Page images
PDF
EPUB

important works are Il Parlatore eterno, a musical farce (1873), and a ballet, Clarina (1873). In 1881 Ponchielli was made maestro di cappella of Piacenza Cathedral. His music shows the influence of Verdi, but at its best it has a distinct value of its own, and an inexhaustible flow of typically Italian melody. His fondness for fanciful figures in his accompaniments has been slavishly imitated by Mascagni, Leoncavallo, and many of their contemporaries. Ponchielli died at Milan on the 17th of January 1886.

PONCHO (a South American Spanish word, adopted from the Araucanian poncho or pontho in the 17th century), a form of cloak worn originally by the South American Indians, and afterwards adopted by the Spaniards living in South America. It is merely a long strip of cloth, doubled, with a hole for the head. POND, JOHN (c. 1767-1836), English astronomer-royal, was born about 1767 in London, where his father made a fortune in trade. He entered Trinity College, Cambridge, at the age of sixteen, but took no degree, his course being interrupted by severe pulmonary attacks which compelled a long residence abroad. In 1800 he settled at Westbury near Bristol, and began to determine star-places with a fine altitude and azimuth circle of 2 ft. diameter by E. Troughton. His demonstration in 1806 (Phil. Trans. xcvi. 420) of a change of form in the Greenwich mural quadrant led to the introduction of astronomical circles at the Royal Observatory, and to his own appointment as its head. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society on the 26th of February 1807; he married and went to live in London in the same year, and in 1811 succeeded Maskelyne as astronomer-royal.

During an administration of nearly twenty-five years Pond effected a reform of practical astronomy in England comparable to that effected by Bessel in Germany. In 1821 he began to employ the method of observation by reflection; and in 1825 he devised means (see Mem. Roy. Astron. Soc. ii. 499) of combining two mural circles in the determination of the place of a single object, the one serving for direct and the other for reflected vision. Under his auspices the instrumental equipment at Greenwich was completely changed, and the number of assistants increased from one to six. The superior accuracy of his determinations was attested by S. C. Chandler's discussion of them in 1894, in the course of his researches into the variation of latitude (Astron. Journ. Nos. 313, 315). He persistently controverted (1810-1824) the reality of J. Brinkley's imaginary star-parallaxes (Phil. Trans. cviii. 477, cxiii. 53). Delicacy of health compelled his retirement in the autumn of 1835. He died at Blackheath on the 7th of September 1836, and was buried beside Halley in the churchyard of Lee. The Copley medal was conferred upon him in 1823, and the Lalande prize in 1817 by the Paris Academy, of which he was a corresponding member. He published eight folio volumes of Greenwich Observations, translated Laplace's Système du monde (in 2 vols. 8vo., 1809), and contributed thirty-one papers to scientific collections. His catalogue of 1112 stars (1833) was of great value.

See Mem. Roy. Astron. Soc. x. 357: Proc. Roy. Soc. iii. 434; Penny Cyclopaedia (De Morgan); F. W. Bessel, Pop. Vorlesungen, P. 543: Report Brit. Assoc. i. 128, 136 (Airy); Sir G. Airy's Autobiography, p. 127: Observatory, xiii. 204. xxii. 357: Annual Biography and Obituary (1837): R. Grant, Hist. of Phys. Astron. P. 491; Royal Society's Cal. Scient. Papers.

POND, a small pool or body of standing water, a word often applied to one for which the bed has been artificially constructed. The word is a variant of "pound" (q.v.), an enclosure.

PONDICHERRY, the capital of the French possessions in India, situated on the Coromandel or western coast, 122 m. by rail S. of Madras. The territory, which is entirely surrounded by the British district of South Arcot, has an area of 115 sq. m. with a population (1901) of 174,456. The chief crops are dry grains, rice, earth-nuts and a little indigo. The territory is traversed by a branch of the South Indian railway from Villapuram. The town has a population of 27,448. It is well laid

out with fine public buildings; the water-supply is derived from artesian wells. It has an open roadstead, with a small iron pier. The port is visited yearly by 500 vessels, and has trade of the value of about some £1,300,000. The principal imports are areca-nuts, wines and liqueurs, and the chief exports groundnuts, oil, cotton fabrics and rice. Of the export trade more than one-half is with France, but of the import trade only onefourth. The weaving of various fabrics forms the principal industry.

Pondicherry was founded in 1683 by François Martin, on the site of a village given him by the governor of Gingee. In 1693 the Dutch took Pondicherry, but restored it, with the fortifications greatly improved, in 1697, at the peace of Ryswick. In 1748 Admiral Boscawen laid siege to it without success, but in 1761 it was taken by Colonel Coote from Lally. In 1763 it was restored to the French. In 1778 it was again taken by Sir Hector Munro, and its fortifications destroyed. In 1783 it was retransferred to the French, and in 1793 recaptured by the English. The treaty of Amiens in 1802 restored it to the French, but it was retaken in 1803. In 1816 it was finally restored to the French.

