BELJAME, ALEXANDRE (1842-1906), French writer, was born at Villiers-le-Bel, Seine-et-Oise. He spent part of his childhood in England and was a frequent visitor in London. His lectures on English literature at the Sorbonne, where a chair was created expressly for him, did much to promote the study of English in France. In 1905-06 he was Clark lecturer on English literature at Trinity college, Cambridge. His best known book, Le Public et les hommes de lettres en Angleterre au siecle (1881), a masterly study of the conditions of literary life in Eng land in the 18th century illustrated by the lives of Dryden, Addi son and Pope, was crowned by the French Academy on the appear ance of the second edition in 1897. He was a good Shakespearian scholar, and his editions of Macbeth, Othello and Julius Caesar also received an academic prize in 1902.