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BRIENZ, LAKE OF, in the Swiss canton of Bern, the first lake into which the river Aar expands. It lies in a deep hollow between the village of Brienz on the east (2580 inhabitants, the chief centre of the Swiss wood-carving industry) and, on the west, Bönigen (1515 inhabitants), close to Interlaken. Its length is about 9 m., its width 1˝ m., and its maximum depth 856 ft., while its area is 11˝ sq. m., and the surface is 1857 ft. above the sea-level. On the south shore are the Giessbach Falls and the hamlet of Iseltwald. On the north shore are a few small villages. The character of the lake is gloomy and sad as compared with its neighbour, that of Thun. Its chief affluent is the Lütschine (flowing from the valleys of Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen). The first steamer was placed on the lake in 1839.
(W. A. B. C.)
BRIERLEY, BENJAMIN (1825-1896), English weaver and writer in Lancashire dialect, was born near Manchester, the son of humble parents, and started life in a textile factory, educating himself in his spare time. At about the age of thirty he began to contribute articles to local papers, and the republication of some of his sketches of Lancashire character in A Summer Day in Daisy Nook (1859) attracted attention. In 1863 he definitely took to journalism and literature as his work, publishing in 1863 his Chronicles of Waverlow, and in 1864 a long story called The Layrock of Langley Side (afterwards dramatized), followed by others. He started in 1869 Ben Brierley's Journal, a weekly, which continued till 1891, and he gave public readings from his own writings, visiting America in 1880 and 1884. His various Ab-o'-th'-Yate sketches (about America, London, &c.), and his pictures of Lancashire common life were very popular, and were collected after his death. In 1884 he lost his savings by the failure of a building society, and a fund was raised for his support. He died on the 18th of January 1896, and two years later a statue was erected to him in Queen's Park, Manchester.
BRIERLY, SIR OSWALD WALTERS (1817-1894), English marine painter, who came of an old Cheshire family, was born at Chester. He entered Sass's art-school in London, and after studying naval architecture at Plymouth he exhibited some drawings of ships at the Royal Academy in 1839. He had a passion for the sea, and in 1841 started round the world with Benjamin Boyd (1796-1851), afterwards well known as a great Australian squatter, in the latter's ship "Wanderer," and having got to New South Wales, made his home at Auckland for ten years. Brierly Point is called after him. He added to his sea experiences by voyages on H.M.S. "Rattlesnake" in 1848, and with Sir Henry Keppel on the "Meander" in 1850; he returned to England in 1851 on this ship, and illustrated Keppel's book about his cruise (1853). He was again with Keppel during the Crimean War, and published in 1855 a series of lithographs illustrating "The English and French fleets in the Baltic." He was now taken up by Queen Victoria and other members of the royal family, and was attached to the suites of the duke of Edinburgh and the prince of Wales on their tours by sea, the results being seen in further marine pictures by him; and in 1874 he was made marine-painter to the queen. He exhibited at the
