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BRINDLEY RKINKMANN 289 now gained the greatest importance as a com- mercial city, and its excellent harbor, near the narrow extremity of the Adriatic, caused it to be selected for the principal Roman naval station. Hannibal made an unsuccessful at- tempt to capture it. The chief fleets sent out for eastern conquest set sail from its harbor. Sulla landed at Brundusium when he returned in 83 B. 0. from the Mithridatic war, and ac- corded the city many privileges for its kind reception of him. Csesar unsuccessfully en- deavored to blockade Pompey and a part of his fleet in the bay before the city. Brundu- sium was again besieged by Antony hi 40 B. 0., but his reconciliation with Octavius prevent- ed his pushing the siege to its end. Cicero landed here when he returned from exile in 57 B. 0. ; Horace visited the city in company with Maecenas and Oocceius; Virgil died there in 19 B. 0. After the fall of the Roman empire, Castle of Brindisi. Brindisi, after being at different times under the dominion of Goths, Saracens, and Greeks, fell into the hands of the Normans, and under their rule formed an important port of embarka- tion for the crusaders; but it soon lost its commercial prosperity. Louis of Hungary and Louis of Anjou each sacked the town in the 14th century, and in the 15th it was nearly destroyed by an earthquake. Frederick II. began the castle, and Charles V. completed it; but Brindisi even in his time had lost its prom- inence as a point either of attack or defence ; and until the present century it remained an entirely insignificant seaport. BRIN9LEY, James, an English mechanic and engineer, born in Derbyshire in 1716, died at Turnhurst, Sept. 27, 1772. He was appren- ticed to a millwright at the age of 17. After entering upon business he devised in 1752 an improved water engine for draining the coal mines at Clifton. In 1755 he built the ma- chinery for a silk mill at Congleton. His repu- tation recommended him to the duke of Bridge- water, who employed him to construct a canal from his estate at Worsley across the river Ir- well to Manchester; in 1761 he completed this watercourse, the first of the kind in England ; it had no locks, and was in some parts a sub- terraneous tunnel and in others an elevated aqueduct. He revived the idea of canal com- munication across the country by uniting the rivers Mersey and Trent, and tunnelled the Harecastle hill, which had before been deemed an insurmountable obstacle. This tunnel is 2,280 yards in length, and 70 yards below the surface. It was begun in 1766, and finished after Brindley's death by his brother-in-law, Mr. Henshall, in 1777. He superintended the construction of the Coventry and Oxford canals, by means of which, together with the Mersey and Trent canal, he connected the Thames, Humber, Severn, and Mersey. His education was very meagre. It was his custom when perplexed with any extraordinary difficulty to retire to bed, and lie there sometimes for two or three days till his plan was clear. BRINE, the salt water naturally produced in many parts of the world beneath the surface of the earth, which is more or less saturated with chloride of sodium or common salt, and which flows out in springs or is pumped up for the use of the salt manufactories. Brine is also the artificial saline solution used for preserving meats. By a paper communicated to the im- perial academy of medicine of France, it ap- pears that brine thus used acquires poisonous properties in a few months, so that its use with food continued for some time may produce fa- tal effects. The symptoms are first noticed in the effect of the poison upon the nervous sys- tem. Tremblmgs, convulsions, and loss of sen- sation are caused. The secretions of the skin and kidneys are also increased, and violent congestion and inflammation of the intestines ensue. The council of health in Paris, after examining into this subject, recommend that "in all cases brine preserved too long, or in contact with rancid meat, should not be em- ployed, except with the greatest care, and after it has been purified by skimming all the scum which forms on the surface." The salt pickle can be removed from brine by a process termed dialysis, and the juice then has the property of fresh soup. It is proposed in this way to make use of the extract of meat contained in all brines which have not been in contact with rancid meat. BRINKMANN, Karl Gnstaf, a Swedish diplo- matist and poet, born Feb. 24, 1764, died in Stockholm, Jan. 10, 1848. He studied in Ger-