BAG 



192 



BAG 



IUdenoch 

 liagaudz. 



ver, copper, and bronze. There is a stone pillar too, 

 erected in honour of the emperor Trajan, wlio paved 

 in this country a road eighty-five Italian miles long. 

 The baths are about a quarter of a league distant 

 from the city, and their waters, which are mixed 

 with sulphur and alum, are conveyed to the houses 

 by means of pipes. N. Lat. 47 21', E. Long. 8 

 VI'. U) 



BAD ENOCH, a district in the county of Inver- 

 ness in Scotland. See Ixvehn-ess-miiue. 



B A DGER. See Ursus, under M a m m a l i A . 



BADINAGE, the name given in France to a me- 

 thod of hunting wild ducks, practised in some parts 

 of that country, and which M. Gerardin, one of the 

 authors of the Dictiunnaire des Sciences Naturcllcs, 

 describes as very amusing. The sportsmen provide 

 one or more boats, which they cover with green 

 boughs, or green reeds, and row, as silently as pos- 

 sible, along the pond, or lake, which the ducks fre- 

 quent. They have also a little dog, trained to the 

 sport, whom, as they approach the ducks, they slip 

 unobserved into the water. The ducks, who were 

 dispersed here and there on the surface of the water, 

 no sooner perceive this unexpected intruder, than 

 they collect themselves together, and endeavour to 

 escape to another part of the lake. Pursued by the 

 dog, and attracted by the appearance of the green 

 boughs, or reeds, they swim for refuge to these insi- 

 dious islands. The sport now begins ; for the hunters, 

 anticipating the succats of their purveyor's assiduity, 

 are prepared to slaughter the poor birds, either singly, 

 by means of a kind of spear, or in dozens, by dis- 

 charging among them a volley of large shot from a 

 blunderbuss, or other gun of large calibre. This 

 comprehensive execution by the gun will not, it 

 seems, succeed oftener than once in a season, as the 

 noise makes such an impression on the ducks, that 

 they remember the effects, and ever after avoid a 

 similar decoy, (f) 



BjETOEN, a serpent described by Forskal in 

 his Fauna Arabica, whose bite proves almost instan- 

 taneously mortal, and produces an universal swelling 

 of the whole body. The characters of this formi- 

 dable animal are not sufficiently marked to fix its 

 place in a systematic arrangement, little more being 

 known of it, than that it is freckled with black and 

 white spots. {J"\ 



BiECKIA, a genus of plants of the class Octan- 

 dria, and order Monogynia. See Botany, (to) 



BjEOBOTRYS, a genus of plants of the class 

 Pentandria, and order Monogynia. See Botany. 

 (u) 



B7ETICA, the name of one of the ancient pro- 

 vinces of Spain, comprehending modern Andalusia 

 and Grenada, taken from the river Bastis, now the 

 Guadalquivir. ( /) 



BAFFIN'S Bay, a large bay lying between 

 North America and Greenland, which derives its 

 name from William Baffin, who endeavoured, in 

 1618, to discover a passage through Davis' Straits. 

 Its limits have not yet been ascertained by any accu- 

 rate ' observations. See Crautz's History of Green- 

 Itaul. (j) 



BAGAUDiE, the name of a band of turbulent 

 peasants, who frequently disturbed the tranquillity 



situation. 



Occasin 

 of iu being 

 built. 



of the Roman empire. See Crevier's Malory 'of the 1: 

 Roman Empire, vol. ix. p. 282; ( /') ~" ~" v~ 



BAGDAD, a city of Turkey in Asia, and capi- 

 tal of the Pachalek of Bagdad, and of the Babylonian 

 or Arabian Irac, is situated on the banks of the 

 river Tigris, in N. Lat. 33 22', E. Long. 14 21', 

 and was founded by the Caliph Abu .Jaafar Alm?.::- 

 sor, in the 145th year of the Hegira, A. D. 7G2. It 

 has been very erroneously supposed to occupy the 

 same spot on which ancient Babylon formerly stood ; 

 and the mistake may have originated, from the cir- 

 cumstance of its being built upon the scite of Seteu- 

 cia, which was frequently 6tyled New Babylon ; bat 

 the old city of that name stood upon the banks of 

 the Euphrates, about 50 miles farther up the river. 

 Bagdad is indeed the last of a succession of magni- 

 ficent cities, which were built at different periods in 

 the same extensive plain, and each of which was 

 raised from the ruins of its predecessor. Babylon 

 was exhausted of its inhabitants and its ornaments by 

 the city Seleucia ; Seleucia, again, was supplanted by 

 Ctesiphon ; which, in its turn, yielded to Almaday- 

 en ; and, last of all, Bagdad supplied a residence to 

 the sovereigns of the East. 



Almansor, the second caliph of the family of the 

 Abassides, having disgusted, by his cruelties, the in- 

 habitants of Hasomia, where he usually resided, and 

 having thus given occasion to insurrections against 

 his government, as well as conspiracies against his 

 life; he resolved to abandon a place, which was so 

 determined in its disaffection, and to remove the seat 

 of the empire to a city founded by himself. The 

 following account is given by the Persian writers of 

 the foundation of the new city, and the origin of 

 its name. Khosru, named Amishirwan, had given 

 the plain on which it stands to one of his wives, 

 who built and dedicated there a chapel or oratory 

 to her favourite idol Bagh ; and from this circum- 

 -'tance the whole of the neighbouring district was 

 called Baghdad, i. e. in the Persian language, " the 

 gift of Bagh." This little temple, in process of 

 time, served as a place of retreat to a hermit ot ex- 

 traordinary sanctitv, who happened to meet with 

 Almansor, while he was riding on the banks of the 

 Tigris, and meditating on his new scheme; and who, 

 upon learning from one of the attendants the design 

 of the caliph, mentioned an ancient tradition, that a 

 city was to be built in that place by a person named 

 Moclas. Almansor having been informed of due 

 hermit's observation, declared to his officers, that the 

 name of Moclas had been given to him by his nurse; 

 gave thanks to God for having destined him to be 

 the author of so great a work ; and instantly fixed 

 upon the spot where he stood, as the situation of his 

 intended capital. 



According to the Arabian authors, however, there Arabic 

 was none of these marvellous and romantic occur- etymology, 

 rences in the caliph's proceedings. The ground was 

 deliberately chosen near the confluence of the Eu- 

 phrates and the Tigris, as being a favourable situa- 

 tion, both for the defence of the city, and for the 

 conveyance of provisions; and it was called Baghdad, 

 i. e. the garden of Dad, because a Christian monk, 

 of the name of Dad, had been residing on the spot 

 where it was built. 



Persian 

 origin of 

 its name. 



