BEN 



229 



B K N 



a small granite obelisk, which, acccrding to Champollion 

 (Precis, p. 95), belongs to the reign of Domitian. There 

 are several other churches and convents, a seminary, and a 

 palazzo pubblico or town-house, which is a fine structure. 

 The old monastery of Santa Sofia, now suppressed, was rich 

 in archives, chronicles, and other historical records, which 

 have heen lost or dispersed in the vicissitudes of the country. 

 The church adjoining the monastery is an octagon, and is 

 adorned with eight granite columns. In the court of the 

 cloisters is a well, the mouth of which is hewn through a 

 very large capital of the Jonic order. There are also some 

 remains of an amphitheatre and of a Roman bridge, and 

 many inscriptions, rilievi, and other fragments, of which a 

 full account is given in De Vita's Thesaurus Anliquitatum 

 Heneventananun, 2 vols, fol. Rom. 1754-64. But the most 

 interesting monument of antiquity is Trajan's triumphal 

 arch, which forms one of the city gates on the road to 

 Pujilin, and is called the Porta Aurea. It is a single arch 

 of Parian marble, and entire with the exception of part of 

 the cornice : both its sides are adorned with four Corinthian 

 pillars raised on high pedestals. The frieze and pannels, 

 as well as the interior of the arch, are covered with rich 

 sculpture, representing Trajan s achievements and his 

 apotheosis. The figures are in alto rilievo, and exquisitely 

 executed; but unfortunately most of them are damaged, 

 and there is hardly one of them entire. De Vita has given 

 an engraving and a description of this arch, which is one 

 of the finest in existence. Benevento is 125 miles E.S.E. 

 of Rom. 



BENEVOLENCE, a species of forced loan, or gratuity, 

 and one of the various arbitrary modes of obtaining supplies 

 of money, which, in violation of Majjna Charta, were for- 

 merly resorted to by the kings of England. The name 

 implies a free contribution, witli or without the condition of 

 repayment ; hut so early as the reign of Edward IV. the 

 practice had grown into an intolerable grievance. That 

 king's lavish liberality and exiravagance induced him to 

 levy benevolences very frequently ; and one of the wisest 

 and most popular acts of his successor, Richard III., was 

 to procure the passing of a statute (cap. 2) in the only par- 

 liament assembled during his reign, by which benevolences 

 were declared to be illegal ; but this statute is so expressed 

 as not clearly to forbid the solicitation of voluntary gifts, 

 and Richard himself afterwards violated its provisions. 

 Henry VII. exacted benevolences, which were enforced in 

 a very oppressive way. Archbishop Morton, who solicited 

 merchants and others to contribute, employed a piece of 

 logic which obtained the name of ' Morton's fork.' He 

 told those who lived handsomely, that their opulence was 

 manifested by their expenditure ; and those who lived eco- 

 nomically, that their frugality must have made them rich 

 so that no class could evade him. Cardinal Wolsey, among 

 some other daring projects to raise money for Henry VIII., 

 proposed a benevolence, which the citizens of London ob- 

 jected to, alleging the statute of Richard III.; but the 

 answer was, that the act of a usurper could not oblige a 

 la.vful sovereign. Elizabeth also 'sent out her privy seals,' 

 fur so the circulars demanding a benevolence were termed ; 

 but though individuals were committed to prison for re- 

 fusing tu contribute, she repaid the sums exacted. Lord 

 Coke, in the reign of James I., is said to have at first de- 

 clared that the king could not solicit a benevolence, and 

 then to have retracted his opinion, and pronounced upon its 

 legality. 



The subject underwent a searching investigation during 

 the reign of Charles I., as connected with the limitation of 

 the king's prerogative. That king had appointed commis- 

 sioners for the collection of a general loan from every indi- 

 vidual, and they had private instructions to require not less 

 than a certain proportion of each man's property in land or 

 goods, and had extraordinary powers -given them. The 

 name of loan given to this tax was a fiction which the most 

 ignorant could not but detect. Many of the common people 

 were impressed to serve in the navy for refusing to pay ; 

 and a number of the gentry were imprisoned. The deten- 

 tion of five knights, who sued the Court of King's Bench 

 for their writ of Habeas Corpus, gave rise to a most im- 

 portant question respecting the freedom of English subjects 

 from arbitrary arrest, and out of the discussion which then 

 arose, and the contests respecting the levying of ship-money, 

 &c.,came the distinct assertion, and ultimate establishment 

 of the great principle of English liberty. The 13 Car. II. 

 stat. 1, cap. 4, provides for a voluntary present to his ma- 



jesty, with a proviso, however, that no aids of that nature 

 can'be but by authority of parliament. The Bill of Rights, 

 in 1688, repeats what Magna Charta declared in 1215, that 

 levying of money for, or to the use of the crown, by pretence 

 of prerogative, without grant of parliament, for longer time, 

 or in any other manner than the same is or shall be granted, 

 is illegal. 



