Behind

[A. S. behind an.] On or at the hinder part; on or at the back of; in the rear of; following another; posterior to. "Which he had caused his horsemen to take behind them on their horses." - Knolles. -Remaining after; left after the departure of. "I must be cruel only to be kind; Thus bad begins and worse remains behind."-Shaks. -Inferior to in dignity, worth, or attainments; as, he is behind the age. -adv. In the rear; backward; as, to look behind one. -Remaining; not yet brought forward, or presented. "We cannot be sure that we have all the particulars before us; and that there is no evidence behind." - Locke. -Past; backward, or posterior in time of order or succe ion. have need of; Ger. behuf , allied to haben , to have.] be fit, or meet for; to be needful, or nece ary for. "But should you lure the monarch of the brook. Behooves you then to ply your finest art." Thomson. To Behoove'ful, a. Useful; profitable; advantageous. (R.) Madam, we have culled such nece aries As are behooveful for our state to-morrow." Shaks . Behove'. See BEHOOVE. Behring, VITUS, ( ba'ring ,) a Dane, B. 1680, entered the service of Ru ia, and was appointed by the Empre Catherine to command an expedition of discovery in the Sea of Kamtschatka. He left St. Petersburg in February, 1725, and after exploring several rivers, travelled overland by the way of Yakutsk, on the Lena, to Okhotsk, then cro ed over to Bolcheretsk, and arrived at Nischnei Kamtschatka-Ostrog. Here he built a small boat, and sailed on the 20th of July, 1728, coasting Kamtschatka till he reached, in Aug., (67° 18' N. Lat. by his observations,) a cape, which, from the land beyond it trending so much to the westward, he supposed to be the north-easternmost point of Asia. In this conjecture, however, as has since been proved, B. was mistaken; the point reached by him must have been Serdre Kumen; but with this conviction on his own mind, and the approach of winter, he determined to retrace his steps, and he returned in safety to Nischnei Kamtschatka. In 1733 he took command of another expedition, fitted out on a very large scale. After several exploratory excursions, he stationed himself at Yakutsk, directing various detachments of his officers down the rivers on different points of the Frozen Ocean. In 1740 he reached Okhotsk, where ve els had previously been built for him, in which he sailed for Awatska Bay, where he founded the present settlement of Petropaulovski, and pa ed the winter. His discoveries to the northward being deemed sufficiently satisfactory, he was now directed to proceed altered his course to the N.E., and on the 18th of July, (having been forty-four days at sea,) he descried very high mountains covered with snow in Lat. 5816° N., having made, according to his reckoning, 50° of E. Lon. from Awatska. He now followed the coast to the northward, but his crew suffering from sickne , he resolved to return to Kamtschatka, when, Nov. 3, 1741, he was wrecked on the island which now bears his name, and D. on the 8th of the following month. The survivors of his crew reached Kamtschatka in a small ve el which they built from the wreck, and thus some account of this ill-fated voyage was preserved. Behring's Island, a small island in the Pacific Ocean, Lat. 55° 22′ N., Lon. 166° E., the most W. of the Aleutian chain. It is 90 m. long, rocky and desolate, uninhabited, and only remarkable as the place where the great navigator whose name it bears, breathed his last. Behring's Strait, the channel which separates the N.E. of Asia from the N.W. corner of America, and which connects the N. Pacific with the Arctic Ocean. It is formed, in its narrowest part, by two remarkable headlands, the extreme points E. and W. of the continents to which they belong: Cape Prince of Wales, on the American coast, in Lat. 65° 46′ N., Lon. 168° 15′ E.; and East Cape, on the shore of Asia, Lat. 66° 6' N., Lon. 169° 38' W. The distance between these two points is about 36 m.; but N. and S. of them, the land on both sides rapidly recedes, and, on the N. especially, it trends so sharply that the name of "strait" is not very applicable to any part beyond the capes in that direction. It is usual, however, to regard it extending along Asia from Tchukotskoi No , in 64° 13', to Serdre Kumen in 67° 3′ N., which gives it a length of 400 m.; its width between Tchukotskoi No (173° 24') and Cape Rodney, on the opposite shore of America, (166° 3′ W.,) is about 250 m. Shoal water appears to be principally confined to the bays and inlets on the American side. There are a few islands scattered here and there along the strait; and one of some size, St. Lawrence or Clerke's Island, lies at a short distance S. from its entrance. The temperature is low, and N. of the two capes there is always a store of ice throughout the year. Fogs and hazy weather are almost perpetual, and the strait is frozen over every winter. This strait was discovered in 1728, by Vitus Behring, (q. v..) but the complete results of the discovery were left for Capt. Cook, who, in 1788, made a thorough and accurate survey of both coasts. It may, perhaps, be interesting to know, that a very old Japanese map of the world, now in the British Museum, lays down the leading features of this strait with surprising accuracy. Beila, or BELA, an inland town of Be loo chi stan, cap. prov. of Lus, on a rock, on the N. bank of the Poorally; Lat. 26° 11' N., Lon. 66° 36' E., and 50 m. N. of the Indian Ocean. It is a clean and tidy town, inhabited mostly by Hindoos. tain state. Be'ing, p.pr. [From Br.] Existing; existing in a cer-n. Existence; a particular state or condition, as opposed to non-existence, or nonentity. "Thee, Author of all being , Fountain of Light."- Milton. -A person existing; any living creature, whether material or spiritual, actual or ideal. "Ah fair, yet false! ah being form'd to cheat By seeming kindne , mixt with deep deceit!"-Dryden. -An intelligent or living existence or spirit, in contradistinction to a thing without life. -adv. Since; for as much as; inasmuch as. "And being you have Declined his means."-Beaumont and Fletcher. Bei'ra, a province of Portugal. - See BEYRA. Beiram. See BAIRAM. Beirout, Beyrut. See BEYROUT. Beit, ( bite ,) an Arabic word, which properly signifies a tent or hut, but is likewise employed to denote any edifice or abode of men. It is often found as a component part of proper names in the geography of those countries that have become subject to the Arabs, as, Beit - al - Harâm , i. e. "the edifice of the sanctuary." The Hebrew word, corresponding to the Arabic Beit , is Beth , which we find employed in a manner perfectly analogous in the Old Testament; in the name Bethlehem (in Arabic Beit Lahm , or Beit - al - Lahm ), i. e. "the house of bread." The same word, Beth , is, in Syriac, still more extensively used as a component part of geographical names. Beit-el-Fakih, ( bite - el - fa - ke ,) a maritime town of Arabia, 100 m. W. of Sana, on the Red Sea. This place, the hottest in Tehama, is the centre of the Yemen trade in coffee. Pop . 10,000. Beith, a flourishing inland town of Scotland, county of Ayr, 9 m. S.W. of Paisley. Manf . Cottons and muslins. The famous Dunlop cheese is made in the neighborhood. Pop . about 6,000, Beit so. A phrase of supposition or anticipation, equal to suppose it to be so ; or of permi ion, as, let it be so. "My gracious duke, Be't so she will not here, before your grace."-Shaks.