Berg
a Norwegian explorer and lecturer, born in Christiania, in 1864, his mother being English and his father a Scandinavian. He went to sea at an early age, but returned to go to college.
In 1898 he went to Australia, joined the Survey Department, and scaled Mount Lindsay. In 1894-1895 he was in Antarctic waters, a region fully explored by him in 1897, when he attempted to reach the South Pole without success. In 1899 (Feb. 17) he had, however, reached Robertson Bay. Returning to London in 1900 he reported having reached lat. 78.- 50 S., long. 195.50 E., the farthest point S. ever reached by by man. Consult his book, "First in the Antarctic Continent."
BORDEAUX (bor-dō'), a city and port of France, capital of the department of Gironde, on the Caronne river, about 70 miles from the sea. It is built in a crescent form round a bend of the river, which is here lined with fine quays and crossed by a magnificent stone bridge, and consists of an old and a new town.
The former is mostly composed of irregular squares and narrow, crooked streets; while the latter is laid out with great regularity, and on a scale of magnificence hardly surpassed by any provincial town in Europe. In the old town are the Cathedral of St. André, St.
Michael's Church, with its superb front of florid Gothic, the Hotel de Ville, and the Palais de Justice. There are extensive and finely planted promenades. Its position gives it admirable facilities for trade, and enables it to rank next the tonnage employed. Large vessels sail up to the town. The chief exports are wine and brandy; sugar and other colonial produce and wood are the chief imports. Shipbuilding is the chief industry, and there are sugar refineries, woolen and cotton mills, potteries, soap works, distilleries, etc. Bordeaux is the Burdigala of the Romans. By the marriage of Eleanor, daughter of the last Duke of Aquitaine to Henry II. of England, Bordeaux was transferred to the English crown. Under Charles VII., in 1451, it was restored again to France.
Montaigne and Montesquieu were born in the neighborhood; the latter is buried in the Church of St. Bernard. In the World War (1914-1918) Bordeaux became a great military port for the Allies, where troops were concentrated and supplies for the armies were received. Pop. about 262,000.