BALA, a market-town and urban district of Merionethshire, N. Wales, at the north end of Bala Lake, 17 m. N.E. of Dolgelley (Dolgellau). Pop. (1901) 1554. It is little more than one wide street. Its manufactures are flannel, stockings, gloves and hosiery (for which it was well known in the 18th century). The Tower of Bala (some 30 ft. high by 50 diameter) is a tumulus or "moat-hill," formerly thought to mark the site of a Roman camp. The theological college of the Calvinistic Methodists and the grammar school (endowed), which was founded in 1712, are the chief features, together with the statue of the Rev. Thomas Charles, the distinguished theological writer, to whom was largely due the foundation of the British and Foreign Bible Society. Bala Lake, the largest in Wales (4 m. long by some 3/4 m. wide), is subject to sudden and dangerous floods, deep and clear, and full of pike, perch, trout, eel and gwyniad. The gwyniad (Caregonus) is peculiar to certain waters, as those of Bala Lake, and is fully described by Thomas Pennant in his Zoology (1776).

The lake (Llyn Tegid) is crossed by the Dee, local tradition having it that the waters of the two never mix, like those of Alpheus and the sea.

BALAAM ([Hebrew: BIL'AM] Bil'am; [Greek: Balaam]; Vg. Balaam; the etymology of the name is uncertain), a prophet in the Bible. Balaam, the son of Beor, was a Gentile seer; he appears in the history of the Israelites during their sojourn in the plains of Moab, east of Jordan, at the close of the Forty Years' wandering, shortly before the death of Moses and the crossing of the Jordan. Israel had conquered two kings of eastern Palestine—Sihon, king of the Amorites, and Og, king of Bashan. Balak, king of Moab, became alarmed, and sent for Balaam to curse Israel; Balaam came after some hesitation, but when he sought to curse Israel Yahweh compelled him to bless them.

The main passage concerning Balaam in Num. xxii-xxv.; it consists of a narrative which serves as a framework for seven oracular poems, the first four being of some length and the last three very brief. The story is doubtless based on ancient traditions, current in various forms; the Old Testament references are not wholly consistent.

The narrative in Num. xxii. ff. is held to be compiled with editorial additions from the two ancient documents (900-700 B.C.) commonly denoted by the symbols J and E The distribution of the material between the two documents is uncertain; but some such scheme as the following is not improbable. The references to portions the origin of which is especially uncertain are placed in brackets ( ).

The present narrative, therefore, is not really a single continuous story, but may be resolved into two older accounts. In combining these two and using them as a framework for the poems, the compilers have altered, added and omitted. Naturally, when both documents made statements which were nearly identical, one might be omitted; so that neither account need be given in full in the composite passage. The two older accounts, [v.03 p.0232] as far as they are given here, may have run somewhat thus: restorations of supposed omissions are given in square brackets [ ].

(i) J. xxii. 3b-5a to "Beor" (5c to "to the land"—7, 11, 17, 18). Balak, king of Moab, alarmed at the Israelite conquests, sends elders of Moab and Midian to Balaam, son of Beor, to the land of Ammon, to induce him to come and curse Israel. He sends back word that he can only do what Yahweh commands.

The land of Ammon. The current Hebrew Text has the land of ammo, i.e. as EV, "his people," but Ammon is read by the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Syriac and Vulgate Versions and some Hebrew MSS., and is accepted by many modern scholars.

xxii. 22-35a to "Balaam," also "Go" and "So Balaam went." Nevertheless Balaam sets out with two servants to go to Balak, but the Angel of Yahweh meets him. At first the Angel is seen only by the ass, which arouses Balaam's anger by its efforts to avoid the Angel. The ass is miraculously enabled to speak to Balaam. Yahweh at last enables Balaam to see the Angel, who tells him that he would have slain him but for the ass. Balaam offers to go back, but is told to go on.

Speaking animals are a common feature of folk-lore; the only other case in the Old Testament is the serpent in Eden. Maimonides suggested that the episode of the Angel and the conversation with the ass is an account of a vision; similar views have been held by E. W. Hengstenberg and other Christian scholars. Others, e.g. Volck in Hauck's Realencyklopadie (s. "Bileam"), regard the statements about the ass speaking as figurative; the ass brayed, and Balaam translated the sound into words. The ordinary literal interpretation is more probable; but it does not follow that the authors of the Pentateuch intended the story to be taken as historical in its details. It need hardly be said that the exact accuracy of such narratives is not an essential part of the Christian faith; no such doctrine is laid down by the creeds and confessions.

xxii. 36, 39, xxiv. 1, 2, 10-14, 25. Balak meets Balaam and they go together [and offer sacrifices]; Balaam, however, blesses Israel by divine inspiration; Balak remonstrates, but Balaam reminds him of his message and again blesses Israel. Then Balaam goes home. (For the relation of the poems to J's narrative, see below.)

(ii.) E. xxii. 2, 3a, 5b "to Pethor, which is by the river," 8-10, 12-16, 19-21, 37a, to "unto me," 38. Balak, king of Moab, alarmed at the conquests of Israel, sends the princes of Moab to Balaam at Pethor on the Euphrates, that he may come and curse Israel.

A. Jeremias, Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten Orients, p. 278, adopts Marquart's view that the "River" (nahar) is the so-called "River" (better "Ravine" nahal) of Egypt or Musri, on the southern frontier of Judea. So too Winckler, in the new edition of E. Schrader's Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament. It has been usual to keep nahar and take it in its ordinary sense when used absolutely, i.e. the Euphrates, and to identify Pethor with a Pitru on a tributary of the Euphrates, mentioned in an inscription of Shalmaneser II. Deut. xxiii. 4 places Pethor in Mesopotamia.

God appears to him in a dream and forbids him to go. The princes return and report to Balak, who sends them back to put further pressure on Balaam. God in another dream permits him to go, on condition that he speaks what God tells him. He goes with the princes of Moab. Balak meets them, and Balaam warns him that he can only speak what God tells him.

xxii. 40, 41, xxiii. 1-6, 11-17. Balak offers sacrifices, but Yahweh inspires Balaam with a blessing on Israel. Balak remonstrates and Balaam explains. They try to get a more favourable result by sacrificing on a different spot, and by placing Balaam on the top of Pisgah to view Israel, but he is again compelled to bless Israel. After further remonstrances and explanations [Balaam goes home]. (For the relation of the poems to E's narrative, see below.)

Deut. xxiii. 3-6[1] summarizes E's account of this incident, adding, however, the feature that the Ammonites were associated with the Moabites, possibly an imperfect reminiscence of the reference to Ammon in J. Joshua, in his farewell speech to the Israelites,[2] also refers to this episode. The Priestly Code[3] has a different story of Balaam, in which he advises the Midianites how they may bring disaster on Israel by seducing the people from their loyalty to Yahweh. Later on he is slain in battle, fighting in the ranks of Midian.

It is often supposed that the name of the king of Edom,[4] Bela, son of Beor, is a corruption of Balaam, and that, therefore, one form of the tradition made him a king of Edom.

The Poems fall into two groups: the first four, in xxiii. 1.-xxiv. 19, are commonly regarded as ancient lyrics of the early monarchy, perhaps in the time of David or Solomon, which J and E inserted in their narrative. Some recent critics,[5] however, are inclined to place them in the post-exilic period, in which case a late editor has substituted them for earlier, probably less edifying, oracles. But the features which are held to indicate late date may be due to editorial revision.

The first two are found in an E setting, and therefore, if ancient, formed part of E.

The First, xxiii. 7-10, prophesies the unique exaltation of Israel, and its countless numbers.

The Second, xxiii. 18-24, celebrates the moral virtue of Israel, the monarchy and its conquests.

Again the second couple are connected with J.

The Third, xxiv. 3-9, also celebrates the glory and conquests of the monarchy.

Agag, in verse 7, can hardly be the Amalekite king of 1 Sam. xv.; Amalek was too small and obscure. The Septuagint and other Greek Versions and Sam. Pent, have Gog, which would imply a post-exilic date, cf. Ezek. xxxix. Probably both Agag and Gog are textual corruptions. Og has been suggested, but does not seem a great improvement.

The Fourth, xxiv. 14-19, announces the coming of a king, possibly David, who shall conquer Edom and Moab.

The remaining poems are usually regarded as later additions; thus the Oxford Hexateuch on Num. xxiv. 20-24. "The three concluding oracles seem irrelevant here, being concerned neither with Israel nor Moab. It has been thought that they were added to bring the cycle up to seven."

The Fifth, xxiv. 20, deals with the ruin of Amalek. It is of uncertain date; if the historical Amalek is meant, it may be early; but Amalek may be symbolical.

The Sixth, xxiv. 21 f., deals with the destruction of the Kenite state by Assyria; also of uncertain date, Assyria being, according to some, the ancient realm of Nineveh, according to others the Seleucid kingdom of Syria, which was also called Assyria.

The Seventh, xxiv. 23 f., speaks of the coming of ships from the West, to attack Assur and "Eber"; it may refer to the conquest of Persia by Alexander the Great. An interesting, but doubtful, emendation makes this poem describe the ruin of Shamal, a state in N. W. Syria.

In the New Testament Balaam is cited as a type of avarice;[6] in Rev. ii. 14 we read of false teachers at Pergamum who held the "teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to cast a stumbling-block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit fornication."

