Belsham, Thomas

an eminent English Unitarian divine, at one time head of the theological academy of Daventry, and for the last 20 years of his life minister of E ex Chapel, London. He wrote many polemical treatises, and published a new translation of the Epistles of St. Paul. His work on Christian Evidence obtained much popularity. D. in his 80th year, 1829.-His brother, William B., who D. 1827, aged 75, is author of History of Great Britain, from the Revolution to the Treaty of Amens, in 12 vols. 8vo. Belshazzar, ( bel - shaz'zar ,) was the last king of Babylon, of the Chaldæan dynasty. He is the Nab onned us of Alexander Polyhist, Nabonnidochus of Megasthenes, Labynetus of Hero dot us, Naboandelus of Joseph us. B. was the son of Queen Nitocris. In 538 ог 539 B.C., during the night when Babylon was stormed by Cyrus, B. was making an impious feast, at which he and his courtiers drank out of the sacred ve els which had been carried away from the temple of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, his grandfather. He was terrified by the apparition of the hand which wrote upon the wall (see MENE); and in the same night was slain by one of his eunuchs, who brought his head to Cyrus. Bel's ire, n. [O. Fr.] A grandfather or progenitor. (o.) See BELDAM. Belsunce, HENRI FRANÇOIS XAVIER DE, ( bel - soonz,) a French prelate, B. in Perigord, 1671, and was made bishop of Marseilles in 1709. He showed his zeal and charity during the plague in 1720, and his devotion will always be worthy of admiration. He was offered, in 1723, the bishopric of Laon, but refused it, saying, he "would not leave a church to which he had devoted his life;" and he also refused the bishopric of Bordeaux, 1729. D. at Marseilles, 1755. of tribes, which it is impo ible to enumerate. In their domestic life, the Beloochees are almost all pastoral; they usually reside in ghedons or tents, made of black felt or coarse blankets, stretched over a frame of wicker- Belt, n. [A.S. belt ; Icel. belt i ; Lat. balteus , a girdle or