whom this town is indebted for many of its embellishments. Plombieres is celebrated for its mineral and warm springs, which have acquired These springs ap a very extensive reputation. pear to have been known to the Romans, and for several centuries they have been frequented by invalids from all parts of the world. There are four distinct baths supplied from different springs; the temperature varies from 32° to 56°. There are besides these two saponaceous springs, one iron, and several vapor stoves. These waters are used for drinking, washing, and bathing; they are very clear and colorless, without any peculiar taste. They are chiefly beneficial in palsy and external pains, obstinate ulcers, and cutaneous disorders, and are taken from the month of May to the end of September. There are manufactories of cutlery here and other articles of iron and polished steel, tool and nail factories, cotton-spinning mills, paper-mills, forges, &c. A trade is carried on in cherry-water. Plombieres is twelve miles south-west of Remiremont, fifteen N. N. E. of Luxeuil, fifty-four west of Bourbonne, and 309 E. S. E. of Paris.

PLOMO, in metallurgy, is a name given by the Spaniards, who have the care of the silver mines, to the silver ore when found adhering to the surface of stones, and when it incrusts their cracks and cavities like small grains of gun-powder. Though these grains are few in number, and the rest of the stone has no silver in it, yet they are esteemed a certain token that there is a rich vein near it. And if in digging forwards they still meet with these grains, or the plomo in greater quantity, it is a certain sign that they are getting nearer to the rich vein. PLOT, n. s., v. n., & v. a. Or PLAT, which PLOTTER, n. s. S see. Sax. plat. A small piece of ground; a plantation: hence plan; scheme; and hence (or from Fr. complot) a conspiracy; intrigue: to form mischievous schemes; contrive; to plan in any way; describe ichnographically: a plotter is, a contriver; conspirator; schemer.

This liketh moory plots, delights in sedgy bowers. Drayton

The count tells the marquis of a flying noise, that tne prince did plot to be secretly gone; to which the marquis answered, that though love had made his highness steal out of his country, yet fear would never make him run out of Spain. Wotton. This treatise plotteth down Cornwall, as it now standeth, for the particulars.

Carew's Survey of Cornwall. Easy seems the thing to every one, That nought could cross their plot or them suppress.

Who says he was not
A man of much plot,

May repent that false accusation;
Having plotted and penned
Six plays to attend

The farce of his negociation. Frustrate all our plots and wiles.

Daniel.

Denham. Milton.

He who envies now thy state, Who now is plotting how he may seduce Thee from obedience. Milton's Paradise Lost. Nothing must be sung between the acts, But what some way conduces to the plot.

Roscommon.

The wolf that round the' inclosure prowled To leap the fence, now plots not on the fold. Dryden. With shame and sorrow filled; Shame for his folly; sorrow out of time For plotting an unprofitable crime. Colonel, we shall try who's the greater plotter of us two; I against the state, or you against the petticoat.

Id.

Id.

Weeds grow not in the wild uncultivated waste, but in garden plots under the negligent hand of a gardener. Locke.

O think what anxious moments pass between The birth of plots, and their last fatal periods! O'tis a dreadful interval of time,

Made up of horrour all, and big with death! Addison. They deny the plot to be tragical, because its catastrophe is a wedding, which hath ever been accounted comical. Gay.

Our author Produced his play, and begged the knight's advice, Made him observe the subject and the plot, The manners, passions, unities, what not? Pope. If the plot or intrigue must be natural, and such as springs from the subject, then the winding up of the plot must be a probable consequence of all that went before. Id.

PLOT (Robert), LL.D., a learned antiquarian and philosopher, born at Sutton-barn, in the parish of Borden in Kent, in 1641. He studied in Magdalen Hall, and afterwards in University College, Oxford. In 1682 he was elected secretary of the Royal Society, and published the Philosophical Transactions from No. 143 to No. 166 inclusive. The next year Elias Ashmole, Esq., appointed him first keeper of his

museum, and about the same time the vice-chancellor nominated him first professor of chemistry in the university of Oxford. In 1687 he was made secretary to the earl marshal, and in 1688 historiographer to king James II. In 1690 he resigned his professorship of chemistry, and also his place of keeper of the museum, to which he presented a very large collection of natural curiosities; which were those he had described in the histories of Oxfordshire and Staffordshire; the former published at Oxford in 1677, folio; reprinted with additions and corrections in 1705; the latter in the same size in 1686. In January 1694-5, Henry Howard, earl Marshal, nominated him Mowbray-herald extraordinary; and, on the 30th of April 1696, he died of the stone at his house in Borden. Amongst several MSS. which he left were large materials for the Natural History of Kent, Middlesex, and London. He also published De origine fontium tentamen philosophicum, 8vo.; and nine papers in the Philosophical Transactions.