Balaam has attracted much interest, alike from Jews, Christians and Mahommedans. Josephus[7] paraphrases the story more suo, and speaks of Balaam as the best prophet of his time, but with a disposition ill adapted to resist temptation. Philo describes him in the Life of Moses as a great magician; elsewhere[8] he speaks of "the sophist Balaam, being," i.e. symbolizing, "a vain crowd of contrary and warring opinions"; and again[9] as "a vain people"; both phrases being based on a mistaken etymology of the name Balaam. The later Targums and the Talmuds represent him as a typical sinner; and there are the usual worthless Rabbinical fables, e.g. that he was blind of one eye; that he was the Elihu of Job; that, as one of Pharaoh's counsellors, he was governor of a city of Ethiopia, and rebelled against Pharaoh; Moses was sent against him by Pharaoh at the head of an army, and stormed the city and put Balaam to flight, &c. &c.

[v.03 p.0233] Curiously enough, the Rabbinical (Yalkut) identification of Balaam with Laban, Jacob's father-in-law, has been revived from a very different standpoint, by a modern critic.[10] The Mahommedans, also, have various fables concerning Balaam. He was one of the Anakim, or giants of Palestine; he read the books of Abraham, where he got the name Yahweh, by virtue of which he predicted the future, and got from God whatever he asked. It has been conjectured that the Arabic wise man, commonly called Luqman (q.v.), is identical with Balaam. The names of their fathers are alike, and "Luqman" means devourer, swallower, a meaning which might be got out of Balaam by a popular etymology.

If we might accept the various theories mentioned above, Balaam would appear in one source of J as an Edomite, in another as an Ammonite; in E as a native of the south of Judah or possibly as an Aramaean; in the tradition followed by the Priestly Code probably as a Midianite. All these peoples either belong to the Hebrew stock or are closely connected with it. We may conclude that Balaam was an ancient figure of traditions originally common to all the Hebrews and their allies, and afterwards appropriated by individual tribes; much as there are various St Georges.

The chief significance of the Balaam narratives for the history of the religion of Israel is the recognition by J and E of the genuine inspiration of a non-Hebrew prophet. Yahweh is as much the God of Balaam as he is of Moses. Probably the original tradition goes back to a time when Yahweh was recognized as a deity of a circle of connected tribes of which the Israelite tribes formed a part. But the retention of the story without modification may imply a continuous recognition through some centuries of the idea that Yahweh revealed his will to nations other than Israel.

Apparently the Priestly Code ignored this feature of the story.

Taking the narratives as we now have them, Balaam is a companion figure to Jonah, the prophet who wanted to go where he was not sent, over against the prophet who ran away from the mission to which he was called.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.—Ewald, Geschichte des Volkes Israel^3, Bd. ii. p. 298; Hengstenberg's Die Geschichte Bileams und seine Weissagungen (1842); the commentaries on the scriptural passages, especially G. B. Gray on Numbers xxii.-xxiv.; and the articles on "Balaam" (Bileam) in Hamburger's Realencyclopaedie fuer Bibel und Talmud, Hastings' Bible Dict., Black and Cheyne's Encyclopaedia Biblica, Herozog-Hauck's Realencyklopadie. For the analysis into earlier documents, see also the Oxford Hexateuch, Estlin Carpenter and Harford-Battersby.

(W. H. BE.)

[1] Quoted Neh. xiii. 1 f.

[2] Josh. xxiv. 9, 10. E; cf. Micah vi. 5.

[3] Num. xxxi. 8 (quoted Josh. xiii. 22), 16. These references are not necessarily inconsistent with JE; but they are probably based on an independent tradition. The date of the Priestly Code is ca. 400 B.C.

[4] Gen. xxxvi. 32.

[5] For names and reasons, see Gray, Numbers, 314.

[6] 2 Peter ii. 16, 17 (also refer to the ass speaking), Jude xi.

[7] Ant. iv. 6.

[8] Quod. Det. Potiori, s. 20.

[9] De Cherub., s. 10.

[10] T. Steuernagel, Einwanderung der israelitischen Staemme (1901).

BALĀDHURĪ (ABŪ-L-'ABBĀS AHMAD IBN YAHYĀ IBN JĀBIR AL-BALĀDHURĪ), Arabian historian, was a Persian by birth, though his sympathies seem to have been strongly with the Arabs, for Mas'ūdī refers to one of his works in which he refuted the Shu'ūbites (see ABU 'UBAIDA). He lived at the court of the caliphs al-Mutawakkil and al-Musta'īn and was tutor to the son of al-Mu'tazz. He died in 892 as the result of a drug called balādhur (hence his name). The work by which he is best known is the Futūh ul-Buldān (Conquests of Lands), edited by M. J. de Goeje as Liber expugnationis regionum (Leiden, 1870; Cairo, 1901). This work is a digest of a larger one, which is now lost. It contains an account of the early conquests of Mahomet and the early caliphs. Balādhurī is said to have spared no trouble in collecting traditions, and to have visited various parts of north Syria and Mesopotamia for this purpose. Another great historical work of his was the Ansāb ul-Ashrāf (Genealogies of the Nobles), of which he is said to have written forty parts when he died. Of this work the eleventh book has been published by W. Ahlwardt (Greifswald, 1883), and another part is known in manuscript (see Journal of the German Oriental Society, vol. xxxviii. pp. 382-406). He also made some translations from Persian into Arabic.

(G. W. T.)

BALAGHAT (i.e. "above the ghats or passes," the highlands), a district of British India in the Nagpur division of the Central Provinces. The administrative headquarters are at the town of Burha. The district contains an area of 3132 sq. m. It forms the eastern portion of the central plateau which divides the province from east to west. These highlands, formerly known as the Raigarh Bichhia tract, remained desolate and neglected until 1866, when the district of Balaghat was formed, and the country opened to the industrious and enterprising peasantry of the Wainganga valley. Geographically the district is divided into three distinct parts:—(1) The southern lowlands, a slightly undulating plain, comparatively well cultivated and drained by the Wainganga, Bagh, Deo, Ghisri and Son rivers. (2) The long narrow valley known as the Mau Taluka, lying between the hills and the Wainganga river, and comprising a long, narrow, irregular-shaped lowland tract, intersected by hill ranges and peaks covered with dense jungle, and running generally from north to south. (3) The lofty plateau, in which is situated the Raigarh Bichhia tract, comprising irregular ranges of hills, broken into numerous valleys, and generally running from east to west. The highest points in the hills of the district are as follows:—Peaks above Lanji, 2300 or 2500 feet; Tepagarh hill, about 2600 ft.; and Bhainsaghat range, about 3000 ft. above the sea. The principal rivers in the district are the Wainganga, and its tributaries, the Bagh, Nahra and Uskal; a few smaller streams, such as the Masmar, the Mahkara, &c.; and the Banjar, Halon and Jamunia, tributaries of the Nerbudda, which drain a portion of the upper plateau. In the middle of the 19th century the upper part of the district was an impenetrable waste. About that time one Lachhman Naik established the first villages on the Paraswara plateau. But a handsome Buddhist temple of cut stone, belonging to some remote period, is suggestive of a civilization which had disappeared before historic times. The population in 1901 was 326,521, showing a decrease of 15% in the decade, due to the effects of famine. A large part of the area is still covered with forest, the most valuable timber-tree being sal. There are few good roads. The Gondia-Jubbulpore line of the Bengal-Nagpur railway traverses the Wainganga valley in the west of the district. The district suffered very severely from the famine of 1896-1897. It suffered again in 1900, when in April the number of persons relieved rose above 100,000.

BALAGUER, VICTOR (1824-1901), Spanish politician and author, was born at Barcelona on the 11th of December 1824, and was educated at the university of his native town. His precocity was remarkable; his first dramatic essay, Pepin el jorobado, was placed on the Barcelona stage when he was fourteen years of age, and at nineteen he was publicly "crowned" after the production of his second play, Don Enrique el Dadivoso. From 1843 to 1868 he was the chief of the Liberal party in Barcelona, and as proprietor and editor of El Conseller did much to promote the growth of local patriotism in Catalonia. But it was not till 1857 that he wrote his first poem in Catalan—a copy of verses to the Virgin of Montserrat. Henceforward he frequently adopted the pseudonym of "lo Trovador de Montserrat"; in 1859 he helped to restore the "Juegos Florales," and in 1861 was proclaimed mestre de gay saber. He was removed to Madrid, took a prominent part in political life, and in 1867 emigrated to Provence. On the expulsion of Queen Isabella, he returned to Spain, represented Manresa in the Cortes, and in 1871-1872 was successively minister of the colonies and of finance. He resigned office at the restoration, but finally followed his party in rallying to the dynasty; he was appointed vice-president of congress, and was subsequently a senator. He died at Madrid on the 14th of January 1901. Long before his death he had become alienated from the advanced school of Catalan nationalists, and endeavoured to explain away the severe criticism of Castile in which his Historia de Cataluna y de la Corona de Aragon (1860-1863) abounds. This work, like his Historia politica y literaria de los trovadores (1878-1879), is inaccurate, partial and unscientific; but both books are attractively written and have done great service to the cause which Balaguer once upheld. As a poet he is imitative: reminiscences of Quintana are noticeable in his patriotic songs, of Zorrilla in his historical ballads, of Byron in his lyrical poems. He wrote too hastily to satisfy artistic canons; but if he has the faults he has also the merits of a pioneer, and in Catalonia his name will endure.

