glossarium Sauscritum,' 4to, 1828-30; a 'Grammatica Critica 

 Linguse Sanscritoe,' 4to, 1832; and some of the episodes from the 

 great poem of the 'Mahabharata' in the original Sanscrit, with Latin 

 and German versions, and notes. He also published au abridgment 

 of his Sanscrit Grammar, ' Kritische Grammatik der Sanscrit-Sprache, 

 iu kurtzer Fassung,' 8vo, 2nd ed. 1845. His latest works were 

 ' Ueber die Verwandsohaft der Malayisch-Polynesischeu Sprachen mit 

 den Indo-Gerujanischen ' ('On the Relationship of the Malay-Polyneeiau 

 Languages with the Indo-Germanic'), 1841, aud ' Ueber die Kauka- 