PLOTINA POMPEIA, a Roman lady who was married to the emperor Trajan, when he was in a private station. She accompanied him and shared his honors when he was elected emperor, and became celebrated for her humanity, affability, and liberality to the poor. She accompanied Trajan in his expedition to the east, and on his death brought back his ashes to Rome, where she was treated by Adrian with all the honors due to her dignity and virtue. She died A. D.

122.

PLOTINUS, a Platonic philosopher of the third century, born at Licopolis, in Egypt, A. D. 204. He attended some of the most famous professors of philosophy in Alexandria. But, upon hearing Ammonius, he became so fond of his system, that he studied under him for eleven years. He then travelled for farther improvement into Persia and India, and followed the Roman army, in 243, when the emperor Gordian set out on his unfortunate expedition against the Persians, in which he lost his life, and our philosopher narrowly escaped sharing his fate. In 244 he returned to Rome, where he read philosophical lectures, which were attended by people of all ranks, patricians and plebeians, and rendered him very popular. Among other learned pupils, the celebrated Porphyry attended him six years; and his reputation for integrity and virtue, as well as learning, became so great, that his arbitration was often applied for, to decide or prevent law-suits; and many persons of property, when dying, left their children to his tutorage, and their estates to his care. The emperor Gallienus and his empress Salonina had so great esteem for him, that they once intended to rebuild the city of Campania, and assign it over, with its territory, to Plotinus, to be colonised by a set of philosophers, upon the plan of Plato's republic; but were dissuaded by some of the courtiers. The philosophical opinions of Plotinus were rather remarkable. He not only entertained the utmost contempt for all terrestrial enjoyments, but despised matter so philosophically, that he was ashamed that his soul was obliged to be lodged in a body, which he considered as a prison. From this principle he lived

very abstemiously, and slept very little, and hence there is reason to believe his brain was in some degree affected; for, though a Pagan to the end of his life, he pretended to many of those visions and illuminations by the Deity, which the superstitious devotees in all ages and religions have boasted of. In short he boasted that he not only had a familiar dæmon or angel, like Socrates, but that he had even often been united to the Deity himself. Yet of this Deity he appears to have entertained very confused notions. Full of romantic metaphysical ideas and uncertaintities, he died, A. D. 570, aged sixty-six, with these words: I am laboring with all my might to return the divine part of me to that Divine Whole which fills the universe!' He left fifty-four treatises on various subjects, which his disciple Porphyry collected and arranged in six Enneades, or volumes, of nine tracts each; and published with his life. Marsilius Ficinus, at the desire of Cosmo de Medicis, translated this work into Latin, which was published at Basil in 1559, and reprinted along with the Greek in 1580, folio.

He

PLOTIUS TUCCA, a learned Roman, who flourished in the Augustan age, and was intimate with the literati of that dignified period. was particularly the friend of Horace, Mæcenas, and with Virgil, who left him his heir. Augustus appointed him, together with Varius, to review Virgil's Eneid.

PLOTUS, or darter, in ornithology, a genus of birds belonging to the order palmipedes. The bill is long and sharp-pointed; the nostrils are merely a long slit placed near the base; the face and the chin are bare of feathers; the neck is very long, and the legs are short. They have four toes webbed together.

1. P. anhinga, the white-bellied darter, is not quite so big as a mallard; but its length from the point of the bill to the end of the tail is ten inches. The bill is three inches long, straight and pointed, the color is grayish, with a yellowish base, the neck long and slender, the upper part of the back and scapulars are of a dusky black color, the middle of the feathers is dashed with white, the lower part of the back, &c., is of a fine black color, the under parts from the breast are silvery white, the smaller wing-coverts and those in the middle are dusky black, the larger ones are spotted with white, and the outer ones are plain black, the tail-feathers are twelve, broad, long, and glossy black, the legs and toes are of a yellowish-gray. This species inhabit Brasil, and are exceedingly expert in catching fish. Like the cormorant, they build nests on trees, and roost in them at night. They are scarcely ever seen on the ground; being always on the highest branches of trees on the water, or such as grow in the moist savannas on river sides. When at rest, they sit with the neck drawn in between the shoulders like the heron. The flesh is in general very fat, but has an oily, rank, and disagreeable taste, like that of a gull.