[v.03 p.0234] BALAKIREV, MILI ALEXEIVICH (1836- ), Russian musical composer, was born at Nijni-Novgorod on the 31st of December 1836. He had the advantage as a boy of living with Oulibichev, author of a Life of Mozart, who had a private band, and from whom Balakirev obtained a valuable education in music. At eighteen, after a university course in mathematics, he went to St Petersburg, full of national ardour, and there made the acquaintance of Glinka. Round him gathered Cesar Cui (b. 1835), and others, and in 1862 the Free School of Music was established, by which, and by Balakirev's personal zeal, the modern school of Russian music was largely stimulated. In 1869 Balakirev was appointed director of the imperial chapel and conductor of the Imperial Musical Society. His influence as a conductor, and as an organizer of Russian music, give him the place of a founder of a new movement, apart even from his own compositions, which though few in number are remarkable in themselves. His works consist largely of songs and collections of folk-songs, but include a symphony (first played in England in 1901), two symphonic poems ("Russia" and "Tamara"), and four overtures, besides pianoforte pieces. His orchestral works are of the "programme-music" order, but all are brilliant examples of the highly coloured, elaborate style characteristic of modern Russian composers, and developed by Balakirev's disciples, such as Borodin and Rimsky-Korsakov.

BALAKLAVA, a village in the Crimea, east of Sevastopol, famous for a battle in the Crimean War. The action of Balaklava (October 25th, 1854) was brought about by the advance of a Russian field army under General Liprandi to attack the allied English, French and Turkish forces besieging Sevastopol. The ground on which the engagement took place was the Vorontsov ridge (see CRIMEAN WAR), and the valleys on either side of it. Liprandi's corps formed near Traktir Bridge, and early on the 25th of October its advanced guard moved southward to attack the ridge, which was weakly occupied by Turkish battalions behind slight entrenchments. The two nearest British divisions were put into motion as soon as the firing became serious, but were prevented by their orders from descending at once into the plain, and the Turks had to meet the assault of greatly superior numbers. They made a gallant resistance, but the Russians quickly cleared the ridge, capturing several guns, and their first line was followed by a heavy mass of cavalry which crossed the ridge and descended into the Balaklava plain. At this moment the British cavalry division under the earl of Lucan was in the plain, but their commander was prevented from engaging the Russians by the tenor of his orders. One of his brigades, the Heavy (4th and 5th Dragoon Guards, 1st, 2nd and 6th Dragoons) under Brigadier-General J. Y. Scarlett, was in the Balaklava plain; the other, the Light Brigade under Lord Cardigan (4th and 13th Light Dragoons now Hussars, 8th and 11th Hussars and 17th Lancers) in the valley to the north of the Vorontsov ridge. All these regiments were very weak in numbers. The Russian cavalry mass, after crossing the ridge, moved towards Balaklava; a few shots were fired into it by a Turkish battery and a moment later the Heavy Brigade charged. The attack was impeded at first by obstacles of ground, but in the melee the weight of the British troopers gradually broke up the enemy, and the charge of the 4th Dragoon Guards, delivered against the flank of the Russian mass, was decisive. The whole of the Russian cavalry broke and fled to the ridge. This famous charge occupied less than five minutes from first to last, and at the same time some of the Russian squadrons, attempting to charge the 93rd Highlanders (who were near Balaklava) were met by the steady volleys of the "thin red line," and fled with the rest. The defeated troops retreated past the still inactive Light Brigade, on whose left a French cavalry brigade was now posted. The Russians were at this juncture reinforced by a mixed force on the Fedukhine heights; Liprandi's infantry occupied the captured ridge, and manned the guns taken from the Turks. The cavalry defeated by the Heavy Brigade was re-formed in the northern valley behind the field guns, and infantry, cavalry and artillery were on both the Fedukhine and the Vorontsov heights. Thus, in front of the Light Brigade was a valley over a mile long, at the end of which was the enemy's cavalry and twelve guns, and on the ridges on either side there were in all twenty-two guns, with cavalry and infantry. It was under these circumstances that an order was given by the British headquarters, which led to the charge for which above all Balaklava is remembered. It was carried to Lord Lucan by Captain L. E. Nolan, 15th Hussars, and ran as follows:—"Lord Raglan wishes the cavalry to advance rapidly to the front and try to prevent the enemy carrying away the guns ... French cavalry is on your left." Lucan, seeing no attempt on the part of the enemy to move guns, questioned Nolan, who is said to have pointed down the valley to the artillery on the plain; whereupon Lucan rode to Lord Cardigan, the commander of the Light Brigade, and repeated Lord Raglan's order and Nolan's explanation. The Light Brigade then advanced straight to its front, and soon came under fire from the guns on both flanks. Nolan was killed as he rode across the front of the brigade, perhaps with the intention of changing its direction to the Vorontsov ridge. Five minutes later the guns in front began to fire with telling effect. The pace was increased, though the "charge" was not sounded, and Cardigan and those of his men who remained mounted, rode up to and through the Russian line of guns. Small parties even charged the Russian cavalry in rear and on either flank. The French 4th Chasseurs d' Afrique made a dashing charge which drove the Russians off the Fedukhine heights, though at considerable loss. Lucan had meanwhile called up the Heavy Brigade to support the Light, but it lost many men and horses and was quickly withdrawn. Only two formed bodies of the Light Brigade found their way back. The 13th Light Dragoons mustered but ten mounted men at the evening parade; the brigade as a whole had lost 247 men and 497 horses out of a total strength of 673 engaged in the charge, which lasted twenty minutes from first to last. The two infantry divisions which now approached the field were again halted, and Liprandi was left undisturbed on the Vorontsov ridge and in possession of the captured guns. The result of the day was thus unfavourable to the allies, but the three chief incidents of the engagement—the two cavalry charges and the fight of the 93rd Highlanders—gave to it all the prestige of a victory. The impression created by the conduct of the Light Brigade was forcibly expressed in Tennyson's well-known ballad, and in spite of the equally celebrated remark of the French general Bosquet, C'est magnifique mais ce n'est pas la guerre, it may be questioned whether the moral effect of the charge did not outweigh the very serious loss in trained men and horses involved.

BALALAIKA, a stringed instrument said to have retained its primitive form unchanged, very popular in Russia among the peasants, more especially in Ukraine. The instrument has a triangular soundboard to which is glued a vaulted back, forming a body having a triangular base, enabling it to stand upright. To the body is added a fretted neck strung with two, three or four strings, generally so tuned as to produce a minor chord when sounded together. The strings are generally plucked with the fingers, but the peasants obtain charming "glissando" effects by sweeping the strings lightly one after the other with the fingers or side of the hand. The Balalaika is common to the Slav races, who use it to accompany their folk-songs and dances. It is also to be seen in the hands of gipsies at rural festivities and fairs.

BALANCE (derived through the Fr. from the Late Lat. bilantia, an apparatus for weighing, from bi, two, and lanx, a dish or scale), a term originally used for the ordinary beam balance or weighing machine with two scale pans, but extended to include (with or without adjectival qualification) other apparatus for measuring and comparing weights and forces. In addition to beam and spring balances (see WEIGHING MACHINES), apparatus termed "torsion balances," in which forces are measured or compared by their twisting moment on a wire, are used, especially in gravitational, electrostatic and magnetic experiments (see GRAVITATION and ELECTROMETER). The term also connotes the idea of equality or equalization; e.g. in the following expressions: "balance," in bookkeeping, the amount which equalizes the debit and credit accounts; "balance wheel," [v.03 p.0235] in horology, a device for equalizing the relaxing of a watch or clock spring (see CLOCK); the "balancing of engines," the art of minimizing the total vibrations of engines when running, and consisting generally in the introduction of masses which induce vibrations opposed to the vibrations of the essential parts of the engine.

BALANCE OF POWER, a phrase in international law for such a "just equilibrium" between the members of the family of nations as should prevent any one of them from becoming sufficiently strong to enforce its will upon the rest. The principle involved in this, as Hume pointed out in his Essay on the Balance of Power, is as old as history, and was perfectly familiar to the ancients both as political theorists and as practical statesmen. In its essence it is no more than a precept of commonsense born of experience and the instinct of self-preservation; for, as Polybius very clearly puts it (lib. i. cap. 83): "Nor is such a principle to be despised, nor should so great a power be allowed to any one as to make it impossible for you afterwards to dispute with him on equal terms concerning your manifest rights." It was not, however, till the beginning of the 17th century, when the science of international law took shape at the hands of Grotius and his successors, that the theory of the balance of power was formulated as a fundamental principle of diplomacy. According to this the European states formed a sort of federal community, the fundamental condition of which was the preservation of the balance of power, i.e. such a disposition of things that no one state or potentate should be able absolutely to predominate and prescribe laws to the rest; and, since all were equally interested in this settlement, it was held to be the interest, the right and the duty of every power to interfere, even by force of arms, when any of the conditions of this settlement were infringed or assailed by any other member of the community.[1] This principle, once formulated, became an axiom of political science. It was impressed as such by Fenelon, in his Instructions, on the young duke of Burgundy; it was proclaimed to the world by Frederick the Great in his Anti-Machiavel; it was re-stated with admirable clearness in 1806 by Friedrich von Gentz in his Fragments on the Balance of Power. It formed the basis of the coalitions against Louis XIV. and Napoleon, and the occasion, or the excuse, for most of the wars which desolated Europe between the congress of Muenster in 1648 and that of Vienna in 1814. During the greater part of the 19th century it was obscured by the series of national upheavals which have remodelled the map of Europe; yet it underlay all the efforts of diplomacy to stay or to direct the elemental forces let loose by the Revolution, and with the restoration of comparative calm it has once more emerged as the motive for the various political alliances of which the ostensible object is the preservation of peace (see EUROPE: History).

An equilibrium between the various powers which form the family of nations is, in fact,—as Professor L. Oppenheim (Internat. Law, i. 73) justly points out—essential to the very existence of any international law. In the absence of any central authority, the only sanction behind the code of rules established by custom or defined in treaties, known as "international law," is the capacity of the powers to hold each other in check. Were this to fail, nothing could prevent any state sufficiently powerful from ignoring the law and acting solely according to its convenience and its interests.