PONDO, a Kaffir people who have given their name to Pondoland, the country comprising much of the seaboard of Kaffraria, Cape province, immediately to the south-west of Natal. The Pondo, who number about 200,000, are divided into several tribal groups, but the native government, since the annexation of the country to Cape Colony in 1894, has been subject to the control of the colonial authorities. (See KAFFIRS.)

PONDWEED, a popular name for Potamogeton natans, a cosmopolitan aquatic plant found in ponds, lakes and ditches, with broad, more or less oblong-ovate, olive-green, floating leaves. The name is also applied to other species of Potamogeton, one of the characteristic genera of lakes, ponds and streams all over the world, but more abundant in temperate regions. It is the principal genus of the natural order of Monocotyledous Potamogetonaceae, and contains plants with slender branched stems, and submerged and translucent, or floating and opaque, alternate or opposite leaves, often with membranous united stipules. The small flowers are borne above the water in

[graphic]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

(After Wossidlo. From Strasburger's Lehrbuch der Botanik)
Potamogeton natans.

1, Apex of flowering shoot. 3. Flower viewed from the side.
2, Flower viewed from above. 4, Diagram of flower.
axillary or terminal spikes; they have four stamens, which bear
at the back four small herbaceous petal-like structures, and
four free carpels, which ripen to form four small green fleshy
fruits, each containing one seed within a hard inner coat;
the seed contains a large hooked embryo. An allied genus
Zannichellia (named after Zanichelli, a Venetian botanist),
occurring in fresh and brackish ditches and pools in Britain,
and also widely distributed in temperate and tropical regions,
is known as horned pondweed, from the curved fruit.

PONIARD, a dagger, particularly one of small size, used for stabbing at close quarters. The French word poignard, from

which the English is a 16th-century adaptation, is formed from | national forces. In 1789, when Poland was threatened by the poing, fist, the clenched hand in which the weapon is grasped. (See DAGGER.)

PONIATOWSKI, the name of a Polish princely family of Italian origin, tracing descent from Giuseppe Torelli, who married about 1650 an heiress of the Lithuanian family of Poniator, whose name he assumed.

armed intervention of Russia, he was appointed commander of the Ukraine division at Braclaw on Bug. After the proclamation of the constitution of the 3rd of May 1791 he was appointed commander-in-chief, with instructions to guard the banks of the Dniester and Dnieper. On the outbreak of the war with Russia, Prince Joseph, aided by Kosciuszko, displayed The first of the Poniatowskis to distinguish himself was great ability. Obliged constantly to retreat, but disputing STANISLAUS PONIATOWSKI (1677-1762), who only belonged to every point of vantage, he turned on the pursuer whenever the family by adoption, being the reputed son of Prince Sapieha he pressed too closely, and won several notable victories. At and a Jewess. He was born at Dereczyn in Lithuania, and was Polonna the Russians were repulsed with the loss of 3000 men; adopted by Sapieha's intendant, Poniatowski. With his father at Dubienka the line of the Bug was defended for five days he attached himself to the party of Stanislaus Leszczynski, and against fourfold odds; at Zielence the Poles won a still more became major-general in the army of Charles XII. of Sweden. signal victory. Finally the Polish arms converged upon Warsaw, After the defeat of Pultowa he conveyed Charles XII. across and were preparing for a general engagement when a courier the Dnieper, and remained with him at Bender. From there from the capital informed the generals that the king had acceded he was sent to Constantinople, where he extracted from the to the confederation of Targowica (see POLAND: History) and sultan Achmet III. a promise to march to Moscow. When the had at the same time guaranteed the adhesion of the army. grand vizier, Baltagi Mehemet, permitted the tsar Peter I. to All hostilities were therefore to be suspended. After an indig. retreat unharmed from the banks of the Pruth, Poniatowski nant but fruitless protest, Poniatowski and most of the other exposed his treason. He rejoined Leszczynski in the duchy generals threw up their commissions and emigr..ted. During of Zweibrücken, Bavaria, of which he became governor. the Kosciuszko rising he again fought gallantly for his country After the death of Charles XII. in 1718 he visited Sweden; under his former subordinate, and after the fall of the republic and was subsequently reconciled with Leszczynski's rival on resided as a private citizen at Warsaw for the next ten years. the throne of Poland, Augustus II., who made him grand After Jena and the evacuation of the Polish provinces by treasurer of Lithuania in 1724. On the death of Augustus 11. Prussia, Poniatowski was offered the command of the National he tried to secure the reinstatement of Leszczynski, who then | Guard; he set about reorganizing the Polish army, and on the resumed his claims to the Polish crown. He was taken prisoner creation of the grand duchy of Warsaw was nominated war at Danzig by the Russians, and presently gave his allegiance minister. During the war of 1809, when an Austrian army to Augustus III., by whom he was made governor of Cracow. corps under the archduke Ferdinand invaded the grand duchy, He died at Ryki on the 3rd of August 1762. Poniatowski encountered them at the bloody battle of Radzyn, and though compelled to abandon Warsaw ultimately forced the enemy to evacuate the grand duchy, and captured Cracow. In Napoleon's campaign against Russia in 1812 Poniatowski commanded the fifth army corps; and after the disastrous retreat of the grand army, when many of the Poles began to waver in their allegiance to Napoleon, Poniatowski remained faithful and formed a new Polish army of 13,000 men with which he joined the emperor at Lützen. In the campaign of 1813 he guarded the passes of the Bohemian mountains and defended the left bank of the Elbe. As a reward for his brilliant services at the three days' battle of Leipzig he was made a marshal of France and entrusted with the honourable but dangerous duty of covering the retreat of the army. Poniatowski heroically defended Leipzig, losing half his corps in the attempt, finally falling back slowly upon the bridge over the Elster which the French in the general confusion blew up before he reached it. Contesting every step with the overwhelming forces of the pursuers, he refused to surrender, and covered with wounds plunged into the river, where he died fighting to the last. His relics were conveyed to Poland and buried in Cracow Cathedral, where he lies by the side of Tadeusz Kosciuszko and Jan Sobieski. Poniatowski's Mes souvenirs sur la campagne de 1792 (Lemberg, 1863) is a valuable historical document.