2. P. Cayennensis, the anhinga of Cayenne, black-bellied anhinga, is as large as a common duck, with a very long neck and a long sharppointed straight bill. The upper part of the bill is of a pale blue, and the lower is reddish;

With speed we plough the watery way, My power shall guard thee. Pope's Odyssey. A ploughboy that has never seen any thing but thatched houses, and his parish church, imagines that thatch belongs to the very nature of a house.

Watts's Logick. In ancient times the sacred plough employed The kings and awful fathers. Thomson.

At the plough, scythe, or reap-hook, I feared no competitor, and thus I set absolute want at defiance; and, as I never cared farther for my labours than while I was in actual exercise, I spent the evenings in the way after my own heart. Burns.

Peace be to those (such peace as earth can give) Who live in pleasure (dead e'en while they live); Born capable indeed of heavenly truth; But down to latest age, from earliest youth, Their mind a wilderness through want of care, The plough of wisdom never entering there. Cowper. PLOUGH is by others defined, a machine for turning up the soil by the action of cattle, contrived to save the time, labor, and expense, which, without this instrument, must have been employed in digging the ground, and fitting it for receiving all sorts of seeds. See RURAL

ECONOMY.

PLOUGH MONDAY, the first Monday after Twelfth-day, appears to have received this name because it was the first day after Christmas that husbandmen resumed the plough. In some of the northern and midland counties they still draw the plough on this day in procession to the doors of the villagers and towns-people. Long ropes are attached to it, and thirty or forty men, stripped to their clean white shirts, but protected from the weather by waistcoats beneath, drag it along. Their arms and shoulders are decorated with gay-colored ribands, tied in large knots and bows, and their hats are smartened in the same way. They are usually accompanied by an old woman, or a boy dressed up to represent one; she is gaily bedizened, and called the Bessy. Sometimes the sport is assisted by a humorous countryman to represent a fool. He is covered with ribands, and attired in skins, with a depending tail, and carries a box to collect money from the spectators. They are attended by music, and Morris-dancers when they can be got; but there is always a sportive dance with a few lasses in all their finery, and a superabundance of ribands. When this merriment is well managed it is very pleasing. The money collected is spent at night in conviviality.

Blomfield's History of Norfolk tends to clear the origin of these annual processions. Anciently, a light called the plough-light, was maintained by old and young persons who were husbandmen, before images in some churches, and on Plough Monday they had a feast, and went about with a plough and dancers to get money to support the plough-light. The reformation put out these lights; but the practice of going about with the plough begging for money remains, and the money for light' increases the income of the village alehouse.

PLOWDEN (Edmund), serjeant at law, the son of Humphrey Plowden of Plowden, in Shropshire, of an ancient and genteel family. He was first a student at the university of Cambridge, where he studied philosophy and medicine for three years. He then removed to Oxford, where, having studied about four years more, in 1552 he was admitted to the practice of physic and surgery; but afterwards gave up both, entered the Middle Temple, and began to study the law. Wood says, that in 1557 he was summer reader to that society, and Lent reader three years after, being then serjeant. He died in 1584, aged sixty-seven. He married the daughter of William Sheldon, of Boley, in Worcestershire; by whom he had a son, who died soon after his father. He wrote, 1. Commentaries or Reports of divers Cases, &c., in the reigns of king Edward VI., queen Mary, and queen Elizabeth, London, 1571, &c., in the old Norman language. 2. Queries, or a Moot-book of cases, &c., translated, methodised, and enlarged, by H. B. of Lincoln's Inn, London, 1662, 8vo.