See, besides the works quoted in the article, the standard books on International Law (q.v.).

(W. A. P.)

[1] Emerich de Vattel, Le Droit des gens (Leiden, 1758).

BALANCE OF TRADE, a term in economics belonging originally to the period when the "mercantile theory" prevailed, but still in use, though not quite perhaps in the same way as at its origin. The "balance of trade" was then identified with the sum of the precious metals which a country received in the course of its trading with other countries or with particular countries. There was no doubt an idea that somehow or other the amount of the precious metals received represented profit on the trading, and each country desired as much profit as possible. Princes and sovereigns, however, with political aims in view, were not close students of mercantile profits, and would probably have urged the acquisition of the precious metals as an object of trade even if they had realized that the country as a whole was exporting "money's worth" in order to buy the precious metals which were desired for political objects. The "mercantile theory" was exploded by Adam Smith's demonstration that gold and silver were only commodities like others with no special virtue in them, and that they would come into a country when there was a demand for them, according to the amount, in proportion to other demands, which the country could afford to pay; but the ideas in which the theory itself has originated have not died out, and the idea especially of a "balance of trade" to which the rulers of a country should give attention is to be found in popular discussions of business topics and in politics, the general notion being that a nation is prosperous when its statistics show a "trade balance" in its favour and unprosperous when the reverse is shown. In modern times the excess of imports over exports or of exports over imports, shown in the statistics of foreign trade, has also come to be identified in popular speech with the "balance of trade," and many minds are no doubt imbued with the ideas (1) that an excess of imports over exports is bad, and (2) an excess of exports over imports is the reverse, because the former indicates an "unfavourable" and the latter a "favourable" trade balance. In the former case it is urged that a nation so circumstanced is living on its capital. Exact remedies are not suggested, although the idea of preventing or hampering foreign imports as a means of developing home trade and of thus altering the supposed disastrous trade balance is obviously the logical inference from the arguments. A consideration of these ideas and of recent discussions about imports and exports, appears accordingly to be needed, although the "mercantile theory" is itself exploded.

The phrase "balance of trade," then, appears to be an application of a trader's language in his own business to the larger affairs of nations or rather of the aggregate of individuals in a nation engaged in foreign trade. A trader in his own books sets his sales against his purchases, and the amount by which the former exceed the latter is his trade balance or profit. What is true of the individual, it is assumed, must be true of a nation or of the aggregate of individual traders in a nation engaged in the foreign trade. If their collective sales amount to more than their collective purchases the trade balance will be in their favour, and they will have money to receive. Contrariwise, if their purchases amount to more than their sales, they will have to pay money, and they will presumably be living on their capital. The argument fails, however, in many ways. Even as regards the experience of the individual trader, it is to be observed that he may or may not receive his profit, if any, in money. As a rule he does not do so. As the profit accrues he may invest it either by employing labour to add to his machinery or warehouses, or by increasing his stock-in-trade, or by adding to his book debts, or by a purchase of stocks or shares outside his regular business. At the end of a given period he may or may not have an increased cash balance to show as the result of his profitable trading. Even if he has an increased cash balance, according to the modern system of business, this might be a balance at his bankers', and they in turn may have invested the amount so that there is no stock of the precious metals, of "hard money," anywhere to represent it. And the argument fails still further when applied to the transactions between nations, or rather, to use the phrase already employed, between the aggregate of individuals in nations engaged in the foreign trade. It is quite clear that if a nation, or the individuals of a nation, do make profit in their foreign trading, the amount may be invested as it accrues—in machinery, or warehouses, or stock-in-trade, or book debts, or stocks and shares purchased abroad, so that there may be no corresponding "balance of trade" to bring home. There is no doubt also that what may be is in reality what largely happens. A prosperous foreign trade carried on by any country implies a continuous investment by that country either abroad or at home, and there may or may not be a balance receivable in actual gold and silver.

[v.03 p.0236] In another particular the argument also fails. In the aggregate of individual trading with various countries, there may sometimes be purchases and sales as far as the individuals are concerned, but not purchases and sales as between the nations. For example, goods are exported from the United Kingdom, ammunition and stores and ships, which appear in the British returns as exports, and which have really been sold by individual British traders to individuals abroad; but these sales are not set off by any purchases on the other side which come into the international account, as the set-off is a loan by the people of one country to the people or government of another. The same with the export of railway and other material when goods are exported for the purpose of constructing railways or other works abroad. The sales are made by individuals in the United Kingdom to individuals abroad; but there is no set-off of purchases on the other side. Mutatis mutandis the same explanation applies to the remittance of goods by one country to another, or by individuals in one country to individuals in another to pay the interest or repay the capital of loans which have been received in former times. These are all cases of the movement of goods irrespective of international sales and purchases, though the movements themselves appear in the international records of imports and exports, and therefore it seems to be assumed, though without any warrant, in the international records of the balance of trade. There is yet another failure in the comparison. The individual trader would include in his sales and purchases services such as repairs performed by him for others, and similar services which others do for himself; but no similar accounts are kept of the corresponding portions of international trade such as the earning of freights and commissions, although in strictness, it is obvious, they belong as much to international trade as the imports and exports themselves, which cannot therefore show a complete "balance of trade."

The illusions which may result then from the confusion of ideas between a balance of trade or profit, and a balance of cash paid or received, and from the identification of an excess of imports over exports or of exports over imports with the balance of trade itself, though they are not the same things, hardly need description. The believers in such illusions are not entitled to any hearing as economists, however, much they may be accepted in the market-place or among politicians.

The "balance of trade" and "the excess of imports over exports" are thus simply pitfalls for the amateur and the unwary. On the statistical side, moreover, there is a good deal more to be urged in order to impress the student with care and attention. The records of imports and exports themselves may vary from the actual facts of international purchases and sales. The actual values of the goods imported and paid for by the nation may vary from the published returns of imports, which are, by the necessity of the case, only estimated values. And so with the exports. The actual purchases and sales may be something very different. A so-called sale may prove abortive through its not being paid for at all, the debtor failing altogether. In any case the purchases of a year may not be paid for by the sales of the year, and the "squaring" of the account may take a long time. Still more the estimates of value may be so taken as not to give even an approximately correct account as far as the records go. Thus in the plan followed in the United Kingdom imports are valued as at the port where they arrive and exports at the port where they are despatched from—a plan which so far places them on an equal footing for the purpose of striking a balance of trade. But in the import and export records of the United States a different plan is followed. The imports are no longer valued as at the port of arrival with the freight and other charges included, but as at the port of shipment. The results on the balance of trade drawn out must accordingly be quite different in the two cases. With other countries similar differences arise. To deduce then from records of imports and exports any conclusions as to the excess of imports or exports at different times is a work of enormous statistical difficulty. Excellent illustrations will be found in J. Holt Schooling's British Trade Book (1908).

The country which presents the most interesting questions in connexion with the study is the United Kingdom, with its largely preponderating foreign trade. Its annual imports and exports, excluding bullion, exceed 800 millions sterling, and the bullion one year with another is 100 millions more. Its excess of imports, moreover, between the middle and end of the 19th century gradually rose from a small figure to 180 millions sterling annually, and occasioned the popular discussion referred to respecting an "adverse" balance of trade, and particularly the belief existing in many quarters that the nation is living on its capital. The result has been a new investigation of the subject, so as to bring out and present the credits to which the country is entitled in its trade as a shipowner and commission merchant, and to exhibit at the same time the magnitude of British foreign investments, which cannot be less than 2000 millions sterling and must bring in an enormous annual income. Other countries such as France, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Norway and Sweden, are in the same condition, though their foreign trade is not on the same scale, and similar rules apply to the reading of their import and export accounts. The United States is a conspicuous instance of a country which in the first decade of the 20th century was still in the position of a borrower and had a large excess of exports, though there were signs of a change in the opposite direction. New countries generally, such as Canada, Australia and the South American countries, resemble the United States. Comparisons are made difficult by the want of uniformity in the methods of stating the figures, but that different countries have to be grouped according as they are indebted or creditor countries is undeniable, and no study of the trade statistics is possible without recognition of the underlying economic circumstances.

In conclusion it may be useful to repeat the main propositions laid down as to the balance of trade, (1) A "balance of trade" to the individual trader, from whose experience the phrase comes, is not necessarily, as is supposed, a balance received or receivable in the precious metals. It may be invested as it accrues—in machinery, or warehouses, or stock-in-trade, or in book debts, or in stocks and shares or other property outside the trader's business, as well as in cash. (2) What is true of the individual trader is also true of the aggregate of individuals engaged in the foreign trade of a country. Cash is only one of the forms in which they may elect to be paid. (3) The imports and exports recorded in the statistical returns of a country do not correspond with the purchases and sales of individual traders, as the sales especially may be set off by loans, while the so-called imports may include remittances of interest and of capital repaid. (4) When capital is repaid the country receiving it need not be living on it, but may be investing it at home. (5) The foreign trading of countries may also comprise many transactions, such as the earning of freights and commissions, which ought to appear in a proper account showing a balance of trade, as similar transactions appear in an individual trader's account, but which are not treated as imports or exports in the statistical returns of a nation's foreign trade. (6) Import and export returns themselves are not the same as accounts of purchases and sales; the values are only estimates, and must not be relied on literally without study of the actual facts. (7) Import and export returns in different countries are not in all cases taken at the same point, there being important variations, for instance, in this respect between the returns of two great countries, the United Kingdom and the United States, which are often compared, but are really most difficult to compare. (8) The United Kingdom is a conspicuous instance of a country which has a great excess of imports over exports in consequence of its large lending abroad in former times; while its accounts are specially affected by the magnitude of its services as a trading nation carrying passengers and goods all over the world, which do not result, however, in so-called "exports." The United States, on the other hand, is a conspicuous instance of an indebted nation, which has or had until lately few or no sums to its credit in foreign trade except the visible exports. (9) The various countries of the world naturally fall into groups. The nations of western Europe, such as France, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Sweden and Norway, fall into a [v.03 p.0237] group with Great Britain as creditor nations, while Canada, Australasia and the South American countries fall into a group with the United States as undeveloped and indebted countries, So also of other countries, each belongs naturally to one group or another. (10) The excess of imports or exports may vary indefinitely at different times according as a creditor country is receiving or lending at the time, or according as a debtor country is borrowing or paying off its debts at the time, but the permanent characteristics are always to be considered.