His second son Stanislaus Augustus became king of Poland (see STANISLAUS II.). Of the other sons, Casimir (1721-1780) was his brother's chancellor; Andrew (1735-1773) entered the Austrian service, rising to the rank of feldzeugmeister; and Michael (1736-1794) became archbishop of Gnesen and primate of Poland. Joseph Anthony Poniatowski (q.v.), son of Andrew, became one of Napoleon's marshals.

STANISLAUS PONIATOWSKI (1757-1833), son of Casimir, shared in the aggrandisement of the family during the reign of Stanislaus II., becoming grand treasurer of Lithuania, starost of Podolia and lieutenant-general of the royal army. In 1793 he settled in Vienna, and subsequently in Rome, where he made a magnificent collection of antique gems in his house on the Via Flaminia. This collection was sold at Christie's in London in May 1839. He died in Florence on the 13th of February 1833, and with him the Polish and Austrian honours became extinct.

His natural, but recognized, son, JOSEPH MICHAEL XAVIER FRANCIS JOHN PONIATOWSKI (1816-1873), was born at Rome and in 1847 was naturalized as a Tuscan subject. He received the title of prince in Tuscany (1847) and in Austria (1850). He had studied music under Ceccherini at Florence, and wrote numerous operas, in the first of which, Giovanni di Procida, he sang the title rôle himself at Lucca in 1838. He represented the court of Tuscany in Paris from 1848, and he was made a senator by Napoleon III., whom he followed to England in 1871. His last opera, Gelmina, was produced at Covent Garden in 1872. He died on the 3rd of July 1873, and was buried at Chislehurst. His son, Prince Stanislaus Augustus, married and settled in Paris. He was equerry to Napoleon III., and died in January 1908.

PONIATOWSKI, JOSEPH ANTHONY (1763-1813), Polish prince and marshal of France, son of Andrew Poniatowski and the countess Theresa Kinsky, was born at Warsaw in 1763. Adopting a military career, he joined the Imperial army when Austria declared war against the Turks in 1788, and distinguished himself at the storming of Sabac on the 25th of April, where he was seriously wounded. Recalled by his uncle King Stanislaus when the Polish army was reorganized, he received the rank of major-general, and subsequently that of lieutenant-general, and devoted himself zealously to the improvement of the

See Stanislaw Kostka Boguslawski, Life of Prince Joseph Poniatowski (Pol.; Warsaw, 1831); Franciszek Paszkowski, Prince Joseph Poniatowski (Pol.; Cracow, 1898); Correspondence of Poniatowski (ed. E. Raczynski, Posen, 1843); Bronislaw Dembinski, Stanislaus Augustus and Prince Joseph Poniatowski in the light of their Corre spondence (Fr.; Lemberg, 1904); Szymon Askenazy, Prince Joseph Poniatowski (Pol.; Warsaw, 1905). (R. N. B.)

