112 



FUSS'S STK A I TS B ASSOK A. 



lion that. Ne have derived their origin from Phidias, 



Polyvleuis, and others of tin- great < st masii rs. a- i! is 

 -carcely possible such groups and such expressions 

 as we see in these had OOptet, could have IM-CII tirsi 

 imagined by such inferior artists. Among them arc 

 the stories of Prometheus. Meilen, I'liaen'.n. <>ivste. 

 Alcesle, the anger of Achilles. Macclnis ami Ariadne, 

 the fall of the giants, ami tin- judgment of 1'aris, Sec. 

 Among the famous modern Ixiss reliefs are those of 

 liandiirli, (Jhiberti, and I, mm della Kohhia, at Flo- 

 rence. Some of the finest bass-reliefs existing are 

 \>\ Canova and Thorwaldsen. 



livs,'> SrK.uTs; a channel, which separates N. 

 Holland from Van Piemen's Land ; 1 20 miles broad ; 

 Ion. 147:y K. ; hit. 40 S. 



l!'ss.\ ; a country on the west coast of Africa, 

 about 400 miles south of Sierra Leone. It came into 

 notice by a gram of land, which the American colo- 

 nial ion society recently obtained there from the 

 king. The Bassos are descrilx'd as without civiliza- 

 tion, like so many other negro tribes of the west coast 

 of i hat part of the world. See Liberia. 



\N (whose real name was Giacomo tic Poutr). 

 a painter; born in 1510. He was surnamed linxnan. 

 from the place, liassmo. where his father lived. His 

 pictures are scattered all over Europe. He painted 

 historical pieces, lands-ap-s, flowers, &<:., and also 

 portraits ; among otliers, tliat of I he doge of Venice, 

 of Ariosto, Tasso, and other persons of eminence. 

 He lived to the age of 82, dying in 1592. Several 

 of his best works are in the churches of Bassano, 

 Venice, Vicenza, and other towns of Italy. He left 

 four sons, who all became painters. Francesco was 

 the most distinguished of them. 



BASSANO, a commercial city in the Venetian dele- 

 gation Vicenza, on the Brenta (Ion. 11 43' E. ; lat. 

 45 46' N.), has spacious suburbs, and 9600 inhabi- 

 tants. Its thirty churches contain beautiful paintings. 

 A stone bridge, 182 feet long, unites the town with 

 the large village Vicantino. The climate is very 

 favourable to the cultivation of the vine and olive. 

 The trade in silk, cloth, and leather, is active, and 

 Remontini's printing-house furnishes beautiful printed 

 works and engravings. Napoleon made B. a duchy, 

 with 11,000 dollars yearly income, and granted it, in 

 1809, to his minister of foreign affairs, Maret (q. v.). 

 Near B., September 8, 1796, Bonaparte defeated the 

 Austrian general Quosdanowich. This town must 

 not be confounded with Bassanclle, on the lake Bas- 

 sauo, in the papal territory, capital of a duchy of the 

 house of Colonna. 



BASSANO, duke of. See Maret. 



BASSET ; the name of a game at cards, formerly 

 much played, especially in France. It is very similar 

 to the modern faro. Severe edicts were issued against 

 it by Louis XIV., and it was afterwards played under 

 the name of pour et contre. De Moivre, in his Doc- 

 trine of Chances, has calculated many problems con- 

 nected with this game. 



BASSET-HORN, the richest of all wind instruments 

 (called also cornet, by reason of its curvature), is 

 believed to have been invented in Passau, in 1770. 

 It was afterwards perfected by Theodore Lotz, in 

 Presburg. It is, properly considered, an enlarged 

 clarionet ; and, notwithstanding the difference of its 

 form, it resembles that, not only in its qualities and 

 tone, but also as regards its intonation, the mode of 

 holding it, and fingering ; so that every clarionet- 

 player can perform on it without practice. Besides 

 the mouth-piece, by which the intonation is given, it 

 is formed of five pieces the head-piece (called the 

 oarrel), two middle pieces, the trunk and the bell, 

 which is usually of brass. It has fifteen ventages, of 

 which four are provided with open, four with closed 

 keys. Its compass is three and a half octaves, from 



lower F in the bass, in double C of the treble. It is 

 seldom used in the orchestra; however, it is found 

 in Mozart's requiem and some other pieces. The 

 basset-horn may also be used as a bnss instrument. 



