BEL 



200 



BEL 



on the house-top than in the confined streets. Many houses 

 in Horn* hae l>cKe<lcr<-s, for the most pnrt of a simplo 

 firm. The must celebrated construction of this kind at 

 Rome, which i' -i. the Vatican, was built by Bramnnte in that 

 illed the court of the Belvedere. The form of this 

 building is semicircular, and it stands over an enormous 

 niche, a remarkable feature in the facade, of which the bel- 

 e makes a part. From this belvedere the view is one 

 of the finest that can b imagined, extending over the whole 

 city of Rome and the Carapagna, bounded by the distant 

 Apennines, the tops of which are covered with snow for a large 

 part of the year. Belvederes are not uncommon in France ; 

 out the term is applied rather to a summer-house in a park 

 or garden, than to the constructions on the tops of houses, 

 although small edifices, similar to thoe in Italy, are some- 

 times constructed on the top* of buildings for the purpose 

 of commanding a fine view. There is a small building in 

 Windsor Great Park which is called a Belvedere. 



It is not improbable that the wooden trellice-work, so 

 common in the painted representations of buildings at 

 Pompeii, was a construction similar in its purpose to the 

 Ix-hcdere of the modern Italians. (Plant and Elevation*, in 

 SfSS. of the Vatican, 3 vols. fol., and a View nf the J'citt- 

 riin in 'the King's Library, Prit. Mus. ; Encyclopfdie Mt- 

 itf. art. 'Architecture;' Cell's Pompgii.ptatei.') 



BELYISI A'CEJJ, a little-known natural order of plants, 

 comprehending one genus only, discovered in the kingdom 

 of Oware, by Palisotde Beauvois, who called it NapOUDno ; 

 it was subsequently named RtMtia after its discoverer. 

 [See BEAUVOIS.] It has been figured under the name of 



[telvln 



1, nljrc Tlnml from iborr; 1. Cj Mme i ptofllm .1. tlir <mt.-r rarolU; 

 . Ow iimiT corolla : 5. the lUm-ni Men Iron mbotc | 6, DM of Ihn lUmeui 

 Mpmto ; 7. u owij eat through. 



JVaptilenna imperialis in the Flora of Oware and Benin. 

 where we find the only account of it It was discovered in 

 the neighbourhood of the town of Oware, growing to the 

 heiuhl f seven or eiuht feet, and loaded with large broad 

 bright blue lowers. silting close upon tbe branches. Tliey 

 are remarkable for having a superior calyx of five pieces, to- 

 gether with a double monopetalous corolla, of which the 

 outer form* flat crenelled disc, and the interior is divided 



into a groat number of regular narrow sejrment*. The sta- 

 mens are only five, or rather perhaps ten. united by pairs 

 into five parcels, resembling so many petals. The stigma 

 is peltate- with five angles, and covers over the am: 

 The fruit is said to be a berry, with a single rell, containing 

 a parcel of seeds lying in pulp. : i an areoiii 



will be evident to the botanical reader that this must be 

 one of the greatest curiosities in the vegetabl 



Palisot de Beauvois, its discoverer, < type 



of a new natural order allied to the gourds : Brown, we 

 believe, suspects its relation to the passion II lley 



originally stationed it near Slynn-eic, l>nt. in I; 

 places it near the Campanulas. It is probable that H has 

 been inaccurately described, and that no exact opinion can 

 be formed about it until it has been examined m a ; 

 state. In the mean while we give a figure ol 

 from the Flora of Oware, in the nope that this notice may 

 fall into the hands of soru traveller visiting the reinots 

 country in which it grows. 



BE'LYTA, in entomology, a genus of the order Hy- 

 menoptera, and family PrcictotrujndfC. The species of this 

 genus are minute four-winged Hies, having the ant. 

 fourteen or fifteen-jointed, filiform in the in. 

 thickened towards their extremity in the females. '1 

 frequent sandy situati 



BELZO'NI, GIOVA'NNI. was a native of Padua, hut 

 of a family originally from Rome, as he himself st:u 

 the preface to his work on Egypt. !!< passed Ins 

 youth at Rome, where he intended to niter the 111.0 

 life, but the French invasion of that city in 1798 altered 

 his purpose, and in the year 1800 he left Italy, and 

 visited in succession several parts of Europe. His family 

 supplied him occasionally with remittances, but as they 

 were not rich, Belzoni exerted himself to gain a livin: 

 his own talents. He turned his attention cluelly to h\.. 

 lies, which he had studied at Rome. In 1803 he arrived in 

 England, where he soon after married ; and after nine 

 \ e;irs' residence in England, during part of which he ; 

 Ills living by exhibitin;: feats of strength, he set off with his 

 irife for Portugal and Spain, from whence he proceeded t) 

 Malta, and from Malta to Egypt, where he arrived in IH.'i. 

 11^ uiiject in going to Enypt was to construct an hydraulic 

 machine for irrigation, which should raise the water quicker 

 and in greater quantity than the clumsy engines then used 

 in that country. He proposed his plan to Mclicnu t All 

 Pacha, by whom it was approved. Bclzoni constructed u 

 machine in the pacha's garden at Zubra, near Cairo, and 

 the experiment proved successful, but owing to the preju- 

 dices and opposing interests of the natives, it was abandoned 

 before it was completed. Belzoni then decided upon visiting 

 Thebes, and his intention becoming known to Mr. Burek- 

 hardt, the latter gentleman prevailed upon Mr. Salt, the 

 British consul, to employ Belzoni to remove the colossal 

 bust, commonly, but incorrectly, called the Young Mcmnon, 

 which he accomplished with great ingenuity, shipped it in a 

 I, which sailed down to Rosetta, and thence to Alex- 

 andria, where it was shipped for England. This head, 

 now in the British Museum, is one of the finest speci- 

 mens of Egyptian colossal sculpture. Belzoni, on his 

 return to Cairo, received a present through Burckhardt, 

 half of which was paid by Mr. Salt. For the whole parti- 

 culars of this transaction, see Belzoni's Travels, and also a 

 compressed narrative of the same in vol. i. jilian 



Atitii]tiitifx, Hrilish Museum, in the Library nj i'.iilfr- 

 lainhiff Knmcli-.lzi: Before embarking li . Bel- 



y.oni made an excursion higher up the country, visiied the 

 temple of Edfu, and the islands til' Elephantine and 

 of Philaj, and proceeded into Nubia as far as t) 

 cataract. He was the first to open the great temple of 

 Abousambul, or Ipsambul, which is cut in the side of a 

 mountain, and the front of which was so much encumbered 

 by the accumulated sand, that only the upper part of it was 

 vi.-ih!c. He succeeded in partly clearing the sand which 

 stopped the entrance, and thus made the interior of this 

 antienl rock-c.ut temple known to the world. In 181? 

 zoni made a second journey into Upper Egypt and Nubia, 

 during which he made excavations at Cartiak, on the 

 crn side of the Nile, and found there a colossal head of 

 granite, several statues, an altar with basso-rilievi, sphinxes. 

 The colossal head and an arm ten feet in leimth. both 

 belonging to one colossus, are now in the British Museum. 

 But one ol the- greatest discoveries of thin enterprising tra- 

 veller was the opening of a splendid tomb in the Beban el 