(Hallam's Constitutional History of England, and Tur- 

 ner's History of England.) 



BENGAL, a large province of Hindustan, which derives 

 much importance from the circumstance of its being the 

 seat of the supreme government in British India. 



Boundaries. Bengal is bounded on the south by the Bay 

 of Bengal and the district of Midnapore in Orissa, on the 

 east by the Burmese empire, on the north by Nepaul and 

 Bootan, and on the west by the province of Bahar. It is 

 situated between 21 and 27 N. lat. and 86 and 93 

 E. long. The lev.gth of the province from east to west may 

 he estimated at 350 English miles, and its average breadth 

 from north to south at 300 miles : the area is estimated 

 by Major Rennell at 97,244 square miles, or upwards 

 of 8000 square miles more than Great Britain. It appears 

 from the various surveys that have been made of different 

 parts of the province, that its surface is divided in nearly 

 the following proportions, viz. : 



Parts. 



Rivers and lakes ..... 3 



Sites of towns and villages, roads and tanks . 1 

 Land deemed irreclaimable and barren . . 4 

 Land in cultivation, or capable of improve- 

 ment, viz. : 

 Free lands ...... 3 



Lands in tillage, liable to payment of rent to 

 the Company's government . . .9 



Waste lands 4 



16 



24 



From its geographical position, Bengal is advantageously 

 circumstanced in regard to security from foreign invasion. 

 The sea-coast, which forms nearly tho whole southern boun- 

 dary, is guarded by shallows and impenetrable woods. It 

 has only one considerable port, and that is difficult of access. 

 The eastern boundary is protected by a belt, the breadth of 

 which varies from ten to twenty miles, and which is covered 

 throughout with the rankest and most luxuriant vegetation, 

 forming an impassable barrier. On the north rises a chain 

 of lofty mountains, containing a scanty and half-civilized po- 

 pulation, who obtain a bare subsistence from an ungrateful 

 soil. On the west alone Bengal is vulnerable, but even 

 there the natural barrier is strong, while its population and 

 resources are such as iiiitiht bid defiance to any hostile force 

 that could be brought against it. 



Character of the Soil. The general character of Bengal 

 is that of a flat champaign country ; there are no hills of 

 considerable elevation in the province. The districts in 

 which some elevations occur, are Chittagong and Tiperah 

 on the east, Silhet on the north-east, and Birbhoom on the 

 wot, but even in these districts the hills occupy only a 

 small part of (he surface. 



The soil most general throughout Bengal is a light loam, 

 in which sand greatl', predominates. Except in tracts which 

 are annually inundated, the stratum of productive earth 

 which covers tho barren sand is seldom more than a few 

 inches in depth. The annual inundations here spoken of 

 are occasioned by the swelling of the rivers in the rainy 

 season ; as tho water afterwards drains away it leaves a de- 

 posit of decayed vegetable matter, which renews the pro- 

 ductiveness <>(' the soil. 



Rwers. Bengal is intersected in every direction by navi- 

 gable streams, for the most part utlhients of the Ganges, by 

 which river the province is watered from its north-western 

 boundary at Purneah to the sea. The Brahmapootra enters 

 the province of Bengal at its north-eastern extremity, whence 

 it Hows with a westerly course through the district of Rang- 

 amatty, then takes a southerly direction, winding occa- 

 sionally towards the east, and tails into the Bay of Bengal 

 at the spot where ihe Ganges has i:s principal embouchure. 

 [Sec GANGKS and BRAHMAPOOTRA.] The other principal 

 rivers are the Cosi. Conki, Uummoodah, Jhinayi, Korotoya, 

 Manas, and Teesla. 



The Cosi rises in the Ncpaul Hills near Catmandoo, tho 

 capital of Ncpaul, and outers Bengal twenty miles north of 