PONS, JEAN LOUIS (1761-1831), French astronomer, was born at Peyres (Hautes Alpes) on the 24th of December 1761. He entered the Marseilles observatory in 1789, and in 1819 became the director of the new observatory at Marlia near Lucca, which he left in 1825 for the observatory of the museum at Florence. Here he died on the 14th of October 1831. Between 1801 and 1827 Pons discovered thirty-seven comets, one of which (observed on the 26th of November 1818) was named after J. F. Encke, who determined its remarkably short period. See M. R. A. Henrion, Annuaire biographique, i. 288 (Paris, 1834); Memoirs Roy. Astron. Soc. v. 410; R. Wolf, Geschichte der Astronomie, p. 709; J. C. Poggendorff, Biog. lit. Handwörterbuch,

PONSARD, FRANÇOIS (1814-1867), French dramatist, was born at Vienne, department of Isère, on the 1st of June 1814. He was bred a lawyer, and his first performance in literature was a translation of Manfred (1837). His play Lucrèce was represented at the Théâtre Français on the 1st of April 1843. This date is a kind of epoch in literature and dramatic history, because it marked a reaction against the romantic style of Dumas and Hugo. He received in 1845 the prize awarded by the Academy for a tragedy "to oppose a dike to the waves of romanticism." Ponsard adopted the liberty of the romantics with regard to the unities of time and place, but he reverted to the more sober style of earlier French drama. The tastes and capacities of the greatest tragic actress of the day, Rachel, suited his methods, and this contributed greatly to his own popularity. He followed up Lucrèce with Agnès de Méranie (1846), Charlotte Corday (1850), and others. Ponsard accepted the empire, though with no very great enthusiasm, and received the post of librarian to the senate, which, however, he soon resigned, fighting a bloodless duel with a journalist on the subject. L'Honneur et l'argent, one of his most successful plays, was acted in 1853, and he became an Academician in 1855. For some years he did little, but in 1866 he obtained great success with Le Lion amoureux, another play dealing with the revolutionary epoch. His Galilée, which excited great opposition in the clerical camp, was produced early in 1867. He died in Paris on the 7th of July of the same year, soon after his nomination to the commandership of the Legion of Honour. Most of Ponsard's plays hold a certain steady level of literary and dramatic ability, but his popularity is in the main due to the fact that his appearance coincided with a certain public weariness of the extravagant and unequal style of 1830.

His Euvres complètes were published in Paris (3 vols., 18651876). See La Fin du théâtre romantique et François Ponsard d'après des documents inédits (1899), by C. Latreille.

PONSONBY, JOHN (1713-1789), Irish politician, second son of Brabazon Ponsonby, 1st earl of Bessborough, was born on the 29th of March 1713. In 1739 he entered the Irish parliament and in 1744 he became first commissioner of the revenue; in 1746 he was appointed a privy councillor, and in 1756 Speaker of the Irish House of Commons. Belonging to one of the great families which at this time monopolized the government of Ireland, Ponsonby was one of the principal" undertakers," men who controlled the whole of the king's business in Ireland, and he retained the chief authority until the marquess Townshend became lord-lieutenant in 1767. Then followed a struggle for supremacy between the Ponsonby faction and the party dependent on Townshend, one result of this being that Ponsonby resigned the speakership in 1771. He died on the 12th of December 1789. His wife was Elizabeth, daughter of William Cavendish, 3rd duke of Devonshire, a connexion which was of great importance to the Ponsonbys.

Ponsonby's third son, George Ponsonby (1755-1817), lord chancellor of Ireland, was born on the 5th of March 1755 and was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge. A barrister, he became a member of the Irish parliament in 1776 and was chancellor of the Irish exchequer in 1782, afterwards taking a prominent part in the debates on the question of Roman Catholic relief, and leading the opposition to the union of the parliaments. After 1800 Ponsonby represented Wicklow and then Tavistock in the united parliament; in 1806 he was lord chancellor of Ireland, and from 1808 to 1817 he was the official leader of the opposition in the House of Commons. He left an only daughter when he died in London on the 8th of July. 1817. George Ponsonby's elder brother, William Brabazon Ponsonby, 1st Baron Ponsonby (1744-1806), was also a leading Whig politician, being a member of the Irish, and after 1800, of the British parliament. In 1806 shortly before his death he was created Baron Ponsonby of Imokilly. Three of his sons were men of note. The eldest was John (c. 1770-1855), who | succeeded to the barony and was created a viscount in 1839; he was ambassador at Constantinople from 1832 to 1837 and at Vienna from 1846 to 1850. The second son was Major

