Bowditch," by his son, N. I. Bowditch. Boston, 1839.)

BOWDITCH ISLAND, a coral island of triangular form, in the South Pacific. It was discovered by Commander Wilkes, of the United States navy, Jan. 29, 1841. Length, 8 miles; breadth, about 4.

BOWDLER, THOMAS, English author, born in 1754, died in 1825. He was a physician, and wrote "Letters from Holland," but is best known as having published a curious expurgated "Family Shakespeare."

BOWDOIN, JAMES, governor of Massachusetts, born in Boston, Aug. 8, 1727, died Nov. 6, 1790. He was descended from a family of Huguenot refugees, graduated at Harvard college in 1745, and entered public life in 1753, as representative in the general court. He was subsequently senator and councillor. Throughout the troubles which preceded the revolution, he was forward in opposition to the royal governor, by whom his influence was denounced as formidable. In 1775 he was president of the council of government; when the convention assembled in 1778, for the formation of a constitution, he was chosen president; and in 1785 and '86 succeeded Hancock as governor. It was during his administration that the disturbances and armed rebellions in the western counties of Massachusetts, known as Shays's war, occurred. The country was in great distress, and the aspect of affairs dangerous; but he called out 4,000 militia, under Gen. Lincoln, the funds for whose maintenance were raised by subscription in Boston, and the speedy suppression of the insurrection was due to his vigorous and decided course; yet he lost his election the next year. He was afterward a member of the convention called to accept the federal constitution.

BOWDOIN, JAMES, patron of Bowdoin college, and son of the preceding, born Sept. 22, 1752, died Oct. 11, 1811. He graduated at Harvard college in 1771, afterward spent one year at Oxford, and commenced his travels on the continent, but was recalled by the news of the battle of Lexington. Upon his return, devoting himself principally to literary pursuits, he was successively representative, senator, and councillor. In May, 1805, he went to Spain with a commission from Mr. Jefferson, to procure a settlement of the Louisiana bond-claims, the cession of Florida, and compensation for injuries to American commerce. He remained abroad until 1808, but without accomplishing the object of his mission. He brought home with him from Paris an extensive library, philosophical apparatus, and collection of paintings, all of which he left at his death to Bowdoin college, of which he had been previously a benefactor; together with 6,000 acres of land, and the reversion of the island of Naushon, which had been his favorite residence.

BOWDOIN COLLEGE, the oldest and most prominent literary institution in the state of Maine, situated at Brunswick on an elevated

plain south of the village, about 1 mile from the Androscoggin river, and 4 miles from the shore of the Atlantic ocean. It derives its name from James Bowdoin, governor of Massachusetts in 1785, and a descendant of Pierre Baudouin, a French Protestant who fled to America on the revocation of the edict of Nantes. His name was selected as one of the most honored which Massachusetts at that time boasted, and his son became a munificent patron of the college. Prior to the revolution, it had been proposed to establish a college in Maine, then a district of Massachusetts, but by reason of the tumults of the time, it was not till 1788 that a petition for a charter was presented to the Massachusetts legislature, from the association of ministers and the court of sessions for Cumberland county. The charter was granted in 1794, together with 5 townships, as a foundation for the college, whose object, as stated in the act of incorporation, should be to "promote virtue and piety, and the knowledge of the languages and of the useful and liberal arts and sciences." The government was vested in 2 boards, one of trustees, and the other of overseers, which met in 1801, and elected Joseph McKeen, D. D., a graduate of Dartmouth, for president of the college, and John Abbot, a graduate of Harvard, for professor of languages. These officers were installed in 1802, when 8 students were admitted, and in 1806 the first honors bestowed by the new institution were conferred upon 8 graduates. A single building at this time served all the college uses, and also as the residence of the family of the president. President McKeen, dying in 1807, was succeeded by Jesse Appleton, D. D., who a few years before had been one of the 2 prominent candidates for the chair of theology in Harvard university, and who, during the 12 years of his presidency, contributed largely to the prosperity of the college by his ability and efficiency as an officer, and his amiable personal character. James Bowdoin, son of the governor, had before made a donation to the college of 1,000 acres of land, and more than £1,100; and at his death in 1811, he left to it, beside another donation of land, a magnificent bequest of 400 models in crystallography, more than 500 specimens of minerals, which had been arranged by Hay, an elegant private library, and a costly collection of paintings which he had purchased in Europe. This gallery of paintings, since then much increased, is one of rare excellence, and the crystals and minerals were the nucleus to the large and valuable mineralogical and conchological cabinets which have been collected and arranged by Prof. Cleaveland. Upon the death of President Appleton in 1819, the Rev. William Allen, who had formerly been president of Dartmouth university, was elected his successor, and retained the office till 1839, with the exception of a short interval in 1831, when, being indirectly removed by an act of the legislature of Maine, which had now become a

