This volume of the eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica opens with the historic Bethlehem Hospital, tracing its seventeenth-century relocation and its evolution from a monastic foundation into a notorious institution for the insane, while noting the parallel history of bedsores as an indicator of early hospital hygiene standards and the nursing practices required to prevent them.
The text then turns to Bedlington and its ancient connexions with the see of Durham, detailing the transportation of the relics of Saint Cuthbert and the rise of local collieries that transformed the district into a major mining centre. Biographical entries follow, including accounts of the informer William Bedloe and his participation in the fabrications surrounding the popish plot, and of the Spanish diplomat Alphonso Bella Cueva, Marquis of Bedmar, and his conspiracy in seventeenth-century Venice.
A comprehensive study of the Bedouin tribes of North Arabia and the Nile Valley describes their pastoral life, intertribal feuds, blood-money customs, nomadic migrations, and social organization under tribal sheiks. This ethnological section details their pastoral economy, sparse religious observances, marriage customs, and characteristic weapons, relying on accounts by early travellers such as Johann Ludwig Burckhardt.
The volume continues with detailed entries on the natural history of bees, examining their anatomy, solitary and social habits, queen-rearing, and the organization of the hive. This leads directly into an extensive treatise on practical bee-keeping, tracing the evolution of hives from straw skeps to movable-frame systems developed by François Huber, Dzierzon, and Langstroth, alongside the invention of the honey extractor and comb foundation machines, concluding with an analysis of foul brood diseases.
Following minor geographical and biographical notices, the work examines the botanical features of the beech tree and its historical association with early writing materials, before offering extensive biographical memoirs of American figures, most notably the abolitionist preacher Henry Ward Beecher and his father Lyman Beecher, chronicling their religious views and theological controversies in nineteenth-century New England.
The volume concludes with historical and geographical surveys, including the ancient kingdom of Magadha and the province of Behar in British India, tracing their history from Buddhist antiquity through the Mogul conquests, alongside a detailed technical article on the history, chemical composition, and production of beer.