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

General Sir William Ponsonby (1772-1815), who, after serving in the Peninsular War, was killed at the battle of Waterloo whilst leading a brigade of heavy cavalry. Another son was Richard Ponsonby (1772-1853), bishop of Derry. Sir William Ponsonby's posthumous son William (1816-1861) became 3rd Baron Ponsonby on the death of his uncle John, Viscount Ponsonby; he died childless and was succeeded by his cousin William Brabazon Ponsonby (1807-1866), only son of the bishop of Derry, on whose death the barony of Ponsonby became extinct. Among other members of this family may be mentioned MajorGeneral Sir Frederick Cavendish Ponsonby (1783-1837), son of the 3rd earl of Bessborough, a soldier who distinguished himself at the battles of Talavera, Salamanca and Vittoria, in the Peninsular War, and was wounded at Waterloo; he was governor of Malta from 1826 to 1835. His eldest son, Sir Henry Frederick Ponsonby (1825-1895), a soldier who served in the Crimea, is best remembered as private secretary to Queen Victoria from 1870 until a few months before his death.

PONSON DU TERRAIL [PIERRE ALEXIS DE PONSON], VICOMTE DE (1829-1871), French romance writer, was born at Montmaur (Isère) on the 8th of July 1829. He was a prolific novelist, producing in the space of two years some seventythree volumes. Among his most successful productions were Les Coulisses du monde (1853), Exploits de Rocambole (1859), Les Drames de Paris (1865) and Le Forgeron de la Cour-Dieu (1869). He died at Bordeaux on the 20th of January 1871.

PONT (or KYLPONT), ROBERT (1524-1606), Scottish reformer, was educated at St Andrews. In 1562 he was appointed minister at Dunblane and then at Dunkeld; in 1563, commissioner for Moray, Inverness and Banff. Then in succession he became minister of Birnie (1567), provost of Trinity College near Edinburgh (1571), a lord of session (1572), minister of St Cuthbert's, Edinburgh (1573) and at St Andrews (1581). Pont was a strenuous champion of ecclesiastical independence, and for protesting against parliamentary interference in church government he was obliged to leave his country. From 1584 to 1586 he was in England, but returning north he resumed his prominence in church matters and kept it until his death in 1606. His elder son Timothy Pont (1560?-1614?) was a good mathematician, surveyor, and "the first projector of a Scottish atlas."

PONTA DELGADA, the capital of an administrative district, comprising the islands of St Michael's and St Mary in the Portuguese archipelago of the Azores. Pop. (1900), 17,620. Ponta Delgada is built on the south coast of St Michael's, in 37° 40′ N. and 25° 36′ W. Its mild climate, and the fine scenery of its mountain background, render it very attractive to visitors; it is the commercial centre, and the most populous city of the archipelago. Besides the cathedral, it contains several interesting churches and monasteries, and an observatory. Formerly its natural inner harbour only admitted vessels of light draught, while larger ships were compelled to anchor in an open roadstead, which was inaccessible during the prevalence of southerly gales. But great improvements were effected after 1860 by the construction of a breakwater 2800 ft. long.

PONT-À-MOUSSON, a town of northern France in the department of Meurthe-et-Moselle, 17 m. N.N.W. of Nancy by rail. Pop. (1906), 12,282. The Moselle, which is canalized, divides the town into two quarters, united by a bridge of the late 16th century. The church of St Martin, dating from the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries, has a handsome façade with two towers, and in the interior a choir screen and Holy Sepulchre of the 15th century. The lower ecclesiastical seminary occupies the building of an old Premonstratensian convent. There are several interesting old houses. The town has a communal college and engineering workshops, blast furnaces, and manufactures of lacquered ware, paper, cardboard, cables and iron-ware. Dating from the 9th or 10th century, Pont-à-Mousson constituted a lordship, which was made a marquisate in 1354. It was from 1572 to 1763 the seat of a well-known university.

PONTANUS, JOVIANUS (1426-1503), Italian humanist and poet, was born in 1426 at Cerreto in the duchy of Spoleto,

exuberant facility and energetic handling of material. Not less excellent is the didactic poem on orange trees, De hortis Hesperidum. His most original compositions in verse, however, are elegiac and hendecasyllabic pieces on personal topics-the De conjugali amore, Eridanus, Tumuli, Naeniae, Baiae, &c.-in which he uttered his vehemently passionate emotions with a warmth of southern colouring, an evident sincerity, and a truth of painting from reality which excuse their erotic freedom.