(R. GN.)



BALANOGLOSSUS, the general name given to certain peculiar, opaque, worm-like animals which live an obscure life under stones, and burrow in the sand from between tide-marks down to the abyssal regions of the sea. Their colour is usually some tone of yellow with dashes of red, brown and green, and they frequently emit a pungent odour. The name has reference to the tongue-shaped muscular proboscis by which the animal works its way through the sand. The proboscis is not the only organ of locomotion, being assisted by the succeeding segment of the body, the buccal segment or collar. By the waves of contraction executed by the proboscis accompanied by inflation of the collar, progression is effected, sometimes with marvellous rapidity. The third body region or trunk may attain a great length, one or two feet, or even more, and is also muscular, but the truncal muscles are of subordinate importance in locomotion, serving principally to promote the peristaltic contractions of the body by which the food is carried through the gut. The function of alimentation is closely associated with that of locomotion, somewhat as in the burrowing earthworm; in the excavation of its burrows the sand is passed through the body, and any nutrient matter that may adhere to it is extracted during its passage through the intestine, the exhausted sand being finally ejected through the vent at the orifice of the burrow and appearing at low tide as a worm casting. In accordance with this manner of feeding, the mouth is kept permanently open and prevented from collapsing by a pair of skeletal cornua belonging to a sustentacular apparatus (the nuchal skeleton), the body of which lies within the narrow neck of the proboscis; the latter is inserted into the collar and surrounded by the anterior free flap of this segment of the body.

When first discovered by J. F. Eschscholtz at the Marshall Islands in 1825, Balanoglossus was described as a worm-like animal belonging to the Echinoderm order of Holothurians or sea-cucumbers. In 1865 Kowalevsky discovered that the organs of respiration consist of numerous pairs of gill-slits leading from the digestive canal through the thickness of the body-wall to the exterior. On this account the animal was subsequently placed by Gegenbaur in a special class of Vermes, the Enteropneusta. In 1883-1886 Bateson showed by his embryological researches that the Enteropneusta exhibit chordate (vertebrate) affinities in respect of the coelomic, skeletal and nervous systems as well as in regard to the respiratory system, and, further, that the gill-slits are formed upon a plan similar to that of the gill-slits of Amphioxus, being subdivided by tongue-bars which depend from the dorsal borders of the slits.

Coelom and Pore-canals.—In correspondence with the tri-regional differentiation of the body in its external configuration, the coelom (body-cavity, perivisceral cavity) is divided into three portions completely separated from one another by septa:—(1) proboscis-coelom, or first body-cavity; (2) the collar-coelom, or second body-cavity; (3) truncal coelom, or third body-cavity. Of these divisions of the coelom the first two communicate with the exterior by means of a pair of ciliated pore-canals placed at the posterior end of their respective segments. The proboscis-pores are highly variable, and frequently only one is present, that on the left side; sometimes the pore-canals of the proboscis unite to open by a common median orifice, and sometimes their communication with the proboscis-coelom appears to be occluded, and finally the pore-canals may be quite vestigial. The collar-pores are remarkable for their constancy; this is probably owing co the fact that they have become adapted to a special function, the inhalation of water to render the collar turgid during progression. There are reasons for supposing that the truncal coelom was at one time provided with pore-canals, but supposed vestiges of these structures have only been described for one genus, Spengelia, in which they lie near the anterior end of the truncal coelom.

Enteron.—Not only is the coelom thus subdivided, but the enteron (gut, alimentary canal, digestive tube) itself shows indications of three main subsections in continuity with one another:—(1) proboscis-gut (Eicheldarm, stomochord, vide infra); (2) collar-gut (buccal cavity, throat); (3) truncal gut extending from the collar to the vent.

Stomochord.—The proboscis-gut occurs as an outgrowth from the anterior dorsal wall of the collar-gut, and extends forward into the basal (posterior) region of the proboscis, through the neck into the proboscis-coelom, ending blindly in front. Although an integral portion of the gut, it has ceased to assist in alimentation, its epithelium undergoes vacuolar differentiation and hypertrophy, and its lumen becomes more or less vestigial. It has, in fact, become metamorphosed into a resistant supporting structure resembling in some respects the notochord of the true Chordata, but probably not directly comparable with the latter structure, being related to it solely by way of substitution. On account of the presence and mode of origin (from the gut-wall) of this organ Bateson introduced the term hemichorda as a phyletic name for the class Enteropneusta. As the proboscis-gut appears to have undoubtedly skeletal properties, and as it also has topographical relations with the mouth, it has been designated in English by the non-committal term stomochord. It is not a simple diverticulum of the collar-gut, but a complex structure possessing paired lateral pouches and a ventral convexity (ventral caecum) which rests in a concavity at the front end of the body of the nuchal skeleton (fig. 3). In some species (Spengelidae) there is a long capillary vermiform extension of the stomochord in front. The nuchal skeleton is a non-cellular laminated thickening of basement-membrane underlying that portion of the stomochord which lies between the above-mentioned pouches and the orifice into the throat. At the point where the stomochord opens into the buccal cavity the nuchal skeleton bifurcates, and the two cornua thus produced pass obliquely backwards and downwards embedded in the wall of the throat, often giving rise to projecting ridges that bound a dorsal groove of the collar-gut which is in continuity with the wall of the stomochord (fig. 3).

Nervous System.—At the base of the epidermis (which is in general ciliated) there is over the entire surface of the body a layer of nerve-fibres, occurring immediately outside the basement-membrane which separates the epidermis from the subjacent musculature. The nervous system is thus essentially epidermal in position and diffuse in distribution; but an interesting concentration of nerve-cells and fibres has taken place in the collar-region, where a medullary tube, closed in from the outside, opens in front and behind by anterior and posterior neuropores. This is the collar nerve-tube. Sometimes the central canal is wide and uninterrupted between the two neuropores; in other cases it becomes broken up into a large number of small closed medullary cavities, and in others again it is obsolete. In one family, the Ptychoderidae, the medullary tube of the collar is connected at intermediate points with the epidermis by means of a variable number of unpaired outgrowths from its dorsal wall, generally containing an axial lumen derived from and in continuity with the central canal. These hollow roots terminate blindly in the dorsal epidermis of the collar, and place the nervous layer of the latter in direct connexion with the fibres of the nerve-tube. The exact significance of these roots is a matter for speculation, but it seems possible that they are epiphysial structures remotely comparable with the epiphysial (pineal) complex of the craniate vertebrates. In accordance with this view there would be also some probability in favour of regarding the collar nerve-tube of the Enteropneusta as the equivalent of the cerebral vesicle only of Amphioxus and the Ascidian tadpole, and also of the primary fore-brain of vertebrates.

Special thickenings of the diffuse nervous layer of the epidermis occur in certain regions and along certain lines. In the neck of the proboscis the fibrous layer is greatly thickened, and other intensifications of this layer occur in the dorsal and ventral middle lines of the trunk extending to the posterior end of the body. The dorsal epidermal nerve-tract is continued in front into the ventral wall of the collar nerve-tube, and at the point of junction there is a circular commissural thickening following the posterior rim of the collar and affording a special connexion between the dorsal and ventral nerve-tracts. From the ventral surface of the collar nerve-tube numerous motor fibres may be seen passing to the subjacent musculature. These fibres are not aggregated into roots.

[v.03 p.0238]

Gill-slits.—The possession of gill-slits is as interesting a feature in the organization of Balanoglossus as is the presence of tracheae in Peripatus. These gill-slits occupy a variable extent of the anterior portion of the trunk, commencing immediately behind the collar-trunk septum. The branchial bars which constitute the borders of the clefts are of two kinds:—(1) Septal bars between two contiguous clefts, corresponding to the primary bars in Amphioxus; (2) Tongue-bars. The chief resemblances between Balanoglossus and Amphioxus in respect of the gill-slits may be stated briefly as follows:—([alpha]) the presence of two kinds of branchial bars in all species and also of small crossbars (synapticula) in many species; ([beta]) numerous gill-slits, from forty to more than a hundred pairs; ([gamma]) the addition of new gill-slits by fresh perforation at the posterior end of the pharynx throughout life. The chief differences are, that (a) the tongue-bar is the essential organ of the gill-slit in Balanoglossus, and exceeds the septal bars in bulk, while in Amphioxus the reverse is the case; (b) the tongue-bar contains a large coelomic space in Balanoglossus, but is solid in Amphioxus; (c) the skeletal rods in the tongue-bars of Balanoglossus are double; (d) the tongue-bar in Balanoglossus does not fuse with the ventral border of the cleft, but ends freely below, thus producing a continuous U-shaped cleft. The meaning of this singular contrast between the two animals may be that we have here an instance of an interesting gradation in evolution. From serving primitively as the essential organ of the cleft the tongue-bar may have undergone reduction and modification, becoming a secondary bar in Amphioxus, subordinate to the primary bars in size, vascularity and development; finally, in the craniate vertebrates it would then have completed its involution, the suggestion having been made that the tongue-bars are represented by the thymus-primordia.

