"Catalogue of the Plants in the Medical Garden at Padua;" "Treatises on Fungi," &c.—J. H. B.
BONAVENTURA, Frederigo, an Italian philosopher, born at Ancona in 1555; died in 1602. Author of several essays on the tides, weather, winds, and other physical subjects.—J. G.
BONAVENTURE, Giovanni de Fidenza, Saint, designated by the schoolmen and by his order, the Seraphic Doctor, and by the Greeks styled Eustachius and Eutychius. The name under which he is canonized was given him, according to the monkish chroniclers, from the circumstance that, during an illness which befel him in his infancy, the prayers of Francis of Assisi having been invoked on his behalf, the aged monk exclaimed as he saw the child recover, "O buona ventura" (What good fortune)! He was born at Bagnarea in Tuscany, 1221; entered the order of St. Francis, 1243; studied at Paris, it is said, under the English schoolman, Alexander Hales, famous as the Irrefragable Doctor; and after having taken his doctor's degree, in company with Aquinas, in 1255, was chosen public lecturer on the Sentences. The following year, on the demission of John of Parma from the dignity of general of the Franciscans, Bonaventure succeeded him in that office, and avoiding the error of over-rigour into which his predecessor had fallen, not only restored peace among the brethren of St. Francis, but insinuated some reforms into their establishments, at the same time that his erudition and eloquence were employed in the defence of their privileges. For reasons which, if they do not, as Wikes has said, exhibit advantageously his disinterested character, yet do honour to his prudence, he refused in 1265 a nomination of Clement IV. to the see of York; in 1273 was raised to the bishopric of Albano by Gregory X., of whom it is said, had he been so disposed, he might have taken precedence in claiming the honours of the pontificate; and having been decorated with the Roman purple, was sent as legate to the council of Lyons in 1274. In that city, while the council was still sitting, he died in July, 1274. His relics were preserved by the inhabitants until the sixteenth century, when the Huguenots, indignant at the honours which were paid to them, cast them into the Saone. Sixtus IV. canonized him in 1482, and Sixtus V., by a decree of 1587, assigned him the rank of fifth doctor of the church. To both distinctions he was amply entitled, as the greatest of the Franciscans; as the rival in scholastic reputation of the Dominican Aquinas; as the great apologist of celibacy, transubstantiation, and the worship of the Virgin; and still more, as the author of numerous treatises in practical theology, and of many more of an ascetic character, which, abounding in the freaks of an imagination that resorted to mystical lore with the keenest relish, and to mystical invention with a power over the art almost unequalled, are also characterized by a devotional spirit of so much fervour and pathos, that that was felt to be their ruling feature even by the fathers of the Reformation. His collected works were published at Rome, 1588-1596.—J. S., G.
* BONCOMPAGNI, Baltasare, a descendant of the princes of Piombino, and related to Pope Gregory XIII., born at Rome on the 10th of May, 1821. He was privately instructed by the celebrated poet and writer, Santucci; and so rapidly did he advance in his studies, that he was soon known all through Italy as a literary man of great expectation. His works on various branches of literature and science are very numerous. Boncompagni was elected by the present pope to the important and responsible post of librarian and treasurer to the pontifical academy of I Nuovi Lincei, the acts and transactions of which he published in 1851. His great wealth, which he most liberally distributes in charitable and noble deeds, affords him the means of undertaking costly literary works, which have already ranked him amongst the most eminent literati of the present time.—A. C. M.
BONCUORE, Giovanni Battista, an Italian historical painter, born at Abruzzo in 1645. He became a pupil of Albano, and learned to draw well and spiritedly, though his colour was as heavy as his manner. He upholsteried many of the Roman churches, and ceased to disfigure them in 1699.—W. T.