where his father was murdered in one of the frequent civil | brawls which then disturbed the peace of Italian towns. His mother escaped with the boy to Perugia, and it was here that Pontano received his first instruction in languages and literature. Failing to recover his patrimony, he abandoned Umbria, and at the age of twenty-two established himself at Naples, which continued to be his chief place of residence during a long and prosperous career. He here began a close friendship with the distinguished scholar, Antonio Beccadelli, through whose influence he gained admission to the royal chancery of Alphonso the Magnanimous. Alphonso discerned the singular gifts of the young scholar, and made him tutor to his sons. Pontano's connexion with the Aragonese dynasty as political adviser, military secretary and chancellor was henceforth a close one; and the most doubtful passage in his diplomatic career is when he welcomed Charles VIII. of France upon the entry of that king into Naples in 1495, thus showing that he was too ready to abandon the princes upon whose generosity his fortunes had been raised. Pontano illustrates in a marked manner the position of power to which men of letters and learning had arrived in Italy. He entered Naples as a penniless scholar. He was almost immediately made the companion and trusted friend of its sovereign, loaded with honours, lodged in a fine house, enrolled among the nobles of the realm, enriched, and placed at the very height of social importance. Following the example of Pomponio Leto in Rome and of Cosimo de' Medici at Florence, Pontano founded an academy for the meetings of learned and distinguished men. This became the centre of fashion as well as of erudition, in the southern capital, and subsisted long after its founder's death. In 1461 he married his first wife, Adriana Sassone, who bore him one son and three daughters before her death in 1491. Nothing distinguished Pontano more than the strength of his domestic feeling. He was passionately attached to his wife and children; and, while his friend Beccadelli signed the licentious verses of Hermaphroditus, his own Muse celebrated in liberal but loyal strains the pleasures of conjugal affection, the charm of infancy and the sorrows of a husband and a father in the loss of those he loved. Not long after the death of his first wife Pontano took in second marriage a beautiful girl of Ferrara, who is only known to us under the name of Stella. Although he was at least sixty-five years of age at this period, his poetic faculty displayed itself with more than usual warmth and lustre in the glowing series of elegies, styled Eridanus, which he poured forth to commemorate the rapture of this union. Stella's one child, Lucilio, survived his birth but fifty days; nor did his mother long remain to comfort the scholar's old age. Pontano had already lost his only son by the first marriage; therefore his declining years were solitary. He died in 1503 at Naples, where a remarkable group of terra-cotta figures, life-sized and painted, still adorns his tomb in the church of Monte Oliveto. He is there represented together with his patron Alphonso and his friend Sannazzaro in adoration before the dead Christ.

As a diplomatist and state official Pontano played a part of some importance in the affairs of southern Italy and in the Barons' War, the wars with Rome, and the expulsion and restoration of the Aragonese dynasty. But his chief claim upon the attentions of posterity is as a scholar. His writings divide themselves into dissertations upon such topics as the "Liberality of Princes" or "Ferocity," composed in the rhetorical style of the day, and poems. He was distinguished for energy of Latin style, for vigorous intellectual powers, and for the faculty, rare among his contemporaries, of expressing the facts of modern life, the actualities of personal emotion, in language sufficiently classical yet always characteristic of the man. treatises are more useful to students of manners than the similar lucubrations of Poggio. Yet it was principally as a Latin poet that he exhibited his full strength. An ambitious didactic composition in hexameters, entitled Urania, embodying the astronomical science of the age, and adorning this high theme with brilliant mythological episodes, won the admiration of Italy. It still remains a monument of fertile invention,

His prose

Pontano's prose and poems were printed by the Aldi at Venice. For his life see Ardito, Giovanni Pontano ei suoi tempi (Naples, 1871); for his place in the history of literature, Symonds, Renais (.A.S.) sunce in Italy.

PONTARLIER, a frontier town of eastern France, capital of an arrondissement in the department of Doubs, 36 m. S.E. of Besançon by road. Pop. (1906), 7896. It is situated 2750 ft. above sea-level on the Doubs, about four miles from the Swiss frontier, and forms an important strategic point at the mouth of the defile of La Cluse, one of the principal passes across the Jura. The pass is defended by the modern fort of Larmont, and by the Fort de Joux, which was originally built in the 10th century by the family of Joux and played a conspicuous part in the history of Franche-Comté. Pontarlier is the junction of railway lines to Neuchâtel, Lausanne, Lons-le-Saunier, Dôle and Besançon. A triumphal arch of the 18th century commemorates the reconstruction of the town after the destructive fire of 1736. It was at Pontarlier that the French army of the East made its last stand against the Prussians in 1871 before crossing the Swiss frontier. The distillation of herbs, extensively cultivated for the manufacture of absinthe, kirsch and other liqueurs, is the chief industry. The town is the seat of a subprefect and has a tribunal of first instance and a communal college.

