BANDETTINI. BANFF. 



399 



and resident nobility, by the abolition of tnists and 

 entails, and by the equal division of property among 

 the children of these families, nothing was more na- 

 tural than that, with the increase of population, so- 

 cieties should be formed to purchase the edifices 

 which had thus become useless (churches, chapels, ab- 

 beys, monasteries, bishops' residences, parsonages, Go- 

 thic castles, with their prisons and other appurtenan- 

 ces, hunting lodges, watch-towers, &c.), and pull them 

 down, just as the merchants of Amsterdam, oil the 

 decline of their prosperity, allowed the villas about 

 that commercial city to be pulled down, or sold in or- 

 der to be pulled down, by the slopers, so called. To 

 many this seems a barbarous custom. In Germany, 

 .. also, after the great secularization of cathedrals and 

 monasteries, associations were formed, particularly of 

 the Jews, who, with profit to themselves, bought the 

 buildings which had become unnecessary, pulled 

 them down, and sold the materials, as well as the 

 state's domains, which had been alienated in large 

 lots, and were now disposed of by them in small por- 

 tions. The bande noire enriched itself from the sale 

 of the materials for building, from the felling of wood 

 in the parks, and from the disposal of land for gar- 

 dens, meadows, and fields. The public, too, were be- 

 nefited at the same time. In places where this has 

 frequently happened, the countryman dwells more 

 comfortably, and is richer, than in many other quar- 

 ters ; for example, in the Pyrenees, and particularly 

 in the southerly part of France. 



BANDETTINI, Theresa, an improvisatrice, born at 

 Lucca, about 1756, received a careful education, but 

 was obliged (her family having lost their property) 

 to go upon the stage. She made her first appearance 

 in Florence, and was unsuccessful. This, united to 

 her love for polite literature, led her to the most as- 

 siduous study of the poets. As she was one day lis- 

 tening to an improvisatore of Verona, her own genius 

 broke forth in a splendid poetical panegyric on the 

 poet. Encouraged by him, she devoted herself en- 

 tirely to this beautiful art. Her originality, her fer- 

 vid imagination, and the truth and harmony of her 

 expression, soon gained for her a distinguished cele- 

 brity. She was enabled to abandon the stage, and 

 travel through Italy ; and she enjoyed the honour of 

 being chosen a member of several academies. One 

 of her most celebrated poems was that which she 

 delivered, in 1794, impromptu, before the prince 

 Lambertini, at Bologna, on the death of Marie An- 

 toinette of France. In 1813, wearied with travelling, 

 she returned to her native city, where she lived re- 

 tired on her small property. She published Ode tre 

 (Lucca, 4to), of which the first celebrates Nelson's 

 victory at Aboukir, the second Suwaroff's victories in 

 Italy, and the third the victories of the archduke 

 Charles in Germany. She also gave to the world 

 under the name of Amarilli Etrusca, Saggio di Versi 

 Estemporanei (published, in Pisa, by Bodoni), among 

 which the poem on Petrarch's interview with Lau- 

 ra, in the church, is particularly distinguished, and 

 places her by the side of Rossi. 



BANDIT (Ital. bandito) ; originally an exile, then a 

 hired murderer. This name was given to the assas- 

 sins (see Ishmaelites) of Italy. At the present time, 

 in Italy, bandit and robber are almost synonymous. 

 They form a kind of society of themselves, which 

 is subjected to strict laws^and lives in open or secret 

 war with the civil authorities, and are a disgraceful 

 proof of its weakness, no Italian government' having 

 succeeded in extirpating them. The strict measures 

 which the papal government adopted, in 1820, a- 

 gainst persons who should harbour bandits and rob- 

 bers, have indeed destroyed their lurking-places ; 

 but the villains who were formerly settled are now 



become vagabonds. Those, however, who infest the 

 environs ot Naples, are the peasants of the country, 

 who, besides being engaged in agriculture, employ 

 themselves in robbery and murder. The fear of ca- 

 pital punishment is ineffectual to deter them from 

 these crimes. Peter the Calabrian, the most terrible 

 among these robbers, in 1812, named himself, in imi- 

 tation of the titles of Napoleon, " emperor of the 

 mountains," " king of the woods," " protector of the 

 conscribed," and " mediator of the highways from 

 Florence to Naples." The government of Ferdinand 

 I. was compelled to make a compact with this ban- 

 dit. One of the robbers entered the royal service, as 

 a captain, in 1818, and engaged to take captive his 

 former comrades. More lately, adventurers of all 

 kinds have joined them. These bandits are to be 

 distinguished from other robbers, who are called 

 malviventi ; and the Austrian troops, which occupied 

 Naples, were obliged to send large detachments to 

 repress them. It is remarkable, in these robbers, 

 that they only attack travellers on the highways. 

 This also is true of those who exact from strangers 

 and natives a sum of money for protection, and give 

 them in return a letter of security ; which, a short 

 time ago, was the case in Sicily, where the bandits 

 dwell in the greatest numbers in the Val Demone. 

 Here the prince of Villa Franca declared himself, 

 from political and other views, their protector : he 

 gave them a livery, and treated them with much 

 confidence, which they never abused ; tor even a- 

 mong them there is a certain romantic sense of honour 

 derived from the middle ages. They keep their pro- 

 mises inviolate, and often take better care of the 

 security of a place intrusted to them than the public 

 authorities. 



BANER, also BANNIER, John (in English, always 

 written Baner), a Swedish general in the thirty years' 

 war, descended from an old noble family of Sweden, 

 was born in 1596. When a child, he fell from the castle 

 of Hornings-holm, four stories high, without being 

 injured. Gustavus Adolphus, who valued him very 

 much, early prophesied that he was destined for great- 

 ness. He made his first campaigns in Poland and 

 Russia, and accompanied his king to Germany. After 

 the death of Gustarus, in J 632, he had the chief com- 

 mand over 16,000 men, and was the terror of the 

 enemy. He obtained the greatest glory by his vic- 

 tory at Wittstock, in 1636, over the imperial and 

 Saxon troops ; and it was also owing to his activity, 

 that, after the battle of Nordlingen, the aflairs of 

 Sweden gradually improved. He died at Halberstadt, 

 in 1641, under 45 years of age and was suspected 

 to have been poisoned. In him Sweden lost her 

 ablest general, and the imperial troops their most 

 dangerous enemy. B. was careful to engage in no 

 enterprise without a reasonable probability of success. 

 He knew how to avoid danger with dexterity, and to 

 escape from a superior force. During his command, 

 30,000 of the enemy were killed, and 600 standards 

 taken, on different occasions. He was always found 

 at the head of his men, and maintained good disci- 

 pline. He wanted patience for sieges. He has been 

 accused of pride and severity. The pleasures of the 

 table and of love occupied all the leisure time which 

 his employments allowed him, and probably immo- 

 derate indulgence in them was the real poison which 

 brought on his death. He was three times married. 



BANFF, the capital of Banffshire, is pleasantly 

 situated on the side of a hill, at the mouth of the river 

 Deveron, distant 44 miles N. W. from Aberdeen, 

 and 165 N. from Edinburgh. Tradition assigns its 

 foundation to Malcolm Canmore, and it received the 

 same privileges as Aberdeen by a charter granted by 

 Robert II. The town has several handsome streets, 