separate state, he contended against the authority of the state thus to control the college, and the question was decided in his favor by adjudication in the circuit court of the United States. The medical school of Maine was connected with this college in 1821, and has now a very complete anatomical cabinet and chemical apparatus, and a library of 3,550 volumes, principally modern works, which have been selected with much care. President Allen, resigning his office in 1839, was succeeded by the present incumbent, Leonard Woods, D. D. There are now 5 college buildings, all large brick structures, excepting the chapel, which is of light granite, and one of the finest specimens of church architecture in the country. It is in the Romanesque style, was begun in 1846, and completed in 1855, and has rooms also for the library and picture gallery. The library of the college, together with those belonging to the societies of the students, numbers over 30,000 volumes. Bowdoin college has now, beside the president, 14 professors and 2 tutors. Parker Cleaveland, one of the earliest eminent mineralogists in America, has been connected with it since 1805, and has instructed every class that has graduated. Thomas C. Upham, D. D., the author of an elaborate treatise on mental philosophy, better known for several works of a mingled philosophical and devotional character, has held the position of professor of mental philosophy and ethics since 1824. Nathaniel Hawthorne and Henry W. Longfellow graduated here in 1825, and among their contemporaries as students in the college, were J. S. C. Abbott, Luther V. Bell, G. B. Cheever, Jonathan Cilley, William P. Fessenden, John P. Hale, Franklin Pierce, S. S. Prentiss, and Calvin E. Stowe. Longfellow was the professor of modern languages from 1829 to 1835, when he was called to a similar post at Harvard. The whole number of the alumni is 1,260. The present number of students is 203 in the college department, and 50 in the medical. It is an indication of the prosperity of the college, that at the last commencement, a larger class graduated, and also a larger class was admitted, than ever before.

BOWDOINHAM, a post township of Sagadahock co., Me., 25 miles S. W. of Augusta, and 35 N. N. E. of Portland. It lies on the Kennebec river at its junction with a small stream called the Cathans river, which is navigable for ships of 1,000 tons, and on the Kennebec and Portland railroad. It contains 3 churches and 10 stores, and is known for its ship-building. Pop. 2,382.

BOWEN, FRANCIS, an American author, born at Charlestown, Mass., in 1811, was graduated at Harvard university with the highest honors in 1833. In 1835 he was appointed instructor in the university in intellectual philosophy and political economy. He held this position until 1839, when he embarked for Europe, for purposes of travel and study. During his residence