PONT AUDEMER, a town of north-western France, capital of an arrondissement in the department of Eure, 39 m. N.W. of Evreux, on the Risle, a left-bank affluent of the Seine, and on the railway from Evreux to Honfleur. Pop. (1906), 5700. The church of St Ouen, which has fine stained glass of the 16th century, combines the late Gothic and Renaissance styles; its choir is Romanesque. Local institutions are the sub-prefecture, a tribunal of first instance, a board of trade-arbitration, a chamber and tribunal of commerce. Manufacturing industry is active, and includes the founding of malleable metal, a spur factory, the manufacture of glue and paper, cotton-spinning and various branches of leather manufacture. There is trade in flax. wool, grain, cattle, cider, paper, iron, wood and coal. The port has a length of over half a mile on the Risle, which is navigable for small vessels from this point to its mouth (10 m.). The town owes its name to Audomar, a Frank lord, who in the 7th or 8th century built a bridge over the Risle at this point. It was the scene of several provincial ecclesiastical councils in the 12th and 13th centuries and of meetings of the estates of Normandy in the 13th century.

PONTE (Ital. for "bridge"), a rough game peculiar to the city of Pisa, in which the players, divided into two sides and provided with padded costumes, contended for the possession of one of the bridges over the Arno. The weapon used, both for offence and defence, was a kind of shield which served as a club as well.

A history and description of the game may be found in William Heywood's Palio and Ponte (London, 1904).

PONTECORVO, a city of Campania, Italy, in the province of Caserta, on the Garigliano, about 48 m. from Caserta and 3 m. from Aquino on the railway from Rome to Naples. Pop. (1901), 10,518 (town); 12,492 (commune). The town is approached by a triumphal arch adorned with a statue of Pius IX. The principality of Pontecorvo (about 40 sq. m. in extent), once an independent state, belonged alternately to the Tomacelli and the abbots of Monte Cassino. Napoleon bestowed it on Bernadotte in 1806, and in 1810 it was incorporated with the French Empire.

PONTÉCOULANT, LOUIS GUSTAVE LE DOULCET, COMTE DE (1764-1853), French politician, was born at Caen on the 17th of November 1764. He began a career in the army in 1778.

A moderate supporter of the revolution, he was returned to the Convention for the department of Calvados in 1792, and became commissary with the army of the North. He voted for the imprisonment of Louis XVI. during the war, and his banishment after the peace. He then attached himself to the party of the Gironde, and in August 1793 was outlawed. He had refused to defend his compatriot Charlotte Corday, who wrote him a letter of reproach on her way to the scaffold. He returned to the Convention on the 8th of March 1795, and showed an unusual spirit of moderation by defending Prieur de la Marne and Robert Lindet. President of the Convention in July 1795, he was for some months a member of the council of public safety. He was subsequently elected to the council of five hundred, but was suspected of royalist leanings, and had to spend some time in retirement before the establishment of the consulate. Becoming senator in 1805, and count of the empire in 1808, he organized the national guard in Franche Comté in 1811, and the defence of the north-eastern frontier in 1813. At the first restoration Louis XVIII. made him a peer of France, and although he received a similar honour from Napoleon during the Hundred Days, he sat in the upper house under the Second Restoration. He died in Paris on the 3rd of April 1853, leaving memoirs and correspondence from which were extracted four volumes (18611865) of Souvenirs historiques et parlementaires 1764-1848.

His son Louis Adolphe Le Doulcet, comte de Pontécoulant (1794-1882), served under Napoleon in 1812 and 1814, and then emigrated to Brazil, where he took part in the abortive insurrection at Pernambuco in 1817. He also organized a French volunteer contingent in the Belgian revolution of 1830, and was wounded at Louvain. The rest of his life was spent in Paris in the study of ancient music and acoustics. Among his works was one on the Musée instrumental du conservatoire de musique (1864). A younger brother, Philippe Gustave Le Doulcet, comte de Pontécoulant (1795-1874), served in the army until 1849, when he retired to devote himself to mathematics and astronomy. His works include Théorie analytique du système du monde (Paris, 1829-1846) and Traité élementaire de physique celeste (2 vols., Paris, 1840).

[ocr errors]

