OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Beechey, Frederick William

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​BEECHEY, FREDERICK WILLIAM (1796–1856), English naval officer and geographer, son of Sir William Beechey, R.A., was born in London on the 17th of February 1796. In 1806 he entered the navy, and saw active service during the wars with France and America. In 1818 he served under Lieutenant (afterwards Sir) John Franklin in Buchan’s Arctic expedition, of which at a later period he published a narrative; and in the following year he accompanied Lieutenant W. E. Parry in the “Hecla.” In 1821 he took part in the survey of the Mediterranean coast of Africa under the direction of Captain, afterwards Admiral, William Henry Smyth. He and his brother Henry William Beechey, made an overland survey of this coast, and published a full account of their work in 1828 under the title of Proceedings of the Expedition to Explore the Northern Coast of Africa from Tripoly Eastward in 1821–1822. In 1825 Beechey was appointed to command the “Blossom,” which was intended to explore Bering Strait, in concert with Franklin and Parry operating from the east. He passed the strait and penetrated as far as 71° 23′ 31″ N., and 156° 21′ 30″ W., reaching a point only 146 m. west of that reached by Franklin’s expedition from the Mackenzie river. The whole voyage lasted more than three years; and in the course of it Beechey discovered several islands in the Pacific, and an excellent harbour near Cape Prince of Wales. In 1831 there appeared his Narrative of a Voyage to the Pacific and Bering’s Strait to Co-operate with the Polar Expeditions, 1825–1828. In 1835 and the following year Captain Beechey was employed on the coast survey of South America, and from 1837 to 1847 carried on the same work along the Irish coasts. He was appointed in 1850 to preside over the Marine Department of the Board of Trade. In 1854 he was made rear-admiral, and in the following year was elected president of the Royal Geographical Society. He died on the 29th of November 1856.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Beef

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​BEEF (through O. Fr. boef, mod. boeuf, from Lat. bos, bovis, ox, Gr. βοῦς, which show the ultimate connexion with the Sanskrit go, gāus, ox, and thus with “cow”), the flesh of the ox, cow or bull, as used for food. The use of the French word for the meat, while the Saxon name was retained for the animal, has been often noticed, and paralleled with the use of veal, mutton and pork. “Beef” is also used, especially in the plural “beeves,” for the ox itself, but usually in an archaic way. “Corned” or “corn” beef is the flesh cured by salting, i.e. sprinkling with “corns” or granulated particles of salt. “Collared” beef is so called from the roll or collar into which the meat is pressed, after extracting the bones. “Jerked” beef, i.e. meat cut into long thin slices and dried in the sun, like “biltong” (q.v.), comes through the Spanish-American charque, from ccharqui, the Peruvian word for this species of preserved meat. For “Beefeater” see Yeomen of the Guard.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Beeching, Henry Charles

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​BEECHING, HENRY CHARLES (1859– ), English clergyman and author, was born on the 15th of May 1859, and educated at the City of London school and at Balliol College, Oxford. He took holy orders in 1882, and after three years in a Liverpool ​curacy he was for fifteen years rector of Yattendon, Berkshire. From 1900 to 1903 he lectured on pastoral and liturgical theology at King’s College, London, and was chaplain of Lincoln’s Inn, where he became preacher in 1903. He became a canon of Westminster in 1902, and examining chaplain to the bishop of Carlisle in 1905. As a poet he is best known by his share in two volumes—Love in Idleness (1883) and Love’s Looking Glass (1891)—which contained also poems by J. W. Mackail and J. Bowyer Nichols. He was a sympathetic editor and critic of the works of many 16th and 17th century poets, of Richard Crashaw (1905), of Herrick (1907), of John Milton (1900), of Henry Vaughan (1896). Under the pseudonym of “Urbanus Sylvan” he published two successful volumes of essays, Pages from a Private Diary (1898) and Provincial Letters and other Papers (1906). His works also include numerous volumes of sermons and essays on theological subjects.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Beefsteak Club