at Paris, he made the acquaintance of Sismondi, De Gerando, and other eminent scholars. Returning from Europe, he established himself in Cambridge in 1841, occupying himself with literary and philosophical pursuits. In 1842 he published an edition of "Virgil, with English notes," and a volume of "Critical Essays on the History and Present Condition of Speculative Philosophy." At the beginning of 1843, he succeeded Dr. John G. Palfrey as editor and proprietor of the "North American Review," which he conducted for 11 years, until January, 1854. Beside writing about one-fourth part of the articles in this work during this period, he prepared and delivered in the winters of 184849, 2 courses of Lowell lectures, on the application of metaphysical and ethical science to the evidences of religion, the substance of which was published in 1849, in an octavo volume, and a second edition, revised and enlarged, in 1855. In 1850, Mr. Bowen was appointed by the corporation of Harvard university, McLean professor of history, but on account of certain unpopular opinions which he had published on politics and on the Hungarian war of 1848-49, the appointment was not confirmed by the overseers. In the winter of this year Mr. Bowen delivered a course of lectures before the Lowell institute on political economy, and another in 1852 on the origin and development of the English and American constitution. In 1853, when Dr. James Walker was made president of the university, Mr. Bowen was appointed his successor in the Alford professorship of natural religion, moral philosophy, and civil polity, and was confirmed by the overseers almost unanimously. In 1854 he published an abridged edition of Dugald Stewart's "Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind," with critical and explanatory notes; and in the same year com piled and edited, with notes, "Documents of the Constitution of England and America, from Magna Charta to the Federal Constitution of 1789." Beside these various labors, he has written, in Sparks's "Library of American Biography," the lives of Sir William Phipps, of Baron Steuben, of James Otis, and of Gen. Benjamin Lincoln. In philosophy, Prof. Bowen is a follower of the earlier English, rather than of the French or German school. He has written largely in defence of the doctrines of Locke and Berkeley, and in refutation of the systems of Kant, Fichte, and Cousin. He has endeavored especially to connect and develop the doctrines of Berkeley and Malebranche, through a theory of causation, which, rejecting physical agencies, maintains volition, whether human or divine, to be the only true or efficient cause, and refers all the phenomena of the outward universe to the immediate or direct action of the Deity. He has consequently been led to controvert very earnestly the positive philosophy of M. Comte and his distinguished English disciple, J. S. Mill. Mr. Mill has replied in the third edition of his "Logic,"

where he has examined in detail the doctrines of his American critic. In political economy, Mr. Bowen adopts in the main the views of Tooke and Fullarton upon the currency, in opposition to those of the bullionists; but he has taken strong grounds against the doctrines of Adam Smith upon free trade, of Malthus upon population, and Ricardo upon rent. He argues that these theories originated in the peculiar condition of English society, and the political institutions of England, so that they are inapplicable to the circumstances of other countries, and directly conflict with the results of experience in the United States. In dealing with this class of subjects, Prof. Bowen has aimed especially to trace out the economical and social results of republican as contrasted with aristocratic forms of government and society, and to find in our peculiar American polity the explanation of many phenomena, hitherto attributed to physical conditions. Since the commencement of the year 1858, Prof. Bowen has delivered a course of lectures before the Lowell institute on the English metaphysicians and philosophers from Bacon to Sir William Hamilton.

BOWEN, PARDON, a physician of Providence, R. I., born in 1757, died in 1826. He graduated at Brown university in 1775, and was surgeon on board a privateer in 1779. He was taken prisoner several times and carried into Halifax, but gave up the sea for the shore in 1782. He became eminent both in medicine and surgery, and during the prevalence of the yellow fever continued at his post, and was more than once attacked by that disease. He published an account of the course of the yellow fever at Providence in 1805, in Hosack's "Medical Register," vol. iv.

BOWEN, WILLIAM C., professor of chemistry in Brown university, born in 1786, died in 1815. He studied medicine, visited Edinburgh and Paris, and received private instruction from Sir Astley Cooper. He lost his life through experiments on chlorine, in attempting to discover the composition of the bleaching liquor employed in England. His labors led to the erection of the important bleaching establishments in Rhode Island.