Gill-pouches and Gill-pores.—Only rarely do the gill-slits open freely and directly to the exterior (fig. 1). In most species of Balanoglossus each gill-slit may be said to open into its own atrial chamber or gill-pouch; this in its turn opens to the exterior by a minute gill-pore. There are, therefore, as many gill-pouches as there are gill-slits and as many gill-pores as pouches. The gill-pores occur on each side of the dorsal aspect of the worm in a longitudinal series at the base of a shallow groove, the branchial groove. The respiratory current of water is therefore conducted to the exterior by different means from that adopted by Amphioxus, and this difference is so great that the theory which seeks to explain it has to postulate radical changes of structure, function and topography.

Excretory and Vascular Systems.—It seems likely that the coelomic pore-canals were originally excretory organs, but in the existing Enteropneusta the pore-canals (especially the collar canals) have, as we have seen, acquired new functions or become vestigial, and the function of excretion is now mainly accomplished by a structure peculiar to the Enteropneusta called the glomerulus, a vascular complex placed on either side of the anterior portion of the stomochord, projecting into the proboscis-coelom. The vascular system itself is quite peculiar, consisting of lacunae and channels destitute of endothelium, situated within the thickness of the basement-membrane of the body-wall, of the gut-wall and of the mesenteries. The blood, which is a non-corpuscular fluid, is propelled forwards by the contractile dorsal vessel and collected into the central blood-sinus; this lies over the stomochord, and is surrounded on three sides by a closed vesicle, with contractile walls, called the pericardium (Herzblase). By the pulsation of the pericardial vesicle (best observed in the larva) the blood is driven into the glomerulus, from which it issues by efferent vessels which effect a junction with the ventral (sub-intestinal) vessel in the trunk. The vascular system does not readily lend itself to morphological comparison between such widely different animals as Balanoglossus and Amphioxus, and the reader is therefore referred to the memoirs cited at the end of this article for further details.

[Illustration: FIG. 3.—Structure of anterior end.

a, Arrow from proboscis-cavity (pc) passing to left of pericardium (per) and out through proboscis pore-canal. b^1, arrow from central canal of neurochord (cnc) passed out through anterior neuropore. b^2, ditto; through posterior neuropore. c, arrow intended to pass from 1st gill-pouch through collar pore-canal into collar-coelom (cc). cts, posterior limit of collar. dv, dorsal vessel passing into central sinus (bs). ev, efferent vessel passing into ventral vessel (vv). epr, epiphysial tubes. st, stomochord. vs, ventral septum of proboscis. sk, body of nuchal skeleton. m, mouth. th, throat. tb, tongue-bars. tc, trunk coelom. ]

Reproductive System.—The sexes are separate, and when mature are sometimes distinguished by small differences of colour in the genital region. Both male and female gonads consist of more or less lobulated hollow sacs connected with the epidermis by short ducts. In their disposition they are either uniserial, biserial or multiserial. They occur in the branchial region, and also extend to a variable distance behind it. In exceptional cases they are either confined to the branchial region or excluded from it. When they are arranged in uniserial or biserial rows the genital ducts open into or near the branchial grooves in the region of the pharynx and in a corresponding position in the post-branchial region. An important feature is the occurrence in some species (Ptychoderidae) of paired longitudinal pleural or lateral folds of the body which are mobile, and can be approximated at their free edges so as to close in the dorsal surface, embracing both the median dorsal nerve-tract and the branchial grooves with the gill-pores, so as to form a temporary peri-branchial and medullary tube, open behind where the folds cease. On the other hand, they can be spread out horizontally so as to expose their own upper side as well as the dorsal surface of the body (fig. 1). These folds are called the genital pleurae because they contain the bulk of the gonads. Correlated with the presence of the genital pleurae there is a pair of vascular folds of the basement membrane proceeding from the dorsal wall of the gut in the post-branchial portion of the branchio-genital region, and from the dorsal angles made by the pleural folds with the body-wall in the pharyngeal region; they pass, in their most fully developed condition, to the free border of the genital pleurae. These vascular membranes are called the lateral septa. Since there are many species which do not possess these genital pleurae, the question arises as to whether their presence or their absence is the more primitive condition. Without attempting to answer this question categorically, it may be pointed out that within the limits of the family (Ptychoderidae) which is especially characterized by their presence there are some species in [v.03 p.0239] which the genital pleurae are quite obsolete, and yet lateral septa occur (e.g. Ptychodera ruficollis), seeming to indicate that the pleural folds have in such cases been secondarily suppressed.

Development.—The development of Balanoglossus takes place according to two different schemes, known as direct and indirect, correlated with the occurrence in the group of two kinds of ova, large and small. Direct development, in which the adult form is achieved without striking metamorphosis by a gradual succession of stages, seems to be confined to the family Balanoglossidae. The remaining two families of Enteropneusta, Ptychoderidae and Spengelidae, contain species of which probably all pursue an indirect course of development, culminating in a metamorphosis by which the adult form is attained. In these cases the larva, called Tornaria, is pelagic and transparent, and possesses a complicated ciliated seam, the longitudinal ciliated band, often drawn out into convoluted bays and lappets. In addition to this ciliated band the form of the Tornaria is quite characteristic and unlike the adult. The Tornaria larva offers a certain similarity to larvae of Echinoderms (sea-urchins, star-fishes, and sea-cucumbers), and when first discovered was so described. It is within the bounds of possibility that Tornaria actually does indicate a remote affinity on the part of the Enteropneusta to the Echinoderms, not only on account of its external form, but also by reason of the possession of a dorsal water-pore communicating with the anterior body-cavity. In the direct development Bateson showed that the three divisions of the coelom arise as pouches constricted off from the archenteron or primitive gut, thus resembling the development of the mesoblastic somites of Amphioxus. It would appear that while the direct development throws light upon the special plan of organization of the Enteropneusta, the indirect development affords a clue to their possible derivation. However this may be, it is sufficiently remarkable that a small and circumscribed group like the Enteropneusta, which presents such a comparatively uniform plan of composition and of external form, should follow two such diverse methods of development.

Distribution.—Some thirty species of Balanoglossus are known, distributed among all the principal marine provinces from Greenland to New Zealand. The species which occurs in the English Channel is Ptychodera sarniensis. The Ptychoderidae and Spengelidae are predominantly tropical and subtropical, while the Balanoglossidae are predominantly arctic and temperate in their distribution. One of the most singular facts concerning the geographical distribution of Enteropneusta has recently been brought to light by Benham, who found a species of Balanoglossus, sensu stricto, on the coast of New Zealand hardly distinguishable from one occurring off Japan. Finally, Glandiceps abyssicola (Spengelidae) was dredged during the "Challenger" expedition in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Africa at a depth of 2500 fathoms.

AUTHORITIES.—W. Bateson, "Memoirs on the Direct Development of Balanoglossus," Quart. Journ. Micr. Sci. (vols. xxiv.-xxvi., 1884-1886); W. B. Benham, "Balanoglossus otagoensis, n. sp," Q. J. M. S. (vol. xlii. p. 497, 1899); Yves Delage and Ed. Herouard, Traite de zoologie concrete (t. viii.), "Les Procordes" (1898); S. F. Harmer, "Note on the Name Balanoglossus," Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc. (x. p. 190, 1900); T. H. Morgan, "Memoirs on the Indirect Development of Balanoglossus," Journ. Morph. (vol. v., 1891, and vol. ix., 1894); W. E. Ritter, "Harrimania maculosa, a new Genus and Species of Enteropneusta from Alaska," Papers from the Harriman Alaska Exhibition (ii.), Proc. Washington Ac. (ii. p. 111, 1900); J. W. Spengel, "Die Enteropneusten," Eighteenth Monograph on the Fauna und Flora des Golfes von Neapel (1893); A. Willey, "Enteropneusta from the South Pacific, with Notes on the West Indian Species," Zool. Results (Willey), part iii., 1899; see also Q. J. M. S. (vol. xlii. p. 223, 1899); J. P. Hill, "The Enteropneusta of Funafuti," Mem. Austral. Mus. (iii., 1897-1898); M. Caullery and F. Mesnil, "Balanoglossus Kochleri, n. sp. English Channel," C. R. Soc. Biol. lii. p. 256 (1900).

(A. W.*)

BALARD, ANTOINE JEROME (1802-1876), French chemist, was born at Montpellier on the 30th of September 1802. He started as an apothecary, but taking up teaching he acted as chemical assistant at the faculty of sciences of his native town, and then became professor of chemistry at the royal college and school of pharmacy and at the faculty of sciences. In 1826 he discovered in sea-water a substance which he recognized as a previously unknown element and named bromine. The reputation brought him by this achievement secured his election as successor to L. J. Thenard in the chair of chemistry at the faculty of sciences in Paris, and in 1851 he was appointed professor of chemistry at the College de France, where he had M. P. E. Berthelot first as pupil, then as assistant and finally as colleague. He died in Paris on the 30th of April 1876. While the discovery of bromine and the preparation of many of its compounds was his most conspicuous piece of work, Balard was an industrious chemist on both the pure and applied sides. In his researches on the bleaching compounds of chlorine he was the first to advance the view that bleaching-powder is a double compound of calcium chloride and hypochlorite; and he devoted much time to the problem of economically obtaining soda and potash from sea-water, though here his efforts were nullified by the discovery of the much richer sources of supply afforded by the Stassfurt deposits. In organic chemistry he published papers on the decomposition of ammonium oxalate, with formation of oxamic acid, on amyl alcohol, on the cyanides, and on the difference in constitution between nitric and sulphuric ether.