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​BEEFSTEAK CLUB, the name of several clubs formed in London during the 18th and 19th centuries. The first seems to have been that founded in 1709 with Richard Estcourt, the actor, as steward. Of this the chief wits and great men of the nation were members and its badge was a gridiron. Its fame was, however, entirely eclipsed in 1735 when “The Sublime Society of Steaks” was established by John Rich at Covent Garden theatre, of which he was then manager. It is said that Lord Peterborough supping one night with Rich in his private room, was so delighted with the steak the latter grilled him that he suggested a repetition of the meal the next week. From this started the Club, the members of which delighted to call themselves “The Steaks.” Among them were Hogarth, Garrick, Wilkes, Bubb Doddington and many other celebrities. The rendezvous was the theatre till the fire in 1808, when the club moved first to the Bedford Coffee House, and the next year to the Old Lyceum. In 1785 the prince of Wales joined, and later his brothers the dukes of Clarence and Sussex became members. On the burning of the Lyceum, “The Steaks” met again in the Bedford Coffee House till 1838, when the New Lyceum was opened, and a large room there was allotted the club. These meetings were held till the club ceased to exist in 1867. Thomas Sheridan founded a Beefsteak Club in Dublin at the Theatre Royal in 1749, and of this Peg Woffington was president. The modern Beefsteak Club was founded by J. L. Toole, the actor, in 1876.
See J. Timbs, Clubs and Club Life in London (1873); Walter Arnold, Life and Death of the Sublime Society of Steaks (1871).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Beersheba

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​BEERSHEBA, a place midway between Gaza and Hebron (28 m. from each), frequently referred to in the Bible as the southern limit of Palestine (“Dan to Beersheba,” Judg. xx. i, &c.) Its foundation is variously ascribed to Abraham and Isaac, and different etymologies for its name are suggested, in the fundamental documents of Genesis (xxi. 22, xxvi. 26). It was an important holy place, where Abraham planted a sacred tree (Gen. xxi. 23), and where divine manifestations were vouchsafed to Hagar (Gen. xxi. 17), Isaac (xxvi. 24), Jacob (xlvi. 2) and Elijah (1 Kings xix. 5). Amos mentions it in connexion with the shrines of Bethel and Gilgal (Amos v. 5) and denounces oaths by its numen (viii. 14). The most probable meaning of the name is “seven wells,” despite the non-Semitic construction involved in this interpretation. Seven ancient wells still exist here, though two are stopped up. Eusebius and Jerome mention the place in the 4th century as a large village and the seat of a Roman garrison. Extensive remains of this village exist, though they are being rapidly quarried away for building; some inscriptions of great importance have been found here. Later it appears to have been the site of a bishopric; remains of its churches were still standing in the 14th century. Some fine mosaics have been here unearthed and immediately destroyed, in sheer wantonness, by the natives quarrying building-stone. The Biblical Beersheba probably exists at Bir es-Seba‘, 2 m. distant.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Beechworth

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​BEECHWORTH, a town of Bogong county, Victoria, Australia, 172 m. by rail N.E. of Melbourne. Pop. (1901) 7359. The town is the centre of the Ovens goldfields, and the district is mainly devoted to mining with both alluvial and reef working, but much of the land is under cultivation, yielding grain and fruit. The water supply is derived from Lake Kerferd in the vicinity, which is a favourite resort of visitors; the scenery near the town, which lies at an elevation of 1805 ft. among the May Day Hills, being singularly beautiful. The industries of Beechworth include tanning, ironfounding and coach-building.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Chamomile

