The principal market at Bedford, held on day, on the north side of the river, is a considerable mart for corn. The Monday market, on the south side of the river, is chiefly for pigs. There are six annual fairs, besides a fair held in the vicinity at St Leonard's Farm.
It is generally supposed that Bedford is the Bed anford of the Saxon Chronicle, where the battle was fought between Cuthwulf and the Britons in 572 ; it is said to have been the burial place of Ma, king of the Mercians. According to Dooms day-book, it was taxed as half a hundred, both for soldiers and shipping. Before the Conquest, there was a collegiate church here, dedicated to St Paul. The celebrated John Bunyan was porter of an in dependent meeting-house in Mill Lane, from.167! WI his death in 1688. His memory is much revered by the congregation, and the chair in which he used to sit is preserved as a relic in the vestry. The Moravian have had an establishment at Bedford ever since the year 1745.
See Bachelor's AgrkulturalofBedfordshire; —Beayties of England and Vol. 1. --.Lyson's Magna Britannia, Vol. I. ;—Smith's Map of the Strata of England, with a Memoir. (c.) BEE.
' Tux Bee, from its singular instincts, its active in dustry, and the useful products resulting from its la bours, has, from the remotest times, attracted the attention, not only of naturalists, but of mankind in general. No nation upon earth has had so many historians as this tribe of insects. The patience and sagacity of the naturalist have had an ample field for exercise in the study of their struc tore, physiology, and domestic economy. Their preservation and increase have been objects of assi duous care to the agriculturist; and their reputed perfection of policy and government, have long been the theme of admiration, and have afforded copious materials for argument and allusion to the poet and the moralist in every age. It is a subject that has been celebrated and adorned by the muse of Virgil, as well as illustrated by the philosophic genius of Aristotle. Cicero and Pliny report that Aristomachus devoted himself during sixty years to the study of these insects ; and Phi liscus is said to have retired into a desert wood, that he might pursue his observations on them with out interruption. A prodigious number of authors have written express treatises on bees ; periodical works have been published relating exclusively to their management and economy ; and learned so cieties have been established for the sole purpose of conducting researches on this subject. The most
celebrated association of this kind is the Societe des Abeilles, founded about fifty years ago in Little Bautzen, a village in Upper Lusatia, under the aus pices of the Elector of Saxony. Its labours, as we shall presently find, have enriched the science with a number of valuable discoveries.
In so complicated a branch of natural history, the application of the difficult art of observing correct ly, and of the cautious processes of induction, can not be effected without laborious and long continued efforts. But, on the subject of bees, the inquirer after truth had, besides, many obstacles to encounter, from the very general diffusion of errors, which had been transmitted without due examination from one author to another. The history of the opinions of successive writers, will sufficiently prove how gra dual and how slow has been the advancement of real knowledge in what concerns these insects, and will teach us to estimate the value of that which we at length possess, as being the result of the labour of ages, and as being extorted from nature by indefa tigable and persevering exertions. So great an ac cumulation of curious and interesting facts, indeed, has accrued to us from the researches of Swammer darn, Maraldi, Reaumur, Schirach, and Huber, as to constitute almost a new science. Many of these have been discovered subsequent to the time of the compilation of the article BEE in the Encyclopaedia. It will therefore be proper, in this place, to give a connected and systematic account of the natural history of this remarkable insect. For the details of the external characters and distinctions of species, we shall refer to what has been already stated in the above article, and in that of ENTOMOLOGY. The principal features of their internal conformation will be described when treating of the particular functions to which they are more immediately subservient ; and our descriptions will apply, more especially, to the common and best known species, the Apia melli fica, which is the one particularly prized on account of the rich products it affords.