Plymouth had wings, to intimate that he flew away with more velocity than he approached mankind. Pneumonia Its To secure safe an and parliamentary borough of Eng- a Plymouth, a town and county-seat of Plymouth co., Mass.; on Plymouth Bay, 37 miles S. E. of Boston. Plymouth is of importance as the spot where the Pilgrim Fathers landed on Dec. 21, 1620. A portion of the rock on which they first stepped has been placed in front of Pilgrim Hall, in Plymouth Brethren, body which are preserved old books, paintings, pictures, and other valuable rel- which arose almost simultaneously in ics. The rock itself is in Water Dublin and Plymouth, about 1830, Street, and is covered by a handsome and, as they called themselves "The granite canopy. Plymouth also has Brethren," outsiders came to know 66 'Plymouth Brethren " from the National monument, 81 feet high, them as erected to the Pilgrims at a cost of the town where they had fixed their $200,000, and dedicated in 1889. Pop.headquarters. Their communities are of what is known as the Evangelical (1900) 9,592; (1910) 12,141. Calvinistic type. They baptize all adults, whether previously baptized or not, and observe the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper weekly. There are four bodies in the United States, with 10,566 members. 1620 PLYMOUTH ROCK. Pneumatic Dispatch, propulsion by means of compressed air or by forming a vacuum. Propulsion by compressed air has of recent years been successfully applied to a variety of practical uses. Parcels are thus conveyed, and internal communication in warehouses, hotels, etc., is carried on by its means. New York, Phila delphia, and other American cities use a pneumatic mail dispatching system. Plymouth, a town and county-seat The pneumatic dispatch plant conof Washington co., N. C.; on a small nected with the Philadelphia postoffice creek, a few miles S. of the Roanoke is in many respects the most complete Albemarle plant of the sort in the world. It has river, where it enters Sound; 105 miles E. of Raleigh. It been in use since Feb. 17, 1893. In fell into the hands of the Federal the annual report of the Postmastertroops early in 1862, and was taken General to Congress for 1901, he adin April, 1864, by the Confederates vocated the increased use of the pneuwith the aid of the iron-clad ram "Al-matic dispatch service throughout the States. See ATMOSPHERIC bemarle." The "Albemarle " was blown up with a torpedo by Lieut. W. B. Cushing on Oct. 27, and on Oct. 31 Plymouth was reoccupied. United Pneumatic Gun, a gun operated by compressed air. The firing is done by pulling a lanyard. Plymouth, a borough in Luzerne county, Pa.; on the Susquehanna Pneumatics, the science which river and the Delaware, Lackawanna treats of the mechanical properties of & Western railroad; 4 miles W. of air and other gases, investigating their Wilkesbarre; is in the Wyoming Val-weight, pressure, elasticity, condensa ley; has large coal mines nearby; and contains collieries, hosiery mills, and manufactories of mining machinery. Pop. (1910) 16,996. Plymouth, a seaport, municipal tion, etc. Air being a vehicle of sound, pneumatics includes also the science of acoustics. Pneumonia, inflammation of the lung, usually caused by exposure to Po cold or wet, a cold draught or chill after being overheated, injury to the chest, irritation, or as a secondary affection in smallpox, typhoid or puerperal fever, and other low wasting dis eases. Po, the largest river of Italy, rises on Monte Viso, one of the Cottian Alps, at an altitude of 6,405 feet, close to the French frontier. It has an entire length of 360 miles, and drains an area of nearly 28,900 square miles. Below Piacenza its stream has from ante-Roman days been artificially embanked along great stretches with double lines of embankments on each side. Poet Laureate to a neighboring tribe, she was seized, and held as a hostage by the English, as a safeguard against the hostility of her tribe. While on shipboard she became acquainted with, and married John Rolfe, an Englishman, who took her to England, where, in 1616, she was presented at court. She had one son,,, from whom numerous wealthy families of Virginia claim descent. She died in England, in 1617, while preparing to return to America. Pochard or Poachard, a duck. inhabiting the Arctic regions. Its cry has been compared to a serpent's hiss. Its flight is more rapid than that of the wild duck. Pococke, Richard, an English traveler; born in Southampton, England, in 1704, and educated there and at Corpus Christi College, Oxford. He was the pioneer of Alpine travel. He died very suddenly in Charleville, near Tullamore, Sept. 15, 1765. Podargus, a genus of Australasian nocturnal birds of the goatsucker family. By day they are drowsy. Podophyllum, the May apple, called also the wild lemon. The fruit is eatable. Poaching, the trespassing on another's property