a feast or entertainment where people regale themselves with pleasant foods or fruits.

in the manege, that small part of the branch of a bridle that is under the eye; which being rounded like a small rod, gathers and joins the extremities of the bit to the branch, in such a manner that the banquet is not seen, but covered by the cope, or that part of the bit that is next the branch.

BANQUET-Line, an imaginary line drawn, in making a bit, along the banquet, and prolonged up or down, to adjust the designed force or weakness of the branch, in order to make it stiff or easy.

or Banquette, in Fortification, a little foot-bank, or elevation of earth, forming a path which runs along the inside of a parapet, upon which the musketeers get up, in order to discover the counterscarp, or to fire on the enemy, in the meat or in the covert-way.

BANQUETING room or house. See SALOON. The ancient Romans supped in the atrium, or vestibule, of their houses; but, in after times, magnificent saloons, or banqueting-rooms, were built, for the more commodious and splendid entertainment of their guests. Lucullus had several of these, each distinguished by the name of some god; and there was a particular rate of expense appropriated to each. Plutarch relates with what magnificence he entertained Cicero and Pompey, who went with a design to surprise him, by only telling a slave who waited, that the cloth should be laid in the Apollo. The emperor Claudius, among others, had a splendid banqueting-room named Mercury. But every thing of this kind was outdone by the lustre of that celebrated banqueting-house of Nero, called domus au-

rea; which, by the circular motion of its partitions and ceilings, imitated the revolution of the heavens, and represented the different seasons of the year, which changed at every service, and showered down flowers, essences, and perfumes, on the guests.