MASSOMPIKKKK, Francois de, marshal of France, one 

 of the most distinguished ami must amiable nun of 

 the courts of Henry IV. and Louis XIII., was born 

 in 1579, in Lorraine, and descended from a branch 

 of the family of Cleve. After traveling through 

 Italy, lie appeared at the court of Henry J V. where 

 his taste for splendour, play, and gallantry, made 

 him conspicuous in the feasts anil sports of the capi- 

 tal. In 1(502, he mode his first campaign against ilie 

 duke Of Savoy, and fought with equal distinction, in 

 the following year, in the imperial army, against the 

 Turks. His love of France soon called him back ; 

 lie aspired to the hand of the daughter of the consta- 

 ble Pe Montmorency, whose charms had excited the 

 most violent passion in Henry IV. B. yielded to the 

 solicitations of his king, and renounced his intended 

 union with her. In 1622, Louis XIII. appointed 

 him marshal of France, and became so much attached 

 to him, that Luynes, the declared favourite, alarmed 

 at his growing influence, insisted upon his removal 

 from the court, leaving him the option to accept 

 either an embassy, or the chief command of an army, 

 or the office of a. governor. B. decided upon an 

 embassy, and occupied this post successively in Spain, 

 Switzerland, and Kngland. After his return, he en- 

 tered again into the military service, and was present 

 at the siege of Rochelle and Montauban. The car- 

 dinal Richelieu, who soon after obtained entire con- 

 trol of (he king and the country, feared the boldness 

 of B. and his secret connexion with the house of 

 Lorraine; whose machinations served him as a pre- 

 text for sending B., in 1631, to the Bastile, from 

 which he was not released till 1643, after the death 

 of the cardinal. He died in 1646. B. studied, in his 

 youth, philosophy, jurisprudence, medicine, and the 

 military art. During his detention, he. occupied 

 himself with his memoirs, and the history of his 

 embassies in Spain, Switzerland, and England, which 

 sheds much light on the events of that time. 



BASSOON ( Fr. bus son, low sound) ; an instrument 

 which forms the natural bass to the hautboy. It is 

 played, like that instrument, with a reed, and forms 

 a. continuation of its scale downwards. The reed is 

 fixed to a crooked mouth-piece, issuing from the side 

 of the bassoon. There, keys communicate to the 

 ventages, which otherwise are too remote for finger- 

 ing. It was formerly used as an accompaniment to 

 the hautboy, from which it was termed basson de 

 hautbois. But it is now so far improved with keys 

 as to be susceptible of being played solo. Its com- 

 pass is three octaves, from double A in the bass to a 

 in the second space of the treble ; and its designation 

 generally is the F or bass clef ; yet, in the higher 

 passages, for the more convenient arrangement of 

 the notes, the alto, or tenor clef, is often used. It 

 consists of four tubes, bound together like a fagot. 

 Hence the Italians term it fagotto, and from them 

 the Germans fagott. In music designed for wind- 

 instruments, it usually forms the bass. There is a 

 modification of this instrument, much lower and 

 stronger in its tones, the bass horn, which, in 

 field music, has of late been substituted for the ser- 

 pent. 



BASSORA, or BASRAH ; a city in the Arabian Irakt 

 situated on an arm of the Shat-ui-Arab, about half 

 way between the junction of the Tigris with the 

 Euphrates and the Persian gulf; 210 miles S. W. 

 Ispahan, 600 S. E. Aleppo ; Ion. 47 3O E. ; lat. 

 30 31' N. : population estimated by Heude, in 1817, 

 at 80,000; by others at 40, 50, and 60,000. The- 

 Shat-ul-Arab is formed by the junction of the Tigris 