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​CHAMOMILE, or Camomile Flowers, the flores anthemidis of the British Pharmacopoeia, the flower-heads of Anthemis nobilis (Nat. Ord. Compositae), a herb indigenous to England and western Europe. It is cultivated for medicinal purposes in Surrey, at several places in Saxony, and in France and Belgium,—that grown in England being much more valuable than any of the foreign chamomiles brought into the market. In the wild plant the florets of the ray are ligulate and white, and contain pistils only, those of the disk being tubular and yellow; but under cultivation the whole of the florets tend to become ligulate and white, in which state the flower-heads are said to be double. The flower-heads have a warm aromatic odour, which is characteristic of the entire plant, and a very bitter taste. In addition to a bitter extractive principle, they yield about 2% of a volatile liquid, which on its first extraction is of a pale blue colour, but becomes a yellowish brown on exposure to light. It has the characteristic odour of the flowers, and consists of a mixture of butyl and amyl angelates and valerates. Angelate of potassium has been obtained by treatment of the oil with caustic potash, and angelic acid may be isolated from this by treatment with dilute sulphuric acid. Chamomile is used in medicine in the form of its volatile oil, of which the dose is 1/2-3 minims. There is an official extract which is never used. Like all volatile oils the drug is a stomachic and carminative. In large doses the infusion is a simple emetic.
Wild chamomile is Matricaria Chamomilla, a weed common in waste and cultivated ground especially in the southern counties of England. It has somewhat the appearance of true chamomile, but a fainter scent.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Chamonix

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​CHAMONIX, a mountain valley in south-east France, its chief village, of the same name, being the capital of a canton of the arrondissement of Bonneville in the department of Haute-Savoie. The valley runs from N.E. to S.W., and is watered by the Arve, which rises in the Mer de Glace. On the S.E. towers the snowclad chain of Mont Blanc, and on the N.W. the less lofty, but rugged chain of the Brévent and of the Aiguilles Rouges. Near the head of the valley is the village of Argentière (4101 ft.), which is connected with Switzerland by “char” (light carriage) roads over the Tête Noire and past Salvan, and by a mule path over the Col de Balme, which joins the Tête Noire route near Trient and then crosses by a “char” road the Col de la Forclaz to Martigny in the Rhone valley. The principal village, Chamonix (3416 ft.), is 6 m. below Argentière by electric railway (which continues via Finhaut to Martigny) and is visited annually by a host of tourists, as it is the best starting-point for the exploration of the glaciers of the Mont Blanc chain, as well as for the ascent of Mont Blanc itself. It is connected with Geneva by a railway (55 m.). In 1906 the population of the village was 806, of the commune 3482.
The valley is first heard of about 1091, when it was granted by the count of the Genevois to the great Benedictine house of St Michel de la Cluse, near Turin, which by the early 13th century established a priory therein. But in 1786 the inhabitants bought their freedom from the canons of Sallanches, to whom the priory had been transferred in 1519. In 1530 the inhabitants obtained from the count of the Genevois the privilege of holding two fairs a year, while the valley was often visited by the civil officials and by the bishops of Geneva (first recorded visit in 1411, while St Francis de Sales came thither in 1606). But travellers for pleasure were long rare. The first party to publish (1744) an account of their visit was that of Dr R. Pococke, Mr W. Windham and other Englishmen who visited the Mer de Glace in 1741. In 1742 came P. Martel and several other Genevese, in 1760 H. B. de Saussure, and rather later Bourrit.
See J. A. Bonnefoy and A. Perrin, Le Prieuré de Chamonix (2 vols., Chambery, 1879 and 1883); A. Perrin, Histoire de la vallée et du prieuré de Chamonix (Chambéry, 1887); L. Kurz and X. Imfeld, Carte de la chaîne du Mont Blanc (1896; new ed., 1905); L. Kurz, Climbers’ Guide to the Chain of Mont Blanc (London, 1892); also works referred to under Blanc, Mont. (W. A. B. C.)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Chamier, Frederick

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​CHAMIER, FREDERICK (1796–1870), English novelist, was the son of an Anglo-Indian official. In 1809 he entered the navy, and was in active service until 1827. He retired in 1833, and was promoted to be captain in 1856. On his retirement he settled near Waltham Abbey, and wrote several nautical novels on the lines popularized by Marryat, that had considerable success. These were The Life of a Sailor (1832), Ben Brace (1836), The Arethusa (1837), Jack Adams (1838), Tom Bowling (1841) and Jack Malcolm’s Log (1846). He wrote a number of other books, and edited and brought down to 1827 James’s Naval History (1837).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Chamfer