for the purpose of killing or stealing game or fish. While nearly every State, if not every one, has game laws, they are enacted in the public interest, and bear no similarity to the game laws of Great Britain, which are feudal in their character, and intended to reserve for the wealthy alone the recreations of hunting and fishing. Poaching in the English sense is unknown in America. In England when a person's land adjoins a stream where there is no ebb and flow that person is assumed to have an exclusive right to fish in the stream as far as his land extends, and up to the middle of the stream; and so also when a person's land incloses a pond, the fish in that pond belong to him. Where several properties are contiguous to the same lake the right of fishing in that lake belongs to the proprietors, in proportion_to the value of their respective titles. Ex-reer. clusive right of fishing in a public river, that is, one in which there is ebb and flow up to the tidal limit, or a portion of the sea, is held by some proprietors by virtue of royal franchises granted prior to the Magna Charta. Pocahontas, daughter of Powhatan, a powerful Indian chief of Virginia; born about 1595. She displayed a friendliness toward the British colonists, first at 12 years of age, in saving the life of Capt. John Smith, who had been captured and condemned to death by her father, and on several occasions making known to the English their danger when about to be attacked. In 1612, while on a visit Poe, Edgar Allan, an Americau poet and story-writer; born in Boston, Jan. 19, 1809. Left an orphan early, he was adopted by John Allan, of Richmond, Va., and at the age of 19 left this home and published his first volume of verse at Boston. He was a cadet at the United States Military Academy, 1830-1831; and subsequently embarked on a literary ca He was one of the most remarkable characters in literature, gifted with genius, but apparently without any genuine sense of moral obligation to friends and benefactors. His place among American poets, however, will always be high. Poe died in Baltimore, Md., Oct. 7, 1849. Poet Laureate, an office in the household of the sovereigns of Great Britain. The first appointment of a poet laureate dates from the reign of Edward IV., the first patent being granted in 1630. It was formerly the duty of the poet laureate to write an ode on the birthday of the monarch, but this custom has been discontinued since the reign of George III. Among those who have held this office are Poetry Poland Dryden, Southey, Wordsworth, and Poison Ivy, a climbing shrub, a Tennyson. Alfred Austin is the pres-species of sumac, resembling the woodent incumbent. bine, and very irritating to sensitive Poetry, that one of the fine arts skins. Bathing the irritated parts which has for its object the creation of with camphorated oil, vinegar, butterintellectual pleasure by the use of im- milk, or with a decoction of sweet aginative and passionate language, fern leaves, steeped in boiling water, which is generally, though not necesare alleviating remedies. sarily, formed in regular measure; the art of producing illusions of the imag- geometer; born in Pithiviers, departination by means of language. Also ment of Loiret, June 21, 1781. He poetical, imaginative, or passionate was one of the founders of the science language or compositions, whether ex- of mathematical physics. He died pressed rhythmically or in prose. Thus, April 25, 1840. many parts of the prose translations of the Bible are genuine poetry. Poincare, Raymond, a French statesman; born at Bar-le-Duc, France, Aug. 20, 1860: entered political life as a Deputy in 1886: was successively Minister of Agriculture, Public Instruction, and Finance; vice-president of the Chamber of Deputies for four years; became Premier and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jan. 14, 1912; and was elected President of the French Republic, for the term of seven years, Jan. 17, 1913. Poison. Any agent which, when introduced into the animal organism, is capable of producing a morbid or deadly effect upon it. Antidotes vary with the kinds of poisons. In cases of poisoning by acrid and corrosive substances, the fatty, mucilaginous substances, as oil, milk, etc., sheathe and protect the coats of the stomach and bowels against the operation of poison. Against metallic poisons, substances are employed which form with the poison insoluble compounds, such as freshly prepared hydrated oxide of iron, or dialysed iron for arsenic, albumin (white of egg) for mercury. Lime, chalk, and magnesia are the best reme dies for powerful acids. Prussic acid is neutralized by alkalies and freshly precipitated oxide of iron. To arouse those poisoned by opium, use coffee and ammonia, and belladonna as an antagonistic drug. Chloral-hydrate poisoning is similarly treated; and for strychnia or nux vomica, animal charcoal in