BOWIE, a northeastern county of Texas, bounded on the N. by Red river, S. by Sulphur fork of the same stream, and comprising an area of about 960 square miles. It borders on Arkansas on the N. E. and E. The surface is undulating, and in many places covered with thick forests of post oak and other timber. Red river is navigable by steamboats along the northern boundary, and the line of the projected Memphis, El Paso, and Pacific railroad intersects the country. The soil of the bottoms is rich red land, well suited to cotton; in other localities it is sandy. Fruits of various kinds, but particularly apples, are cultivated with success. The staple productions are live stock, grain, hay, and cotton. In 1850, the county yielded 1,113 bales of cot

ton, 93,110 bushels of Indian corn, and 44,355 of sweet potatoes. In 1857, there were 5,690 head of cattle, valued at $34,900, and 1,200 of horses, valued at $77,000. The value of real estate was $384,400, and the aggregate value of all taxable property, $837,853. Capital, Boston. Pop. in 1856, 2,995, of whom 1,910 were slaves. Named in honor of James Bowie, who fell at Fort Alamo.

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BOWIE KNIFE, an American weapon, similar to the French couteau de chasse, except that it has but a single edge. According to a rather doubtful story, it was first used by Col. Bowie, of Texas, who, in a contest with the Mexicans previous to the Texan revolution, had his sword broken off within 18 inches of the hilt. He is said to have subsequently employed the fragment as a knife for handto-hand fighting. It was imitated by others, and is now worn by all who have to bear weapons, in the whole south and west of the United States.

BOWLDERS, loose rounded blocks of stone, named by the French blocs erratiques, found scattered over the surface in high northern and southern latitudes, extending to within 35°, or thereabouts, of the equator. In the northern hemisphere they are always of the varieties of rock which are found in solid ledges in a northerly direction; and in the southern hemisphere, the ledges are again met with toward the pole. These loose rocks appear in each case to have been transported toward the equator, and to have been subjected to rolling action, which has rounded off their corners, and ground their surfaces. The causes that effected this removal will be treated of in the article DILUVIUM. The size of these transported blocks is often enormous. At Fall River, Massachusetts, on the south side of the bay at the mouth of Taunton river, a bowlder of conglomerate rock was uncovered in the gravel resting on granite ledges, which was estimated to weigh 5,400 tons. The ledges of this conglomerate are met with only on the other side of the bay. Along the coast of New England, the bowlders, by their great numbers and size, constitute a marked feature in the landscape. They are sometimes met with perched upon bare ledges of rock, and so nicely balanced that, though of great weight, they may be rocked by the hand. These are called rocking-stones. mouth Rock" is a bowlder of sienitic granite, ledges of which are found in the towns near Boston. The highest mountains are often covered with these bowlders of the drift formation. Upon the bare granite summit of Mt. Katahdin-the highest mountain in Maine-at an elevation of 3,000 feet or more above the surrounding valleys, pieces of limestone containing fossil shells are found, though no ledges resembling them are known except many miles to the northwest, and at a much lower level. The northern and central parts of Europe are equally interesting for the distribution of bowlders. The pedestal of the statue of Peter

Ply

the Great at St. Petersburg was hewn out of a granite bowlder, that lay on a marshy plain near the city. The mass, weighing about 1,500 tons, was transported on rollers and cannon balls over the frozen plain to the city. Upon the limestone ledges of the Jura mountains are found bowlders of granite, which must have come from the higher Alps, where ledges of similar character are found. Some of these bowlders are of very large dimensions, one in particular, known as the Pierre à Martin, according to Mr. Greenough, measuring no less than 10,296 cubic feet, and weighing consequently about 820 tons.

BOWLES, WILLIAM A., an Indian agent and chief, born in Frederick co., Maryland, died in confinement in the Moro castle, Havana, Dec. 23, 1805. When 13 years of age he ran away from home, and joined the British army at Philadelphia. He afterward went among the Creek Indians, married an Indian woman, and was one of the English emissaries to excite them against the Americans. After the war he went to England, and on his return, his influence among the Indians was so hostile to the Spaniards that they offered a price of 6,000 dollars for his capture. He was taken in July, 1792, sent to Madrid, and afterward to Manila. Having obtained leave to visit Europe, he returned among the Creeks, and instigated them to renewed hostilities. He was betrayed again into the hands of the Spaniards in 1804, and perished miserably. His biography was published in London in 1791.

