B I E 



497 



B I J 



Bienne, inexhaustible source of water, which supplies the 

 Biequal. p,p e8 f () public fountains. A large common be- 

 u *"" v ^"' tween the towr and the lake, belonging to the 

 burghers, is laid out in small kitchen gardens. 



The lake of Bienne, which is of an oval form, is 

 nine miles long and four broad. Its margin is deco- 

 rated with villages and castles, and affords many beau- 

 tiful and picturesque view;. 



The lake of Bienne is celebrated by the island of 

 St Peter, which was the temporary residence of 

 Rousseau when he withdrew from Moitier. The island 

 of St Peter is ab;ut two miles in circumference ; on 

 its southern side it slopes gently to the lake ; but in 

 other directions it is steep and rocky. Large oak, 

 beech, and chesnut trees, decorate its gently undu- 

 lating surface, which is traversed by agreeable walks, 

 terminating in a circular pavilion in the centre of tl.e 

 isL.nd. Parties from Bienne, Nidau, and the sur- 

 rounding country, resort in the time of the vintage to 

 this enchanting spot, which has been rendered classi- 

 cal by the short residence of Rousseau. This sin- 

 gular character lived in the farm house, the only one 

 in the island, which belonged to the steward of the 

 general hospital at Berne, to whom he paid 40 shil- 

 lings per month for his board and lodgings. He re- 

 mained here only two months, and the room that he 

 Occupied, from which there is a line view of the gla- 

 ciers, is shown to strangers as an object of cusiosity. 

 A full account of the ancient district of Bienne, 

 which is now included in the department of the 

 Higher Rhine, and a more particular account of the 

 lake, may be seen in Coxe's Travels in Sxvilzer/and, 

 vol. i. p. 210, 21 1 , &c. and vol. ii. p. 152. See also 

 Diet, de la Suisse. (*-) 



BIEQUAL Third, in music, is a name given by 

 Earl Stanhope, in his Principles of the Science of 

 Tuning, to an interval, two of which added to a ma- 

 jor third make up an octave, consequently two of 

 them is equal to a minor sixth ; and its ratio, in his 



Lordship's monochord system, is , =207^2 -J- 4/ 



+ 18ra (see Plate XXX. ;) this exceeds the perfect 

 Hid by 10^Z-+-m,r=? Jc nearly: the logarithm of 

 this biequal third is .8979400,0867 ; and it may be. 

 worthy of remark, that it exceeds a minor third by 

 L-f-^2, and is \Z. larger than a deficient flat fourth. 

 In the Equal- beating sy stem of his Lordship, that 

 is, where his two successive thirds, composing a true 

 minor sixth, are made to beat equally quid:, two other 

 biequal thirds arise, having finite ratios, the largest 

 of which is \{, whose logarithm is .8973376,581 1 ; 

 and the smallest has a ratio of -L, whose logarithm is 

 .8985423,5924 ; whence it appears, that one of these 

 is larger and the other smaller than the monochord- 

 biequal third, first described ; circumstances of which 

 the noble Earl seems not to have been aware, any 

 more than that two of such successive biequal thirds 

 as produce no beating between the toe beatings, 

 " (which his Lordship last proposed, as the mode of. 



tuning his equal beating intervals, Pint. Mag. xxviii. 

 p. 151.) are not equal to each other 111 any case what- 

 ever. The theorems whence the above ratios wire 

 deduced, and whence those of his Lordship's triequal 

 ^uuiti and others may be deduced, will be given 

 VOL. III. TART III. 



under the article Equal-beating Intervals, which 

 see. h) 



BIENNIAL Plants. See Gardening. 



BIGAMY. See Polygamy. 



BIGGLESWADE, a town of England, in the 

 county of Bedford, situated in a fine valley on the 

 banks of the Ivell, which is here navigable. It has 

 one of the largest markets in England for barley, 

 pease, and oats, and there is also here a small manu- 

 factory of thread lace and edgings. Several old 

 houses were thrown down in this town by an earth- 

 quake, which was felt on the 25th of February 1792. 

 Number of houses in 1801, 301. Population 1650, 

 of whom 258 were returned as employed in trade and 

 manufactures. See Beauties (if England and Wales, 

 vol. i. (.; ) 



BIGNONIA, a genus of plants of the class Di- 

 dynamia, and order Angio3permia. See Botany. (u>) 



BIGORRE, the name of a district in Guyenne, 

 one of the former provinces of France, but now 

 included in the department of the Upper Pyrenees, 

 See Pyrenees, Upteh. (j ) 



BIJORE, the name of a mountainous province of' 

 Hindostan. Its history is devoid of interest, and we 

 have no statistical information respecting it that is 

 worth communicating. See Rennel's Memoir, p, 

 159. (to) 



BIJUGAj or Biksagos Islands. The western 

 coast of Africa, between the River Gambia and the 

 Rio Grande, consists of a chain of low fertile islands, 

 separated from each other, and also from the conti- 

 nent, by narrow navigable canals, in consequence of 

 the sea encircling them. To the south-west of these 

 islands is an archipelago, consisting of 18 or 20 is- 

 lands, stretching above 40 leagues from north-west to 

 south-east, called the Bijuga Islands, bounded on the 

 one side by immense shoals, which, being little known, 

 are frequently fatal to navigators ; and on the inside 

 by a channel, about five leagues in width, called the 

 Bijuga channel. Neither the exact limits of these 

 islands, however, nor their number, are definitely as- 

 certained ; but thirteen are said to be inhabited. We 

 are disposed to consider them a separate and distinct 

 groupe from those on the north-east side of the chan- 

 nel, though other geographers rank the latter along 

 with them. 



The Bijuga channel is deep, and is fit for the na- 

 vigation of the largest vessels ; it stretches nearly 50 

 leagues in length, and terminates with the island Bu- 

 lama. The islands gradually rise from the shore to- 

 wards the interior ; none are above six leagues in 

 length, nor any where appear to be above 40 feet high- 

 er than the level of the sea. Some navigators consid. r 

 them of volcanic origin ; others think that they arc 

 alluvial, and that they have been formed, in the course 

 of time, by the deposit of the Rio Grande and the 

 neighbouring streams, on the exiensive sand banks 

 which serve for their base. The Bijuga islands are 

 rich and fertile, abounding in all the necessaries of 

 life, beautiful, and well wooded, whence they have 

 long been recommended as i,uitable for European set- 

 tlements. Warang, also called Formosa, Ca/. 

 Cauabac, Bulama, Carashe, and Suoga, which w&s 

 peopled but lately, are tiiose of principal note. The 

 three immediately north-west of the channel, Jatte, 

 38 



Biennial 



II 

 Bijuga. 