* BOND, William Cranch, director of the astronomical observatory of Harvard college, Cambridge, Massachusetts, was born at Portland, Maine, 9th September, 1790. He was educated as a watchmaker, and continued in that business for half a century. But he had a taste for the science of astronomy, and established at his residence in Dorsetshire one of the earliest private observatories in America. In 1815 he visited Europe, on a commission from the government of Harvard college, to examine and make plans of the observatories in England, and to collect information respecting the appointment and furniture of an observatory, which it was then intended to erect at Cambridge. He performed this mission successfully, but, owing to the want of funds, nothing more was done towards carrying out the intention for nearly a quarter of a century. In 1838 Mr. Bond was employed by the government of the United States to conduct a series of astronomical and meteorological observations in connection with Wilkes' exploring expedition. The next year the college engaged him to transfer his whole apparatus to Cambridge, where he was appointed astronomical observer. A mansion-house was fitted up temporarily for the location of the instruments, and measures were taken to obtain the funds requisite for establishing a permanent observatory. In this place a "Gauss" magnetometer was mounted, and a complete series of magnetic observations, according to the system recommended by the Royal Society of London, was commenced in March, 1840, and continued for three years. Then a suitable site near the college being obtained, and the requisite funds procured by subscription, the erection of the building was begun, and a contract was made with Merz and Mahler of Munich, to construct a Fraunhofer equatorial telescope, with an object-glass 15 inches in diameter, and having a focal distance of 22 feet 6 inches, equal in quality to that which the same makers had recently constructed for the imperial observatory at Poulkova. This instrument was received and mounted in June, 1847; and its excellence has been attested by the remarkable series of astronomical discoveries which it has enabled Mr. Bond to make, he being aided in most of them by his son, Mr. George P. Bond, who is attached to the establishment as assistant observer. Immediately after it was erected, it was mounted upon the great nebula of Orion, and that designated as 27 Messier, commonly known as the Dumb-bell Nebula, both of which it clearly resolved, though they had hitherto resisted the highest power of the best instruments; and the former especially, even when viewed in Lord Rosse's magnificent six-foot reflector, had afforded only probable evidence of resolvability. Interesting discoveries were also made by this instrument in the great nebula of Andromeda. A record of the other discoveries and improvements which have been made by the Messrs. Bond at this observatory, would furnish a large portion of the history of the progress of astronomical science for the last ten years. Among them may be specially mentioned the results of the observations made upon the planet Saturn, such as "the discovery of the new inner ring; the singular fact of its transparency; the abnormal divisions and shadings of the rings; the demonstration of their fluid nature, and of the conditions of their equilibrium; the investigation of the unexplained phenomena of the shadows projected upon the ring, and of the curious appearances presented at the time of its disappearance; and lastly, the discovery of the eighth satellite." To these must be added the discovery of the satellite of Neptune, and the consequent determination of the mass of that planet. Seventeen new comets have also been observed by the Messrs. Bond, either for the first time, or independently of the observation in Europe. Under their direction, also, photography has been first successfully applied to observations of the sun, moon, and fixed stars. They have also prepared and published a catalogue of nine thousand stars, forming a complete zone of all stars to the eleventh magnitude inclusive, from the equator to forty minutes of north declination; and they have first accurately determined the distances and angles of position of the stars in the cluster in Hercules, in order to decide satisfactorily the question as to relative change of their position. They have also perfected and brought into very general notice and use "the American method" of recording astronomical observations by the aid of the electric current, by means of an apparatus invented by Mr. Bond, consisting of the electric clock and "the spring-governor," to which a council medal was awarded by the British Association for the Advancement of Science. Mr. Bond is a corresponding member of the Institute of France, a foreign associate of the Royal Astronomical Society of London, and a member of many other scientific bodies in Europe and America. He is now in feeble health, but is still able to superintend, with much energy and minuteness, the operations of the observatory, with which his name is so closely connected.—F. B.
BONDE, Gustavus, count of, a learned Swede, was born at Stockholm in 1682, and died in 1764. He was the descendant of a noble family, and was a senator of Sweden, and for a long