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​CHAMFER, Champfer or Chaumfer (Fr. chanfrein; possibly from Lat. cantus, corner, and frangere, to break), an architectural term; when the edge or arris of any work is cut off at an angle of 45° in a small degree, it is said to be “chamfered,” while it would be “canted” if on a large scale. The chamfer is much used in medieval work, and is sometimes plain, sometimes hollowed out and sometimes moulded. Chamfers are sometimes “stopped” by a bead or some moulding, but when cut short by a slope they are generally known as “stop chamfer.”
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Chaminade, Cécile

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​CHAMINADE, CÉCILE (1861– ), French musical composer, was born at Paris on the 8th of August 1861. She studied in Paris, her musical talent being shown at the age of eight by the writing of some church music which attracted Bizet’s attention; and at eighteen she came out in public as a pianist. Her own compositions, both songs (in large numbers) and instrumental pieces, were soon produced in profusion: melodious and interesting, and often charming, they became very popular, without being entitled to rank with the greater style of music. Both in Paris and in England Mlle Chaminade and her works became well known at the principal concerts. In 1908 she visited America and was warmly welcomed.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Chamkanni

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​CHAMKANNI, a small Pathan tribe on the Kohat border of the North-West Province of India. They inhabit the western part of the Kurmana Valley in the Orakzai portion of Tirah, but are supposed to be a distinct race. They took part in the frontier risings of 1897, and during the Tirah expedition of that year a brigade under General Gaselee was sent to punish them.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Derna

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​DERNA (anc. Darnis-Zarine), a town on the north coast of Africa and capital of the eastern half of the Ottoman province of Bengazi or Barca. Situated below the eastern butt of Jebel Akhdar on a small but rich deltaic plain, watered by fine perennial springs, it has a growing population and trade, the latter being mainly in fruits grown in its extensive palm gardens, and in hides and wool brought down by the nomads from the interior. If the port were better there would be more rapid expansion. The bay is open from N.W. round to S.E. and often inaccessible in winter and spring, and the steamers of the Nav. Gen. Italiana sometimes have to pass without calling. The population has recovered from the great plague epidemic of 1821 and reached its former figure of about 7000. A proportion of it is of Moorish stock, of Andalusian origin, which emigrated in 1493; the descendants preserve a fine facial type. The sheikhs of the local Bedouin tribes have houses in the place, and a Turkish garrison of about 250 men is stationed in barracks. There is a lighthouse W. of the bay. A British consular agent is resident and the Italians maintain a vice-consul. The names Darnis and Zarine are philologically identical and probably refer to the same place. No traces are left of the ancient town except some rock tombs. Darnis continued to be of some importance in early Moslem times as a station on the Alexandria-Kairawan road, and has served on more than one occasion as a base for Egyptian attacks on Cyrenaica and Tripolitana. In 1805 the government of the United States, having a quarrel with the dey of Tripoli on account of piracies committed on American shipping, landed a force to co-operate in the attack on Derna then being made by Sidi Ahmet, an elder brother of the dey. This force, commanded by William Eaton (q.v.), built a fort, whose ruins and rusty guns are still to be seen, and began to improve the harbour; but its work quickly came to an end with the conclusion of peace. After 1835 Derna passed under direct Ottoman control, and subsequently served as the point whence the sultan exerted a precarious but increasing control over eastern Cyrenaica and Marmarica. It is now in communication by wireless telegraphy with Rhodes and western Cyrenaica. It is the only town, or even large village, between Bengazi and Alexandria (600 m.) (D. G. H.)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Derrick

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​DERRICK, a sort of crane (q.v.); the name is derived from that of a famous early 17th-century Tyburn hangman, and was originally applied as a synonym.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Des Barreaux, Jacques Vallée, Sieur

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​DES BARREAUX, JACQUES VALLÉE, SIEUR (1602–1673), French poet, was born in Paris in 1602. His great-uncle, Geoffroy-Vallée, had been hanged in 1574 for the authorship of a book called Le Fléau de la foy. His nephew appears to have inherited his scepticism, which on one occasion nearly cost him his life. The peasants of Touraine attributed to the presence of the unbeliever an untimely frost that damaged the vines, and proposed to stone him. His authorship of the sonnet on “Pénitence,” by which he is generally known, has been disputed. He had the further distinction of being the first of the lovers of Marion Delorme. He died at Chalon-sur-Saône on the 9th of May 1673.
See Poésies de Des Barreaux (1904), edited by F. Lachèvre.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Des Adrets, François de Beaumont, Baron

