BICETRE RIDDLE. 



529 



the colours conceal the delicacy of the engraving. 

 On this account, the coloured copies of Durer's wood- 

 cuts are esteemed less than those which are left un- 

 co! oured. 



The other means of idle competition being almost 

 all exhausted, the bibliomanists have lately hit upon 

 the idea of enriching many works by the addition of 

 engravings, illustrative indeed of the text of the book, 

 but not particularly called for, and of preparing only 

 single copies. Thus Longman, in London, oft'ers an 

 illustrated copy of the otherwise common Biographi- 

 cal Dictionary of all the Engravers, by John Strutt 

 (London, 1785 86, 2 vols. 4to), which is increased, 

 in this way, to thirty-seven large vols. in folio, and 

 costs not less than 2000 sterling. The library of 

 Dresden has a similar copy of Buddieus's Historical 

 Lexicon, of an earlier date. 



Among the auctions, where the bibliomania raged 

 with the greatest fury, was that of the library of the 

 duke of Roxburgh (q. v.), in London, 1812. Every 

 work was bought at an almost incredible price. The 

 first edition of Boccaccio, published by Valdarfer, in 

 1471, was sold for 2260 sterling; to the memory 

 of which a bibliomanio-Roxburgh club was founded 

 in the following year, of which lord Spencer is presi- 

 dent. It meets yearly on the 13th of July, the anni- 

 versary of the sale of Boccaccio, in the St Alban's 

 tavern. No further evidence is necessary to show 

 that bibliomania, which flourished first in Holland 

 (the seat likewise of the tulipomania), towards the end 

 of the seventeenth century, prevails at present in 

 England to a much greater extent than in France, 

 Italy, or Germany Thomas F. Dibdin's Bibliomania 

 or Book- madness (London, 1811), and his Bibliogra- 

 phical Decameron (London, 1817, 3 vols.), contain 

 many useful directions for the assistance of collectors 

 of books. 



The modern bibliomania is very different from the 

 spirit which led to the purchase of books, in the 

 middle ages, at prices which appear to us enormous. 

 External decorations, it is true, were then held in 

 high esteem ; but the main reason of the great sums 

 then paid for books was their scarcity, and the diffi- 

 culty of procuring perfect copies before the invention 

 of the art of printing. There is sometimes found a 

 rage for possessing oooks, without reference to the 

 value of their contents, or the other circumstances 

 which have been mentioned as influencing the bib- 

 liomanist. A priest in Saxony is said to have mur- 

 dered tliree persons, with a view of getting posses- 

 sion of their libraries. These, however, he did not 

 read. 



BICETRE ; a castle and village in the neighbour- 

 hood of Paris, situated on a hill, and commanding 

 one of the finest prospects of Paris, of the course of 

 the Seine, and of the environs. Louis XIII. erected 

 the castle for the residence of invalids. When Louis 

 XIV. af tenvards erected the great hotel royal des inva- 

 liflcs, B. became a great hospital, for which it is parti- 

 cularly adapted by its healthy situation : water only 

 was wanting in its vicinity, to obtain which a well 

 was dug in the rock (1773). B. contains also a house 

 of correction (maison deforce) for dissolute persons, 

 swindlers, thieves, &c. Since the revolution, a prison 

 for criminals condemned to the galleys has been 

 erected here, from which they are transferred to the 

 public ship-yards. In the prison and the house of 

 correction are shops for the grinding of glass, and 

 for other kinds of work, in which the prisoners are 

 usefully employed. In the hospital of B., 2200 beds 

 are devoted to the reception of aged patients. No 

 one is admitted under the age of seventy years. They 

 are attended to with the greatest care, and fabricate 

 nrat little works of wood and bone, known in France 

 by the name of Bicctre works. A large hospital for 



nctirable madmen lias also been erected since the 

 revolution. 



BICHAT, Marie Frangois Xavier, a celebrated 

 French physician, who, during a si tort career, gave 

 an impulse to the science which he cultivated that 

 lias not yet ceased to be felt, was born at Thoirette, 

 in the department of the Ain, Nov. 11, 1771. His 

 father, a physician, early initiated him into the study 

 of medicine, which the young Bichat prosecuted at 

 Lyons and Paris, to which latter city he withdrew 

 from the storm which agitated the former in 1793. 

 At Paris, he studied under the direction of Desault, 

 who treated him as a son. On the death of that dis- 

 tinguished surgeon (see Desault), Bichat superintend- 

 ed the publication of his surgical works, and, in 1797, 

 began to lecture upon anatomy, in connexion with 

 experimental physiology and surgery. From this 

 period, amidst the pressing calls of an extensive prac- 

 tice, he employed himself in preparing those works 

 which have spread his reputation through Europe and 

 America, and which have had the most beneficial 

 influence upon the whole medical science. In 1800 

 appeared his Traite dcs Membranes, which passed 

 through numerous editions, and immediately . after 

 publication, was translated into almost all the langua- 

 ges of Europe. In the same year was published his 

 celebrated work Recherches sur la Vie et la Mart, 

 which was followed the next year (1801) by his Ana- 

 tomie Generate (4 vols. 8vo), a complete code of mo- 

 dern anatomy, physiology, and medicine. In the 

 twenty-eighth year of his age, Bichat was appointed 

 (1800) physician of the Hotel-Dieu, in Paris, and, 

 with the energy characteristic of true genius, began 

 his labours in pathological anatomy. In a single 

 winter, he opened no less than GOO bodies. He had, 

 likewise, conceived the plan of a great work upon 

 pathology and therapeutics ; and, with this view, 

 immediately upon commencing his duties, as physi- 

 cian to the Hotel-Dieu, had begun his researches in 

 therapeutics by experiments upfen the effects of simple 

 medicines. In the midst of this activity and useful- 

 ness, he was cut off, July 22, 1802, by a malignant 

 putrid fever, probably the consequence of his nume- 

 rous dissections. His friend and physician, Corvisart, 

 wrote to Napoleon in these words : " Bichat has just 

 fallen upon a field of battle which counts more than 

 one victim : no one has done so much, or done it so 

 well, in so short a time." Bichat is the founder of 

 the medical theory at present received. He is the 

 creator of general anatomy, or of the doctrine of the 

 identity of the texture of the different organs, which 

 is the fundamental principle of modern medicine. 

 His Anatomie Generale has been translated into 

 English by doctor G. Hayward, and published in 

 3 vols. 8vo. 



BIDASSOA, a boundary river between Spain and 

 France, rises in the Spanish territory, becomes a 

 boundary at Vera, and is navigable to Biriatou at 

 high tide. It forms the isle of Pheasants, or the 

 island of Conference, where the peace of the Pyre- 

 nees was concluded (1659), and falls into the Bay of 

 Biscay, between Andaye and Fontarabia. On the 

 Spanish side of the river, on the margin of the valley 

 through which it flows, is an advantageous position, 

 near St Martial, which commands the great road to 

 Bayonne, before which (Aug. 31, 1813) 8000 Span- 

 iards repulsed a French force of double that number, 

 who attempted to force this position in order to relieve 

 St Sebastian. 



BIDDLE, John, a celebrated Socinian writer, was 

 born in 1615, at VVotton-under-Eclge, in Gloucester- 

 shire. He entered Magdalen college, Oxford, in his 

 nineteenth year. He graduated as A. M. in 1641. 

 Being led to doubt of the doctrine of the Trinity, he 

 drew up twelve arguments on the subject ; in conse- 



