Beaune (bōn), Florimond, a distinguished mathematician and friend of Descartes, born at Blois 1601, died at the same place 1652. He may be regarded as the originator of the integral calculus.
Beauregard (bō´rė-ga˙rd), Pierre Gustavus Toutant, a general of the Confederate troops in the American Civil War, born in 1818 near New Orleans. He studied at the military academy, West Point, and left it as artillery lieutenant in 1838. He served in the Mexican War, and on the outbreak of the Civil War joined the Confederates. He commanded at the bombardment of Fort Sumter, gained the battle of Bull Run, lost that of Shiloh, assisted in the defence of Charleston, and aided Lee in that of Richmond. He was the author of Principles and Maxims of the Art of War (1863). He died in 1893.
Beausobre (bō-sō-br), Isaac, born in 1659 at Niort, in France, died at Berlin 1738. In 1683 he became Protestant minister of Chatillon-sur-Indre, but was compelled by persecution to go into exile in 1685. In 1694 he became minister to French Protestants at Berlin. He enjoyed much of the favour both of Frederick William I and of the Crown Prince, afterwards Frederick the Great, and died in 1738. His most remarkable work is the Histoire Critique de Manichée et du Manichéisme (1734).
Beauvais (bō-vā; ancient, Bellovacum), a town, France, capital of the department of Oise, at the confluence of the Avelon with the Thérain, 43 miles north of Paris, poorly built, but with some fine edifices, the choir of the uncompleted cathedral being one of the finest specimens of Gothic architecture in France. In 1472 Beauvais resisted an army of 80,000 Burgundians under Charles the Bold. On this occasion the women particularly distinguished themselves, and one of them, Jeanne Lainé, called La Hachette, seeing a soldier planting a standard on the wall, seized it and hurled him to the ground. The banner is preserved in the town hall, and an annual procession of young girls commemorates the deed. Manufactures: tapestry and carpets, trimmings, woollen cloth, cottons, &c. Pop. 20,250.
Beaver, the largest rodent quadruped now existing in the northern hemisphere, about 2 feet in length exclusive of the tail, genus Castor (C. fiber), is now found in considerable numbers only in North America, living in colonies, but occurring solitary in Central Europe and Asia. It has short ears, a blunt nose, small fore-feet, large webbed hind-feet, with a flat ovate tail covered with scales on its upper surface. It is valued for its fur, which used to be largely employed in the manufacture of hats, but for which silk is now for the most part substituted, and for an odoriferous secretion named castor, at one time in high repute, and still largely used in some parts of the world as an antispasmodic medicine. The food of the beaver consists of the bark of trees, leaves, roots, and berries. Their favourite haunts are rivers and lakes which are bordered by forests. In winter they live in houses, which are 3 to 4 feet high, are built on the water's edge, and, being substantial structures with the entrance under water, afford them protection from wolves and other wild animals. These dwellings are called beaver 'lodges', and accommodate a single family. They also live in burrows. They can gnaw through large trees with their strong teeth, this being done partly to obtain food, partly to get materials for houses or dam-building. When they find a stream not sufficiently deep for their purpose, they throw across it a dam constructed with great ingenuity of wood, stones, and mud. Beavers were fairly numerous in Britain in very early times, at least in Scotland and Wales. Their existence has been recorded in Wales till the thirteenth century, and in Scotland to a later date, but they are now extinct in Britain. A colony was some years ago introduced into the Island of Bute, but they died out again.—Bibliography: Harting, British Animals Extinct within Historic Times; E. A. Mills, In Beaver World; A. A. R. Dugmore, The Romance of the Beaver.
Beaver (from Fr. baviére, a child's bib, from bave, saliva), the movable face-guard of a helmet, so fitted on as to be raised and lowered at pleasure.
Beaver Falls, a town of the United States, Pennsylvania, on Beaver River, 30 miles north-west of Pittsburg, in the coal and natural-gas region. Pop. 12,191.
Beaver-rat (Hydromys chrysogaster), a