BUIi 
EUR 
sometimes succeeded so well, that the copy 
has been mistaken for the reality. This in- 
sect proceeds from a large white larva re- 
sembling that of the hicanus cervus, or 
great stag-chaffer. Of the European insects 
of this genus the B. rustica is one of the 
largest, measuring about an inch and a half, 
and of a coppery colour, with several longi- 
tudinal furrows along the wing-shells ; the 
thorax of a deep blue green, with numerous 
impressed points ; it is found in tlie woods. 
The European Biiprestes fall far short of tlie 
Indian and American species, both in point 
of size and splendour, though among them 
may be numbered several elegant insects. 
BURCAEDIA, in botany, so named in 
honour of Henry Burckhard, a genus of the 
Pentandria Pentagynia class and order. 
Essential character : calyx five-leaved ; co- 
rolla five-petalled ; capsule angular, one- 
celled, tliree-valved, seven or eight seeded. 
There is but one species, viz. B. villosa, an 
annual plant, with a branched stem two feet 
high, hirsute with reddish brown hairs. 
Flowers at the end of the stem and bi-auches, 
axillary, solitary, on long hairy peduncles. 
Tiie whole plant is covered with stiff hairs. 
It is found on the sandy coasts of Cayenne 
and Guiana. 
BURDEN, or Burthen, in a general 
sense, implies a load or weight, supposed to 
be as much as a man, horse, &c. can well car- 
ry. A sound and healthy man can raise a 
weight equal to his owm. An able horse 
can draw 350 lb. though for a length of time 
300 lb. is sufficient. Hence calculations are 
formed by the artillery officers. One horse 
will draw as much as seven men. 
Burden of a ship is it contents, or num- 
ber of tons it will cany. The burden of a 
ship may be determined thus : multiply 
the length of the keel, taken within board, 
by the breadth of the ship within board, ta- 
ken from the midship-beam, from plank to 
plank, and multiply the product by the 
depth of the hold, taken from the plank be- 
low the keelson, to the under part of the 
upper-deck plank, and divide the last pro- 
duct by 94, then the quotient is the content 
of the tonnage required. 
BURGAGE, in law, a tenure proper to 
borouglis and towns, whereby the inhabi- 
tants hold their lands and tenements of the 
King, or other lord, at a certain yearly 
rate. This tenure is described by Glanvil, 
and is expressly said by Littleton to be but 
tenure in socage. It is indeed only a kind 
of towm socage ; as common socage, by 
which other lands are holden, is usually of a 
rural nature. A borough is usually distin- 
guished from other towns by the right of 
sending members to parliament ; and where 
the right of election is by burgage tenure, 
that alone is a proof of the antiquity of the 
borough. Tenure in burgage, therefore, 
or burgage tenure, is where houses, or lands 
which were formerly the scite of houses, in 
an ancient borough, are held by some lord 
in common socage, by a certain establish- 
ment. The free socage, in which these te- 
nements are held, seems to be plainly a 
remnant of .Saxon liberty ; and this may 
account for the great variety of customs, af- 
fecting many of these tenements so held in 
ancient burgage ; the principal and most re- 
markable of which is that called borough 
English ; which see. There are also other 
special customs in different burgage te- 
nures ; as in some, that the wife shall be en- 
dowed of all her husband’s tenements and 
not of the third part only, as at the com- 
mon law : and in others, that a man might 
dispose of his tenements by will which in ge- 
nera! was not permitted after the conquest, 
till the reign of Heniy VIII. ; though in 
the Saxon times it was allowable. A preg- 
nant proof, says Judge Blackstone, that 
these liberties of socage tenure were frag- 
ments of Saxon liberty. 
BURGESS, an inhabitant of a borough, 
or one who possesses a tenement therein. 
In other countries, burgess and citizen are 
confounded together ; but with us tliey are 
distinguished: the word is also applied to 
the magistrates of some towns. Burgess is 
now ordinarily used for the representative 
of a borough-town in parliament. 
BURGH-6ote signifies a contribution to- 
wards the building or repairing of castles 
or walls, for the defence of a borough or 
city. 
^BURGLARY, in law, or nocturnal 
house-breaking, an unlawfid entering into 
another man’s dwelling, wherein some per- 
son is, or into a church, in the night-time ; 
in order to commit some felony, or to kill 
some person, or to steal something thence, 
or do some other felonious act ; whether 
the same be executed or not. This crinie 
has been always regarded eis very heinous; 
partly on account of the terror which it oc- 
casions, and partly because it is a forcible 
invasion and disturbance of that right of 
habitation, which every individual might re- 
quire even in a state of nature, and against 
which the laws of civil society have particu- 
larly guarded. Whilst they allow the pos- 
sessor to kill the aggressor, who attempt to 