water and chloral-hydrate are used. Poisoning was common in ancient Rome, and in France and Italy during the 17th century, and recent American criminal records furnish noted cases of poisoning by use of the mail. Poisson, Simeon-Denis, a French Pokeweed, a North American branching herbaceous plant, which is and Asia; the young shoots are somenaturalized in some parts of Europe times eaten in the United States as asparagus. kingdom situated in the N. E. of EuPoland, once a large and important rope; now expunged from all maps as an independent country. It was the most level country in Europe, the Carpathian Mountains on the S. and W. being the only mountain range of any height in the kingdom. The rivers of chief note are the Vistula, Bug, Niemen, Dwina, Dnieper, and Dniester, either flowing into the Baltic or the Euxine. The principal mineral products are iron, lead, gold, and silver, with salt, which last, from the abundance of the yield, and the size and richness of the mines, was considered as the natural wealth of the country. The climate is extremely cold, humid, and unhealthy; the soil generally fertile. Cattle and wheat are still the chief agricultural products. Poland was anciently divided into 12 prov inces, each of which was governed by "Palatine." The a chief, called a Poles were originally a tribe of Vandals, whose history is quite unknown before the 6th century. From the 13th century, the Poles became the most the time when the Turks first crossed warlike nation in Europe, and from the Hellespont and settled in Greece, Poland was denominated the shield of Eastern Europe. In 1674, John Sobieski was advanced to the kingly dignity, and under him the Polish arms acquired a glory that eclipsed all other nations of that age. Sobieski formed a league with the Emperor Leopold, and when that monarch had been defeated, and his capital on the point of Poland Pole Polar Circles, two imaginary cir cles of the earth parallel to the equa tor. falling into the hands of the Turks, best known. It is found over the Sobieski advanced to Vienna, raised whole of Greenland, but its numbers the siege, and, defeating the invaders, are decreasing, as it is regularly drove them back in rout to Constanti-hunted for the sake of its skin. It is nople. The war of succession that quite white when young, changing to succeeded, between Charles XII. of a creamy tint in maturity. Sweden and Frederic Augustus of Saxony, almost ruined the kingdom and hastened its fatal end. Count Poniatowski who, in 1764, was elected to the throne by the name of Stanislaus Augustus, was the last King of Poland. Under this unfortunate sovereign, the country became the theater of a long and devastating war; and Poland was divided between Catherine of Russia, Joseph II., Emperor of Germany, and Frederic of Prussia. This partition of an ancient nation was perpetrated in 1772. In 1795, a further dismemberment was effected between the three great powers, and the whole of Poland absorbed, except the ancient city of Cracow, with a few miles of adjacent country, which was left to point to future ages where the once warlike nation of Poland stood on the physical map of Europe. Of the three spoilers of Poland, Russia possesses the largest share of territory and population. Frequent insurrec tions have occurred. In 1864, Poland was deprived of its administrative independence, and in 1868 was incorporated with Russia. There are two parties, Nationalists and Socialists, both opposed to the Russian government. Pop. (1909) 11,671,800. i. e., bestowing the quality of polarity Polarization, the act of polarizing or opposing poles. In galvanism, the production of a secondary current in a galvanic battery contrary to the chemical change in the elements of the principal one, owing to the gradual battery. This change weakens, or may even destroy, the original current. ethereal undulations which cause the In optics, a state into which the sensation of light are brought under certain conditions. These undulations are perpendicular to the line of transmission of the wave, as in a stretched cord, but in a ray of common light, appear to take place successively in all directions, the vibrations successively passing through rectilinear, elliptical, and circular phases with inconceivable rapidity. If the vibrations become, or are rendered, stable in any one form of orbit, the light is in the condition known as polarized. Pole, in astronomy, one of the twe points in which the axis of the earth is supposed to meet the sphere of the heavens. Pole, Reginald, Cardinal, a Poland, John Scroggs, an Ameri- British statesman and Archbishop of can military officer; born in Princeton, Canterbury in the reign of Queen Ind., Oct. 14, 1836; was graduated at Mary, descended from the blood royal the United States Military Academy of England; born in Stourton Castle, and appointed a 2d lieutenant in 1861; in