PONTEFRACT (pronounced and sometimes written "Pomfret "), a market town and municipal and parliamentary borough in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England, 21 m. S.S.W. from York, served by the Midland, North-Eastern and Lancashire & Yorkshire railways. Pop. (1891), 9702; (1901), 13,427. It is well situated, mainly on an eminence, near the junction of the Aire and the Calder. The most important of the antiquarian remains are the ruins of the famous castle situated on a rocky height, originally covering with its precincts an area of over 8 acres, and containing in all eight round towers. The remains are principally of Norman date, and an unusual feature of the stronghold is the existence of various subterranean chambers in the rock. Below the castle is All Saints church, which suffered severely during the siege of the castle, but still retains some work of the 12th century. In 1837 the tower and transepts were fitted for divine service. The church of St Giles, formerly a chapel of ease to All Saints, but made parochial in the 18th❘ century, is of Norman date, but most of the present structure is modern. The 17th-century spire was removed in 1707, and replaced by a square tower, which was rebuilt in 1797; the chancel was rebuilt in 1869. In Southgate is an ancient hermitage and oratory cut out of the solid rock, which dates from 1396. On St Thomas's Hill, where Thomas, earl of Lancaster, was beheaded in 1322, a chantry was erected in 1373, the site of which is now occupied by a windmill built of its stones. Αι Monkhill there are the remains of a Tudor building called the Old Hall, probably constructed out of the old priory of St John's. A grammar school of ancient foundation. renewed by Elizabeth and George III, occupies modern buildings. The town-hall was built at the close of the 18th century on the site of one erected in 1656, which succeeded the old moot-hall dating from Saxon times. Among other buildings are the court house, the market hall, the assembly rooms (a handsome building adjoining the town-hall), and large barracks. The foundation of the

principal almshouse, that of St Nicholas, dates from before the Conquest. Trinity Hospital was founded by Sir Robert Knolles (d. 1407), an eminent military commander in the French wars of Edward III. At Ackworth, in the neighbourhood, there is a large school of the Society of Friends or Quakers (1778), in the foundation of which Dr John Fothergill (1712-1780) was a prime mover. There are extensive gardens and nurseries in the neighbourhood of Pontefract, and liquorice is largely grown for the manufacture of the celebrated Pomfret cakes. The town possesses ironfoundries, sack and matting manufactories, tanneries, breweries, corn mills and brick and terra-cotta works. The parliamentary borough, falling within the Osgoldcross division of the county, returns one member (before 1885 the number was two). The town is governed by a mayor, six aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 4078 acres.

The remains of a Roman camp have been discovered near Pontefract, but there is no trace of settlement in the town itself until after the Conquest. At the time of the Domesday Survey Tateshall (now Tanshelf, a suburb of the town) was the chief manor and contained 60 burgesses, while Kirkby, which afterwards became the borough of Pontefract, was one of its members. The change was probably owing to the fact that Ilbert de Lacy, to whom the Conqueror had granted the whole of the honour of Pontefract, founded a castle at Kirkby, on a site said to have been occupied by a fortification raised by Ailric, a Saxon thane. Several reasons are given for the change of name but none is at all satisfactory. One account says that it was caused by a broken bridge which delayed the Conqueror's advance to the north, but this is known to have been at Ferrybridge, three miles away; a second says that the new name was derived from a Norman town called Pontfrete, which, however, never existed; and a third that it was caused by the breaking of a bridge in 1153 on the arrival of the archbishop of York, St William, when several people were miraculously preserved from drowning, although the town was already known as Pontefract in 1140 when Archbishop Thurstan died there. The manor remained in the Lacy family until it passed by marriage to Thomas, duke of Lancaster, who was beheaded on a hill outside the town after the battle of Boroughbridge. His estates were restored to his brother Henry, earl of Lancaster, on the accession of Edward III., and the manor has since then formed part of the duchy of Lancaster. The town took part in most of the rebellions in the north of England, and in 1399 Richard II. was imprisoned and secretly murdered in the castle. During the Wars of the Roses the town was loyal to Henry VI., and several of the Yorkist leaders were executed here after the battle of Wakefield. It was taken by Robert Aske, leader of the Pilgrimage of Grace, in 1536. In 1642 the castle was garrisoned for Charles I. and sustained four sieges, the second, in 1644. being successful, but two years later it was retaken by the royalists, who held it until after the execution of the king, when they surrendered to General Lambert and the castle was destroyed.

Roger de Lacy in 1194 granted a charter to the burgesses confirming their liberties and right to be a free borough at a fee-farm of 12d. yearly for every toft, granting them the same privileges as the burgesses of Grimsby, and that their reeve should be chosen annually by the lord of the manor at his court leet, preference being given to the burgesses if they would pay as much as others for the office. Henry de Lacy cofirmed this charter in 1278 and in 1484 Richard III. incorporated the town under the title of mayor and burgesses and granted a gild merchant with a hanse. His charter was withdrawn on the accession of Henry VII. and a similar one was granted, while in 1489 the king gave the burgesses licence to continue choosing a mayor as they had done in the time of Richard III. In 1606-1607 James I. confirmed the charter of Henry VII. and regulated the choice of the mayor by providing that he should be elected from among the chief burgesses by the burgesses themselves. The privilege of returning two members to parliament which had belonged to Pontefract at the end of the 13th century was revived in 1620-1621 on the grounds that the charter of 1606-1607 had restored all their privileges to the burgesses. Since the

« PreviousContinue »