BOWLES, WILLIAM LISLE, an English poet and clergyman, born at King's Sutton, North-amptonshire, Sept. 24, 1762, died at Salisbury, April 7, 1850. He was a person of great attainments, and published sonnets and other poems, which passed through many editions. In 1807 he edited the works of Pope, with a new biography, in which he strongly attacked, not only the poetry, but the personal character of the poet. This involved him in a bitter controversy with Byron.-His sister, CAROLINE ANNE BOWLES, born about 1798, married Robert Southey in 1839, and tended the poet's declining years with devoted affection. She has written some charming poems, pervaded by an exquisite devotional and moral feeling.

BOWLING, an athletic game and popular amusement, of various forms, peculiar, generally, to nations of the Anglo-Saxon family. There are many kinds of bowling, of which 3 may be named in particular, 2 being perfect games in themselves; the 3d, which differs in many respects from the others, being an essential part of the game of cricket. Bowling, which, centuries ago, was a favorite amusement of our English ancestors, was played in the open air, on a flat expanse of turf, carefully shaved, watered, rolled, and tended with the most assiduous care, till it was as hard as a wooden table, and as free from any inequalities in the surface which might give an irregular motion to the ball, as elastic and springy as a piece of India rubber,

and so perfectly drained that it was impossible that it should ever become soaked or spongy with wet. In the reigns of Queen Anne and the first three Georges, a bowling green was as natural and necessary an appendage to a gentleman's country seat, as a billiard table at the present day; and it was often combined with the features of the park or pleasure garden in such a manner as to produce the most agreeable and picturesque effects. It was generally a perfectly level lawn, of an oblong or oval form, surrounded by a tall screen of evergreens, mixed for ornament with flowering shrubs, planted around it, with the double ob ject of preventing the turf from being burned and scorched in hot weather, and of guarding the eyes of the players against the rays of the level sun. Not unfrequently they were placed so that access could be had to them by a flight of steps from the glass doors or bay windows of the dining roomm-bowling being a favorite after-dinner amusement of our burly English and Dutch ancestors, and doubtless a useful one, promotive of digestion after the solid 2 o'clock dinner of beef and pudding, lubricated with heady ale and potent punch. "The first and greatest cunning to be observed in bowling," says an old authority, "is the right choosing of your bowl, which must be suitable to the grounds you design to run on. Thus, for close alleys your best choice is the flat bowl; 2, for open grounds of advantage, the round byassed bowl; 3, for greenswards that are plain and level, the bowl that is as round as a ball. The next thing that requires your care is the choosing out your grounds, and preventing the winding hangings and many turning advantages of the same, whether it be in open, wide places, or in close bowling alleys. Lastly, have your judgment about you, to observe the risings, fallings, and advantages of the place where you bowl." The object at which this bowling was made, in this old game, was a small ball called the Jack, laid off at a certain distance; and it was the aim of every player to lay his own bowl, in playing, as near as possible to this, and to knock away his adversary's bowl, if it were in winning proximity to it. This game was formerly practised in what still retains the name of the Bowling Green, at the lower extremity of Broadway, New York, on which the substantial men of Gotham used to take their pleasure, in the quiet Indian summer afternoons, as described by Geoffrey Crayon, gentleman, with moderate interludes of pipe and tankard.-The modern game of bowling is practised in saloons, on alleys of beautifully fitted carpenter's, or rather, cabinetmaker's work, from 50 to 65 feet in length, and about 4 in width. The alley has a gutter, as it is termed, on each side, and is very slightly convex in the centre, regularly bevelled to the sides. At the further extremity are set up 10 pins, usually of ash wood, about a foot in height, and 2 or 24 lbs. in weight, arranged in the form of a pyramid, with the apex toward the