BALA SERIES, in geology, a series of dark slates and sandstones with beds of limestone which occurs in the neighbourhood of Bala, Merionethshire, North Wales. It was first described by A. Sedgwick, who considered it to be the upper part of his Cambrian System. The series is now placed at the top of the Ordovician System, above the Llandeilo beds. The Bala limestone is from 20 to 40 ft. thick, and is recognizable over most of North Wales; it is regarded as the equivalent of the Coniston limestone of the Lake District. The series in the type area consists of the Hirnant limestone, a thin inconstant bed, which is separated by 1400 ft. of slates from the Bala limestone, below this are more slates and volcanic rocks. The latter are represented by large contemporaneous deposits of tuff and felsitic lava which in the Snowdon District are several thousand feet thick. In South Wales the Bala Series contains the following beds in descending order:—the Trinucleus seticornis beds (Slade beds, Redhill shales and Sholeshook limestone), the Robeston Wathen beds, and the Dicranograptus shales. The typical graptolites are, in the upper part, Dicellograptus anceps and D. complanatus; in the lower part, Pleurograptus linearis and Dicranograptus Clingani. In Shropshire this series is represented by the Caradoc and Chirbury Series; in southern Scotland by the Hartfell and Ardmillan Series, and by similar rocks in Ireland. See CARADOC SERIES and ORDOVICIAN SYSTEM.

BALASH (in the Greek authors, Balas; the later form of the name Vologaeses), Sassanian king in A.D. 484-488, was the brother and successor of Pērōz, who had died in a battle against the Hephthalites (White Huns) who invaded Persia from the east. He put down the rebellion of his brother Zareh, and is praised as a mild and generous monarch, who made concessions to the Christians. But as he did nothing against his enemies, he was, after a reign of four years, deposed and blinded, and his nephew, Kavadh I., raised to the throne.

(ED. M.)

BALASORE, a town and district of British India, in the Orissa division of Bengal. The town is the principal one and the administrative headquarters of the district, and is situated on the right bank of the river Burabalang, about 7 m. from the sea-coast as the crow flies and 16 m. by the river. There is a station on the East Coast railway. The English settlement of Balasore, formed in 1642, and that of Pippli in its neighbourhood seven years earlier, became the basis of the future greatness of the British in India. The servants of the East India Company here fortified themselves in a strong position, and carried on a brisk investment in country goods, chiefly cottons and muslins. They flourished in spite of the oppressions of the Mahommedan governors, and when needful asserted their claims to respect by arms. In 1688, affairs having come to a crisis, Captain William Heath, commander of the company's ships, bombarded the town. In the 18th century Balasore rapidly declined in importance, on account of a dangerous bar which formed across the mouth of the river. At present the bar has 12 to 15 ft. of water at spring-tides, but not more than 2 or 3 ft. at low water in the dry season. Large ships have to anchor outside in the open roadstead. The town still possesses a large maritime trade, despite the silting-up of the river mouth. Pop. (1901) 20,880.

The district forms a strip of alluvial land between the hills and the sea, varying from about 9 to 34 m. in breadth; area, 2085 sq. m. The hill country rises from the western boundary line. The district naturally divides itself into three well-defined tracts—(1) The salt tract, along the coast; (2) The arable tract, or rice country; and (3) The submontane tract, or jungle lands. The salt tract runs the whole way down the coast, and forms a desolate strip a few miles broad. Towards the beach it rises into sandy ridges, from 50 to 80 ft. high, sloping inland and covered with a [v.03 p.0240] vegetation of low scrub jungle. Sluggish brackish streams creep along between banks of fetid black mud. The sandhills on the verge of the ocean are carpeted with creepers and the wild convolvulus. Inland, it spreads out into prairies of coarse long grass and scrub jungle, which harbour wild animals in plenty; but throughout this vast region there is scarcely a hamlet, and only patches of rice cultivation at long intervals. From any part of the salt tract one may see the boundary of the inner arable part of the district fringed with long lines of trees, from which every morning the villagers drive their cattle out into the saliferous plains to graze. The salt tract is purely alluvial, and appears to be of recent date. Towards the coast the soil has a distinctly saline taste.

Salt used to be largely manufactured in the district by evaporation, but the industry is now extinct. The arable tract lies beyond the salt lands, and embraces the chief part of the district. It is a long dead-level of rich fields, with a soil lighter in colour than that of Bengal or Behar; much more friable, and apt to split up into small cubes with a rectangular cleavage. A peculiar feature of the arable tract is the Pāts (literally cups) or depressed lands near the river-banks. They were probably marshes that have partially silted up by the yearly overflow of the streams. These pāts bear the finest crops. As a whole, the arable tract is a treeless region, except around the villages, which are encircled by fine mango, pipal, banyan and tamarind trees, and intersected with green shady lanes of bamboo. A few palmyras, date-palms and screw-pines (a sort of aloe, whose leaves are armed with formidable triple rows of hook-shaped thorns) dot the expanse or run in straight lines between the fields. The submontane tract is an undulating country with a red soil, much broken up into ravines along the foot of the hills. Masses of laterite, buried in hard ferruginous clay, crop up as rocks or slabs. At Kopari, in Kila Ambohata, about 2 sq. m. are almost paved with such slabs, dark-red in colour, perfectly flat and polished like plates of iron. A thousand mountain torrents have scooped out for themselves picturesque ravines, clothed with an ever-fresh verdure of prickly thorns, stunted gnarled shrubs, and here and there a noble forest tree. Large tracts are covered with sal jungle, which nowhere, however, attains to any great height.

Balasore district is watered by six distinct river systems: those of the Subanrekha, the Burabalang, the Jamka, the Kansbans and the Dhamra.

The climate greatly varies according to the seasons of the year. The hot season lasts from March to June, but is tempered by cool sea-breezes; from June to September the weather is close and oppressive; and from October to February the cold season brings the north-easterly winds, with cool mornings and evenings.

Almost the only crop grown is rice, which is largely exported by sea. The country is exposed to destructive floods from the hill-rivers and also from cyclonic storm-waves. The district is traversed throughout its entire length by the navigable Orissa coast canal, and also by the East Coast railway from Calcutta to Madras. The seaports of Balasore, Chandbali and Dhamra conduct a very large coasting trade. The exports are almost confined to rice, which is sent to Ceylon, the Maldives and Mauritius. The imports consist of cotton twist and piece goods, mineral oils, metals, betel-nuts and salt. In 1901 the population was 1,071,197, an increase of 9% in the decade.

BALASSA, BALINT, BARON OF KEKKO and GYARMAT (1551-1594), Magyar lyric poet, was born at Kekko, and educated by the reformer, Peter Bornemissza, and by his mother, the highly gifted Protestant zealot, Anna Sulyok. His first work was a translation of Michael Bock's Wuertzgertlein fuer die krancken Seelen, to comfort his father while in prison (1570-1572) for some political offence. On his father's release, Balint accompanied him to court, and was also present at the coronation diet of Pressburg in 1572. He then joined the army and led a merry life at the fortress of Eger. Here he fell violently in love with Anna Losonczi, the daughter of the hero of Temesvar, and evidently, from his verses, his love was not unrequited. But a new mistress speedily dragged the ever mercurial youth away from her, and deeply wounded, she gave her hand to Krisztof Ungnad. Naturally Balassa only began to realize how much he loved Anna when he had lost her. He pursued her with gifts and verses, but she remained true to her pique and to her marriage vows, and he could only enshrine her memory in immortal verse. In 1574 Balint was sent to the camp of Gaspar Bekesy to assist him against Stephen Bathory; but his troops were encountered and scattered on the way thither, and he himself was severly wounded and taken prisoner. His not very rigorous captivity lasted for two years, and he then disappears from sight. We next hear of him in 1584 as the wooer and winner of Christina Dobo, the daughter of the valiant commandant of Eger. What led him to this step we know not, but it was the cause of all his subsequent misfortunes. His wife's greedy relatives nearly ruined him by legal processes, and when in 1586 he turned Catholic to escape their persecutions they declared that he and his son had become Turks. His simultaneous desertion of his wife led to his expulsion from Hungary, and from 1589 to 1594 he led a vagabond life in Poland, sweetened by innumerable amours with damsels of every degree from cithara players to princesses. The Turkish war of 1594 recalled him to Hungary, and he died of his wounds at the siege of Esztergom the same year. Balassa's poems fall into four divisions: religious hymns, patriotic and martial songs, original love poems, and adaptations from the Latin and German. They are all most original, exceedingly objective and so excellent in point of style that it is difficult even to imagine him a contemporary of Sebastian Tinodi and Peter Ilosvay. But his erotics are his best productions. They circulated in MS. for generations and were never printed till 1874, when Farkas Deak discovered a perfect copy of them in the Radvanyi library. For beauty, feeling and transporting passion there is nothing like them in Magyar literature till we come to the age of Michael Csokonai and Alexander Petofi. Balassa was also the inventor of the strophe which goes by his name. It consists of nine lines—a a b c c b d d b, or three rhyming pairs alternating with the rhyming third, sixth and ninth lines.

See Aron Szilady, Balint Balassa's Poems (Hung.) Budapest, 1879.

(R. N. B.)

