a handsome, large, and populous town of the kingdom of the Netherlands, with a bishop's see. It has a considerable manufactory in cloth and serges, and every year in Lent there is a considerable fair. It is one of the barrier towns, but was besieged and taken by the French in 1744, and also in 1794. It is seated in a fertile plain on the river Ypre, in E. Long. 2° 48'. N. Lat. 50° 51'.