Staffordshire, in 1500. He was served through the Civil War; was as educated at Sheen Monastery and sistant Professor of Geography, His- Magdalen College, Oxford; and after tory, Ethics and Drawing at the United States Military Academy in went to Italy, where he long resided. obtaining preferment in the Church, 1865-1869; and was chief of the De- On his return to England he opposed partment of Law at the United States the divorce of Henry VIII. from CathInfantry and Cavalry School, Fort erine of Aragon in such earnest terms, Leavenworth, Kan., in 1881-1886. At that the king drove him from his presthe beginning of the war with Spain ence, and never saw him more. (1898) he was commissioned a Briga- again left England, was made a cardidier-General of volunteers and com-nal in December, 1536, and had the manded the 2d division, 1st Army offer of the popedom on the death of Corps, stationed at Chickamauga Paul III. When Mary ascended the Park, Ga. He died in Asheville, N. C., Aug. 8, 1898. Polar Bear, the largest individual of the family Ursidae, and one of the He throne, Pole returned to England as legate, in which capacity he absolved the Parliament from their sin of heresy, and reconciled the nation to the Polecat Holy See. The very day after the burning of Cranmer, the cardinal was consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury. He survived the queen but one day, and died Nov. 18, 1558. Polecat, one of the Mustelinæ, akin to the marten, but with a broader head, a blunter snout, and a much shorter tail. It has a shorter neck and a stouter body than the weasel. Two glands near the root of the tail emit a highly offensive smell. It makes immense havoc in poultry yards, rabbit warrens, and among hares and partridges, killing everything which it can overpower. POLECAT. Pole Star, Polaris, a bright star at the tip of the tail of Ursa Minor, and in a line with the pointers Merak and Dubhe, the two stars constituting the front of the plowlike figure in Ursa Major. The pole star is really a double star of yellow hue, but while the larger or visible one is between the second and third magnitude, its companion is only of the ninth, and therefore a telescopic star. There is no corresponding star in the Southern Hemisphere. Police, a system of judicial and executive administration of a country, especially concerned with the maintenance of the quiet and good order of society. In a more limited sense, the administration of the laws, by-laws, and regulations of a city. The designation, also, of a body of men, not military, appointed to enforce state and municipal laws, and preserve the peace. Political Economy, the science which investigates the nature of wealth and the laws of its production and distribution, including the operation of Polk causes by which the condition of mankind in respect to this object of hu man desire, is made prosperous or the reverse. Inquiries on these points must have existed from the earliest times in every nation, but political economy as a science is dated from re cent times. Political Offenses, those offenses considered injurious to the safety of the state. In modern times the crimes considered political offenses have varied at different periods and in different states. In the United States and in most of the countries of Europe, extradition treaties do not include giving up political offenders. Political Parties, divisions of people in a State marked off by the par ticular views they hold as to the pub lic policy to be pursued in the best interests of the people at large. In the United States the chief political parties are the Democrats and the Re publicans. Politics, the science which treats of the distribution of power in a country. Popularly, the political sentiments of an individual, his procedure in promoting the interests of his party. Polk, James Knox, an American statesman, 11th President of the United States, born in Mecklenburg co., N. C., Nov. 2, 1795. His ancestors, who bore the name Pollock, emigrated from the W. of Ireland early in the 18th century. He was educated at the University of Nashville, Tenn., to which State his father had removed in 1806, and was admitted to the bar in 1820. In 1823 he was sent to the Tennessee Legislature, and in 1824 to Congress, to which body he was reëlected for seven successive terms, serving till 1839. He was made chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means in 1833, and twice elected Speaker of the House-1835-1837. In Congress he was consistently a Democrat, supporting unwaveringly the administration of Jackson and Van Buren, and opposing that of Adams. In 1839 he was elected governor of Tennessee, and in 1844 unexpectedly nominated as a compromise candidate of the National Democratic Convention for the presidency, and elected over Henry Clay, the Whig candidate. His administration was eventful, and in some respects |