BALATON (PLATTENSEE), the largest lake of middle Europe, in the south-west of Hungary, situated between the counties of Veszprem, Zala and Somogy. Its length is 48 m., average breadth 3-1/2 to 4-1/2 m., greatest breadth 7-1/2 m., least breadth a little less than 1 m. It covers 266 sq. m. and has an extreme depth of 149 ft. Its northern shores are bordered by the beautiful basaltic cones of the Bakony mountains, the volcanic soil of which produces grapes yielding excellent wine; the southern consist partly of a marshy plain, partly of downs. The most beautiful point of the lake is that where the peninsula of Tihany projects in the waters. An ancient church of the Benedictines is here situated on the top of a hill. In a tomb therein is buried Andrew I. (d. 1061), a king of the Hungarian Arpadian dynasty. The temperature of the lake varies greatly, in a manner resembling that of the sea, and many connect its origin with a sea of the Miocene period, the waters of which are said to have covered the Hungarian plain. About fifty streams flow into the lake, which drains into the Danube and is well stocked with fish. It often freezes in winter. Lake Balaton is of growing importance as a bathing resort.

BALAYAN, a town and port of entry of the province of Batangas, Luzon, Philippine Islands, at the head of the Gulf of Balayan, about 55 m. S. by W. of Manila. Pop. (1903) 8493. Subsequently in October 1903, Calatagan (pop. 2654) and Tuy (pop. 2430) were annexed. Balayan has a healthful climate, and is in the midst of a fertile district (with a volcanic soil), which produces rice, cane-sugar, cacao, coffee, pepper, cotton, Indian corn, fruit (oranges, bananas, mangoes, &c.) and native dyes. Horses and cattle are raised for market in considerable numbers. The fisheries are important. The native language is Tagalog.

BALBI, ADRIAN (1782-1848), Italian geographer, was born at Venice on the 25th of April 1782. The publication of his Prospetto politico-geografico dello stato attuale del globo (Venice, [v.03 p.0241] 1808) obtained his election to the chair of professor of geography at the college of San Michele at Murano; in 1811-1813 he was professor of physics at the Lyceum of Fermo, and afterwards became attached to the customs office at his native city. In 1820 he visited Portugal, and there collected materials for his Essai statistique sur le royaume de Portugal et d'Algarve, published in 1822 at Paris, where the author resided from 1821 until 1832. This was followed by Varietes politiques et statistiques de la monarchie portugaise, which contains some curious observations respecting that country under the Roman sway. In 1826 he published the first volume of his Atlas ethnographique du globe, ou classification des peuples anciens et modernes d'apres leurs langues, a work of great erudition. In 1832 appeared the Abrege de Geographie, which, in an enlarged form, was translated into the principal languages of Europe. Balbi retired to Padua and there died on the 14th of March 1848. His son, Eugenio Balbi (1812-1884), followed a similar career, being professor of geography at Pavia, and publishing his father's Scritti Geografici (Turin, 1841), and original works in Gea, ossia la terra (Trieste, 1854-1867) and Saggio di geografia (Milan, 1868).

BALBO, CESARE, COUNT (1789-1853), Italian writer and statesman, was born at Turin on the 21st of November 1789. His father, Prospero Balbo, who belonged to a noble Piedmontese family, held a high position in the Sardinian court, and at the time of Cesare's birth was mayor of the capital. His mother, a member of the Azeglio family, died when he was three years old; and he was brought up in the house of his great-grandmother, the countess of Bugino. In 1798 he joined his father at Paris. From 1808 to 1814 Balbo served in various capacities under the Napoleonic empire at Florence, Rome, Paris and in Illyria. On the fall of Napoleon he entered the service of his native country. While his father was appointed minister of the interior, he entered the army, and undertook political missions to Paris and London. On the outbreak of the revolution of 1821, of which he disapproved, although he was suspected of sympathizing with it, he was forced into exile; and though not long after he was allowed to return to Piedmont, all public service was denied him. Reluctantly, and with frequent endeavours to obtain some appointment, he gave himself up to literature as the only means left him to influence the destinies of his country. This accounts for the fitfulness and incompleteness of so much of his literary work, and for the practical, and in many cases temporary, element which runs through even his most elaborate productions. The great object of his labours was to help in securing the independence of Italy from foreign control. Of true Italian unity he had no expectation and no desire, but he was devoted to the house of Savoy, which he foresaw was destined to change the fate of Italy. A confederation of separate states under the supremacy of the pope was the genuine ideal of Balbo, as it was the ostensible one of Gioberti. But Gioberti, in his Primato, seemed to him to neglect the first essential of independence, which he accordingly inculcated in his Speranze or Hopes of Italy, in which he suggests that Austria should seek compensation in the Balkans for the inevitable loss of her Italian provinces. Preparation, both military and moral, alertness and patience were his constant theme. He did not desire revolution, but reform; and thus he became the leader of a moderate party, and the steady opponent not only of despotism but of democracy. At last in 1848 his hopes were to some extent satisfied by the constitution granted by the king. He was appointed a member of the commission on the electoral law, and became first constitutional prime-minister of Piedmont, but only held office a few months. With the ministry of d'Azeglio, which soon after got into power, he was on friendly terms, and his pen continued the active defence of his political principles till his death on the 3rd of June 1853. The most important of his writings are historico-political, and derive at once their majesty and their weakness from his theocratic theory of Christianity. His style is clear and vigorous, and not unfrequently terse and epigrammatic. He published Quattro Novelle in 1829; Storia d'Italia sotto i Barbari in 1830; Vita di Dante, 1839; Meditazioni Storiche, 1842-1845; Le Speranze d'Italia, 1844; Pensieri sulla Storia d'Italia, 1858; Della Monarchia rappresentativa in Italia (Florence, 1857).

See E. Ricotti, Della Vita e degli Scritti di Cesare Balbo (1856); A. Vismara, Bibliografia di Cesare Balbo (Milan, 1882).

BALBOA, VASCO NUNEZ DE (c. 1475-1517), the discoverer of the Pacific, a leading figure among the Spanish explorers and conquerors of America, was born at Jerez de los Caballeros, in Estremadura, about 1475. Though poor, he was by birth a gentleman (hidalgo). Little is known of his life till 1501, when he followed Rodrigo de Bastidas in his voyage of discovery to the western seas. He appears to have settled in Hispaniola, and took to cultivating land in the neighbourhood of Salvatierra, but with no great success, as his debts soon became oppressive. In 1509 the famous Ojeda (Hojeda) sailed from San Domingo with an expedition and founded the settlement of San Sebastian. He had left orders with Enciso, an adventurous lawyer of the town, to fit out two ships and convey provisions to the new settlement. Enciso set sail in 1510, and Balboa, whose debts made the town unpleasant to him, managed to accompany him by concealing himself, it is said, in a cask of "victuals for the voyage," which was conveyed from his farm to the ship. The expedition reached San Sebastian to find Ojeda gone and the settlement in ruins. While Enciso was undecided how to act, Balboa proposed that they should sail for Darien, on the Gulf of Uraba, where he had touched when with Bastidas. His proposal was accepted and a new town was founded, named Sta Maria de la Antigua del Darien; but quarrels soon broke out among the adventurers, and Enciso was deposed, thrown into prison and finally sent off to Spain with Balboa's ally, the alcalde Zamudio. Being thus left in authority, Balboa began to conquer the surrounding country, and by his bravery, courtesy, kindness of heart and just dealing gained the friendship of several native chiefs. On one of these excursions he heard for the first time, from the cacique Comogre, of the ocean on the other side of the mountains and of the gold of Peru. Soon after his return to Darien he received letters from Zamudio, informing him that Enciso had complained to the king, and had obtained a sentence condemning Balboa and summoning him to Spain. In his despair at this message Vasco Nunez resolved to attempt some great enterprise, the success of which he trusted would conciliate his sovereign. On the 1st of September 1513 he set out with one hundred and ninety Spaniards (Francisco Pizarro among them) and one thousand natives; on the 25th or 26th of September he reached the summit of the range, and sighted the Pacific. Pizarro and two others were sent on to reconnoitre; one of these scouts, Alonzo Martin, was the first European actually to embark upon the new-found ocean, in St Michael's Gulf. On the 29th of September Balboa himself arrived upon the shore, and formally took possession of the "Great South Sea" in the name of the Spanish monarch. He remained on the coast for some time, heard again of Peru, visited the Pearl Islands, and thence returned to Darien, which he entered in triumph with a great booty on the 18th of January 1514. He at once sent messengers to Spain bearing presents, to give an account of his discoveries; and the king, Ferdinand the Catholic, partly reconciled to his daring subject, named him Adelantado of the South Sea, or admiral of the Pacific, and governor of Panama and Coyba. None the less an expedition sailed from Spain under Don Pedro Arias de Avila (generally called Pedrarias Davila) to replace Balboa in the government of the Darien colony itself. Meanwhile the latter had crossed the isthmus and revisited the Pacific several (some say more than twenty) times; plans of the conquest of Peru and of the exploration of the western ocean began to shape themselves in his mind; and with a view to these projects, materials for shipbuilding were gathered together upon the Pacific coast, and two light brigantines were built, launched and armed. With these Vasco Nunez now took possession of the Pearl Islands, and, had it not been for the weather, would have reached the coast of Peru. But his career was stopped by the jealousy of Pedrarias, who pretended that Balboa proposed to throw off his allegiance, and enticed him to Acla, near Darien, by a crafty message. As soon as he had him in his power, he threw [v.03 p.0242] him into prison, had him tried for treason, and forced the judge to condemn him to death. The sentence was carried into execution on the public square of Acla in 1517. From a reckless adventurer, Balboa had developed into an able general, an excellent colonial administrator, and a statesman of mature judgment and brilliant foresight.