PLUCHE (Antony), an elegant writer, born at Rheims in 1688, who obtained by his engaging manners and proficiency in the belles lettres the appointment of humanist in the university of that city. Two years after he obtained the professor of rhetoric's chair, and was admitted into holy orders. Clermont, bishop of Laon, informed of his talents, gave him the direction of the college of his episcopal city; but some particular political opinions obliged him to resign his office. The intendant of Rouen, at the request of the celebrated Rollin, entrusted him Rouen he went to Paris, where, by the patronage with the education of his son. After having left of some literary friends, and his own writings, he acquired great reputation. He published, 1. Le Spectacle de la Nature (Nature Displayed), in 9 vols. in 12mo., a work equally instructive and entertaining. 2. Histoire du Ciel, or History of the Heavens, in 2 vols. in 12mo., in two parts. translated with this title, La Mecanique des 3. De Linguarum artificio; a work which he Langues, in 12mo. 4. Harmony of the Psalms and the Gospel, or a Translation of the Psalms and Hymns of the Church, with notes relative to the Vulgate, the Septuagint, and Hebrew Text; Paris, 1764, 12mo. In 1749 abbé Pluche retired to Varenne, St. Maure, where he gave himself entirely up to devotion and study, and where he died of an apoplexy, on the 20th of November 1761, aged seventy-three.

PLUCK, v. a. & n. s. Į Saxon ploccian, PLUCKER, n. s. Slyccan; Teut.pflucken; Belg. plocken. To pull with violence; snatch ; draw; force up or down; strip of plumage; it has various adjuncts as away, down, oft, on, up, &c. To pluck up heart or spirit,' is a prover bial expression for taking up or resuming courage as a noun substance a pull; art of plucking a plucker is one who pulls violently or plucks.

I come to thee from plume-plucked Richard. Id. Thou setter up and plucker down of kings! Id. Birds kept coming and going all day; but so few at a time that the man did not think them worth a pluck. L'Estrange.

Pull it as soon as you see the seed begin to grow brown, at which time let the pluckers tie it up in handfuls. Mortimer.

Were the ends of the bones dry, they could not, without great difficulty, obey the plucks and attractions of the motory muscles. Ray on the Creation. Dispatch 'em quick, but first pluck out their tongues,

Lest with their dying breath they sow sedition.

are called hawse plugs, the latter shot plugs, and are formed of various sizes, in proportion to the holes made by the different sizes of shot, which battle. They are always kept ready for this may penetrate the ship's sides or bottom in

purpose.

PLUKENET (Leonard), an English physician, born in 1642, one of the most excellent and laborious botanists of any age. He was author of Phytographia Plucenetiana, a work much esteemed; Almagesticum Britannicum; and other works of the kind, on which he spent the greatest part of his life and fortune. He was appointed superintendant of the garden at Hampton Court, by Charles II., with the title of royal professor of botany. He died about 1706. London in 6 vols. folio, in 1720. Ilis Opera Botanica, with cuts, were printed at

PLUKENETIA, in botany, a genus of the monadelphia order, and monœcia class of plants; natural order thirty-eighth, tricocca. PLUM, n. s. PLUM-PORRIDGE,

Sax. plum, plumrɲeop; Dan. blumme. (Perhaps, says Mr. Thomson, from what we call its bloom or blue color). Improperly written plumb. A fruit with a stone. See PRUNUS. In the cant of the city, as Johnson says, a hundred thousand pounds. A porridge made with plums.

I will dance, and eat plums at your wedding. Shakspeare.

He crammed them till their guts did ache With caudle, custard, and plumcake. Hudibras. Philosophers in vain enquired, whether the summum bonum consisted in riches, bodily delights, virtue, or contemplation? They might as reasonably have disputed whether the best relish were in apples, plums, or nuts? Locke.

Addison.

A rigid dissenter, who dined at his house on Christmas-day, eat very plentifully of his plum-porridge. By the present edict, many a man in France will swell into a plum, who fell several thousand pounds short of it the day before.

Id.

The miser must make up his plum, And dares not touch the hoarded sum. Prior. By fair dealing John had acquired some plums, which he might have kept, had it not been for his law-suit. Arbuthnot.

Every eye is fixed on my countenance to enjoy the transports which I am expected to discover at the entrance of a plum-pudding of immoderate size; half of which is immediately transferred to my plate. Canning.

PLUM, BAY.

See PSIDIUM. PLUM, BRASILIAN. See SPONDIAS. PLUM, BLACK THORN OF SLOE. See PRUNUS. PLUM-TREE, in botany. See PRUNUS. PLUMAGE. See PLUME. PLUMB, n. s., adv., & v. a. PLUMB-LINE, PLUMBER, PLUMBERY.

Fr. plomb; Latin plumbum. A plummet; a weight let down