the county town of Bedfordshire, is a municipal and parliamentary borough and market-town, situated in a fertile vale on both sides of the river Ouse, which is here crossed by a handsome stone bridge of five arches. It is 50 miles N.W. of London by road, and 62½ by the North-Western Railway, a branch of which goes off from the main line at Bletchley to Bedford. The town consists chiefly of one long wide street, intersected by smaller ones at right angles, and is well built, paved, and lighted with gas. It has five parish churches, four of which are fine old Gothic edifices; the fifth is a recent erection in the Norman style. A district church was opened in 1841. There are also Independent, Methodist, and Baptist chapels, and a small Jewish synagogue. Bedford in proportion to its size has more public endowments than any other place in the kingdom, for which it is chiefly indebted to Sir W. Harper, Lord Mayor of London in 1661, who founded here a free school, and conveyed for its support, and for portioning poor maidens, a piece of ground in London, the overplus, if any, to be given to the poor. This ground has gradually risen in value so as now to produce nearly L14,000 annually. It supports a grammar and other schools, and 58 almshouses, besides large sums given annually as marriage portions, for apprenticing youths, and other benevolent purposes. In 1849 above L4000 were expended on the schools, L1,750 on the almshouses, L858 in apprentice fees, L400 in marriage portions, L179 in donations to servants, and upwards of L1,000 in other charities. The grammar-school has eight exhibitions of L80 per annum each, at Oxford, Cambridge, or Dublin. Among its public buildings are the county hall, the jail, built on the site of that in which Bunyan wrote his Pilgrim's Progress—house of correction, lunatic asylum, infirmary, Bedford library and subscription rooms, and the corn exchange. Its principal manufactures are straw-plait and lace; and a considerable trade is carried on with Lynn Regis, by means of the Ouse, in corn, malt, coals, timber, and iron. Market-days, for cattle, Monday, and for corn, Saturday. Bedford is governed by a mayor, 6 aldermen, and 18 councillors; and it sends two members to parliament. Pop. 1851, 11,693.

BEDFORD LEVEL, the name given to a flat district on the eastern coast of England, comprising the greater part (amounting to 450,000 acres) of the marshy district called the Fens, the whole isle of Ely in Cambridgeshire, and a portion of the south of that county, 30,000 acres of Suffolk, 63,000 acres of Norfolk, 57,000 of Huntingdon, about 8000 of Northamptonshire, and the south-eastern portion of Lincolnshire. The extent of the whole tract is 60 miles in length, from Milton in Cambridge to Toyn ton in Lincoln; its breadth is about 40 miles, from Peterborough in Northampton to Brandon in Suffolk. The boundary on three sides is of an irregular form, giving it something of a horse-shoe shape, with the opening terminated by the sea on the north.

This district obtained its present name from the agreement of Francis Earl of Bedford, the principal landholder, and thirteen other adventurers, with Charles I. in 1634, to drain the level, on condition of receiving 95,000 acres of the reclaimed land. This district has within historic periods undergone remarkable changes. In the time of the Romans it was a dense forest, which, as a stronghold of the Britons, those invaders destroyed. It then became a swamp, through which the lazy waters of the Ouse, the Welland, the Nene, and Wisbeach, crept to the sea. In the thirteenth century, the sea here, as in other parts of N.W. Europe, burst its Bedford, boundaries, and the inundated land became a pestilential swamp. The first attempt to drain this morass seems to have been made in the year 1436, and embankments and ditches were formed at a great expense. These, however, were swept away during the ensuing winter by the flooding of the river Ouse. Another partial attempt at drainage was made by Bishop Moreton in the reign of Henry VII., but this also proved a failure. An act was passed in the 44th year of Queen Elizabeth for effecting its reclamation; but the first effectual attempt at reclaiming it was not made until 1634, as already mentioned; and many embankments and canals were constructed at various intervals at an expense above one million sterling. Three years after the agreement of the Earl of Bedford and his partners with the king, after an outlay of £1,000,000 on the part of the company, the contract was annulled, on the fraudulent plea that the works were insufficient; and an offer was made by King Charles to undertake its completion on condition of receiving 57,000 acres in addition to the amount originally agreed on. This unjust attempt was frustrated by the breaking out of the civil war; and no further attempt at drainage was made till 1649, when the parliament reinstated the Earl of Bedford's successor in his father's rights. After an additional outlay of £300,000, the adventurers received 95,000 acres of reclaimed land, according to the contract, which however fell far short of repaying the expense of the undertaking. In 1664 a royal charter was obtained to incorporate the company, which still exists, and carries on the concern under a governor, 6 bailiffs, 20 conservators, and a commonalty, each of whom must possess 100 acres of land in the level, and has a voice in the election of officers. The conservators must each possess not less than 280 acres, the governor and bailiffs each 400 acres. The original adventurers had allotments of land according to their interest of the original 95,000 acres; but Charles II., on granting the charter, took care to secure to the crown a lot of 12,000 acres out of the 95,000, which, however, is held under the directors, whereas the allotments are not held in common, though subject to the laws of the corporation. The level was divided in 1697 into three parts, called the North, Middle, and South Levels, comprising respectively the tracts between the Welland and the Nene, the Nene and Old Bedford rivers, and the third between Old Bedford river and the southern limit of the level.

Since then extensive works have at different times been carried on to complete the drainage of this district; but the most effectual are under the Acts of 1827 and 1829, for "improving the outfall of the Nene," "The Navigation of the Wisbeach," and "The Embanking of the Salt Marshes between the canal called Kinderley Cut and the sea." Vessels of 60 tons burden can now come up to the town of Wisbeach at all tides, and those of from 100 to 200 tons at spring tides. The draining of the lower lands, which, like the Dutch Polders, are below low-water mark, was carried on by windmills; but these have now been almost superseded by steam-engines, with great advantage: in the North Level the drainage is effected by sluices without either windmills or steam-engines. As the result of these extensive operations, the level now abounds in rich pasture and corn lands. (Moore, Dodson, and Burrell, on the Bedford Level; Parliamentary Papers, 1827-29.)

Near, a seaport town of North America, state of Massachusetts, near the entrance of Buzzard's Bay, 51 miles S.S.E. of Boston, with which it is connected by railway. The city is built on a commanding elevation above the west bank of the Acushnet river, and presents a very handsome appearance. The principal public buildings are the town-hall, custom-house, court-house, and several churches. This city is mainly indebted for its prosperity to the whale fishery, to which it furnishes no less than two-thirds of the whole shipping so employed by the United States. Besides oil and candles, it has large manufactures of cordage, hoops, &c. The shipbuilding also is very considerable. Pop. (1850) 16,464.