BELLES-LETTRES (Fr. for “fine literature”), a term used to designate the more artistic and imaginative forms of literature, as poetry or romance, as opposed to more pedestrian and exact studies. The term appears to have been first used in English by Swift (1710).
BELLEVILLE, a city and port of entry of Ontario, Canada, and capital of Hastings county, 106 m. E.N.E. of Toronto, on Bay of Quinté and the Grand Trunk railway. Pop. (1901) 9117. Communication is maintained with Lake Ontario and St Lawrence ports by several lines of steamers. It is the commercial centre of a fine agricultural district, and has a large export trade in cheese and farm produce. The principal industries are planing mills and cement works, cheese factories and distilleries. There are several educational institutions, including a business college, a convent, and a government institute for the deaf and dumb. Albert College, under the control of the Methodist church, was formerly a university, but now confines itself to secondary education.
BELLEVILLE, a city and the county-seat of St Clair county, Illinois, U.S.A., in the S.W. part of the state 14 m. S.E. of St Louis, Missouri. Pop. (1890) 15,361; (1900) 17,484, of whom 2750 were foreign-born; (1910) 21,122. Belleville is served by the Illinois Central, the Louisville & Nashville, and the Southern railways, also by extensive interurban electric systems; and a belt line to O’Fallon, Illinois, connects Belleville with the Baltimore & Ohio South Western railway. A large element of the population is of German descent or German birth, and two newspapers are published in German, besides three dailies, three weeklies and a semi-weekly in English. Among the industrial establishments of the city are stove and range factories, flour mills, rolling mills, distilleries, breweries, shoe factories, copper refining works, nail and tack factories, glass works and agricultural implement factories. The value of the city’s factory products increased from $2,873,334 in 1900 to $4,356,615 in 1905 or 51.6%. Belleville is in a rich agricultural region, and in the vicinity there are valuable coal mines, the first of which was sunk in 1852; from this dates the industrial development of the city. Belleville was first settled in 1813, was incorporated as a city in 1850, and was re-incorporated in 1876.
BELLEY, a town of eastern France, capital of an arrondissement in the department of Ain, 52 m. S.E. of Bourg by the Paris-Lyon railway. Pop. (1906), town, 3709; commune, 5707. It is situated on vine-covered hills at the southern extremity of the Jura, 3 m. from the right bank of the Rhone. Apart from the cathedral of St Jean, which, with the exception of the choir of 1413, is a modern building, there is little of architectural interest in the town. Belley is the seat of a bishopric and a prefect, and has a tribunal of first instance. The manufacture of morocco leather goods and the quarrying of the lithographic stone of the vicinity are carried on, and there is trade in cattle, grain, wine, truffles and dressed pork. Belley is of Roman origin, and in the 5th century became an episcopal see. It was the capital of the province of Bugey, which was a dependency of Savoy till 1601, when it was ceded to France. In 1385 the town was almost entirely destroyed by an act of incendiarism, but was subsequently rebuilt by the dukes of Savoy, who surrounded it with ramparts of which little is left.
BELLI, GIUSEPPE GIOACHINO (1791-1863), Italian poet, was born at Rome, and after a period of literary employment in poor circumstances was enabled by marriage with a lady of means to follow his own special bent. He is remembered for his vivid popular poetry in the Roman dialect, a number of satirical sonnets which in their own way are unique.
See Morandi’s edition, I sonetti romaneschi (1886-1889).