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​DES ADRETS, FRANÇOIS DE BEAUMONT, Baron (c. 1512–1587), French Protestant leader, was born in 1512 or 1513 at the château of La Frette (Isère). During the reign of Henry II. of France he served with distinction in the royal army and became colonel of the “legions” of Dauphiné, Provence and Languedoc. In 1562, however, he joined the Huguenots, not from religious conviction but probably from motives of ambition and personal dislike of the house of Guise. His campaign against the Catholics in 1562 was eminently successful. In June of that year Des Adrets was master of the greater part of Dauphiné. But his brilliant military qualities were marred by his revolting atrocities. The reprisals he exacted from the Catholics after their massacres of the Huguenots at Orange have left a dark stain upon his name. The garrisons that resisted him were butchered with every circumstance of brutality, and at Montbrison, in Forez, he forced eighteen prisoners to precipitate themselves from the top of the keep. Having alienated the affections of the Huguenots by his pride and violence, he entered into communication with the Catholics, and declared himself openly in favour of conciliation. On the 10th of January 1563 he was arrested on suspicion by some Huguenot officers and confined in the citadel of Nîmes. He was liberated at the edict of Amboise in the following March, and, distrusted alike by Huguenots and Catholics, retired to the château of La Frette, where he died, a Catholic, on the 2nd of February 1587.
Authorities.—J. Roman, Documents inédits sur le baron des Adrets (1878); and memoirs and histories of the time. See also Guy Allard, Vie de François de Beaumont (1675); l’abbé J. C. Martin, Histoire politique et militaire de François de Beaumont (1803); Eugène and Émile Haag, La France protestante (2nd ed., 1877 seq.).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Derring-do

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​DERRING-DO, valour, chivalrous conduct, or “desperate courage,” as it is defined by Sir Walter Scott. The word in its present accepted substantival form is a misconstruction of the verbal substantive dorryng or durring, daring, and do or don, the present infinitive of “do,” the phrase dorryng do thus meaning “daring to do.” It is used by Chaucer in Troylus, and by Lydgate in the Chronicles of Troy. Spenser in the Shepherd’s Calendar first adapted derring-do as a substantive meaning “manhood and chevalrie,” and this use was revived by Scott, through whom it came into vogue with writers of romance.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Derwentwater

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​DERWENTWATER, a lake of Cumberland, England, in the northern part of the celebrated Lake District (q.v. for the physical relations of the lake with the district at large). It is of irregular figure, approaching to an oval, about 3 m. in length and from 1/2 m. to 11/4 m. in breadth. The greatest depth is 70 ft. The lake is seen at one view, within an amphitheatre of mountains of varied outline, overlooked by others of greater height. Several of the lesser elevations near the lake are especially famous as view-points, such as Castle Head, Walla Crag, Ladder Brow and Cat Bells. The shores are well wooded, and the lake is studded with several islands, of which Lord’s Island, Derwent Isle and St Herbert’s are the principal. Lord’s Island was the residence of the earls of Derwentwater. St Herbert’s Isle receives its name from having been the abode of a holy man of that name mentioned by Bede as contemporary with St Cuthbert of Farne Island in the 7th century. Derwent Isle, about six acres in extent, contains a handsome residence surrounded by lawns, gardens and timber of large growth. The famous Falls of Lodore, at the upper end of the lake, consist of a series of cascades in the small Watendlath Beck, which rushes over an enormous pile of protruding crags from a height of nearly 200 ft. The “Floating Island” appears at intervals on the upper portion of the lake near the mouth of the beck. This singular phenomenon is supposed to owe its appearance to an accumulation of gas, formed by the decay of ​vegetable matter, detaching and raising to the surface the matted weeds which cover the floor of the lake at this point. The river Derwent (q.v.) enters the lake from the south and leaves it on the north, draining it through Bassenthwaite lake, to the Irish Sea. To the north-east of the lake lies the town of Keswick.