PLUMBA'GO-Graphite, Black Lead. This substance occurs crystallized and massive. Primary form a rhomboid. Occurs in imbedded hexagonal prisms. Cleavage parallel to the terminal planes of the prism, very distinct, and the lamina flexible. Fracture granular and uneven. Hardness 10 to 2:0. Colour steel or blackish-grey. Streak black, shining. Lustre metallic and glistening. Unctuous to the touch. Opaque. Specific gravity 2:08 to 2:45.

Found in Greenland and in the neighbourhood of Philadelphia in the United States. Massive varieties occur amorphous, in reniform masses, and irregular nodules. Structure foliated, granular, com

primary or transition rocks. At Borrowdale it occurs in nests in a greenstone rock, which constitutes a bed in clayslate. In Inverness-shire it occurs in gneiss; at Arendal in Norway, in quartz rock; and in the United States, in felspar and mica-slate, but always in primary rocks.

PLUMBLINE. When a heavy body suspended by a flexible string is at rest, the line passing through the point of suspension and the centre of gravity of the weight is in the direction in which gravity acts. The horizon is a plane perpendicular to this line, and the zenith is that point of the heavens marked out by the continuation of the line upwards. If the string be perfectly flexible, it will coincide with the theoretical line above described.

The application of the plumbline to the arts does not require any explanation here. We shall briefly mention the manner of applying the plumbline to astronomical instruments, and it is necessary to mention it, as in most cases it has been superseded by the spirit level, or observation by reflexion, and so is not described in the account of the instruments.

In the earlier astronomical instruments, where the telescope or line of sight was moveable and the limb of the instrument fixed, two fine dots were made on some part of the instrument, as distant from each other as possible, and parallel to that radius, which was required to be vertical. A fine line was hung in front of the dots, and made to bisect the upper dot by a slow screw motion carrying the wire. The lower dot was then brought under the plumbline by the adjustments of the instrument, and when both were at the same time accurately bisected, the rectification of the instrument in this respect was complete. The weight below was completely immersed in water to diminish its oscillations, and the exact bisection of the dots by the wire was inspected by microscopes. The plumbline was brought as close to the dots as was consistent with perfect freedom, and at the same distance from each as nearly as could be judged. It was also protected by a covering from the influence of the wind.

In instruments of this construction, the bisection of the dots by the plumbline should be noted at the same time as the object is observed by the telescope. As the plumbline in its ordinary position was sometimes in the way of the telescope, two other dots were frequently inserted, which, being verified by the principal dots, could be used for the same purpose of verification; and it is evident, that while the framework of the instrument continues unchanged, the verticality of the line passing over the supplementary dots will ensure the verticality of the line passing over the primary dots, since the two lines are parallel. A simple plumbline, as above described, was universally used up to the latter end of the last century for rectifying instruments employed in measuring altitudes, or zenith distances, in which the telescope and its vernier moved on a fixed limb. When the telescope and limb were united, the plumbline was made to pass over the centre of the divisions, and marked out the division which corresponded to the altitude, the fractional part being measured by the screw which moved the whole instrument until the next division was bisected. Instruments of the latter kind were not, we conceive, much known in this country, but we believe they were used in France.

About 1785 (for we can find no exact date) Ramsden introduced a great improvement in the application of the plumbline. The images of the dots on the instrument were formed on the plumbline by interposing lenses, and the bisection of the image by the plumbline was viewed through microscopes. The plumbline was thus kept out of the way of the observer, and the optical parallax destroyed. This apparatus was, we believe, called Ramsden's Ghost. But the ghost is liable to this objection when applied to circles in which the telescope and limb are fixed and revolve together, and the angles read off by microscopes, viz. that the dots are never visible upon the plumbline at the time of observation, but only before or after, at the moments of adjustment, so that a derangement may take place unnoticed. For circles which do not turn in azimuth, this objection seems incurable (not that it is of much importance, as, from the superior stability of their framing and mounting. transit circles can scarcely be liable to any sudden error), but the present mode of observing by reflexion does away with the use of the plumbline altogether in instruments of this construction. In circles revolving freely in azimuth, the following modification of Ramsden's plumbline, which was introduced by Troughton, is much to be preferred to it.

On considering the mode in which the zenith distance of an object is measured by a circle revolving freely in azimuth, it will be seen that, by combining two observations in reversed positions of the circle, we have the true distance measured from that point in which the axis of rotation when continued cuts the heavens. If the axis is truly vertical, this point is the zenith, and the purpose of Troughton's plumbline is to set the axis truly vertical. An upright tube is attached to the upper part of the instrument, which revolves freely in azimuth, the plumbline hangs in the tube over a notch, the weight below being wholly immersed in water. Near the bottom of the tube, two smaller tubes cross it at right angles to each other and to the principal tube. In each of these smaller tubes is the following apparatus: at one end a mother-of-pearl disc with a dot, then a lens which forms an image of the dot on the plumbline, and at the other end a microscope to note the bisection. The dot is a little excentric, and the tube has sufficient play to admit of the adjustment being effected very nicely. Now when both the dots have been properly bisected by the plumbline, turn the instrument half round, and look at them again. It is clear that if the axis of rotation were vertical, it would be parallel to the plumbline in both positions, and the dots would be still bisected. If not, by touching the foot-screws, the dots can be brought half way to bisection, and then fully bisected by their own adjustments. When this is done, the axis is truly vertical. The operation must of course be repeated and continued until the dots are bisected by the plumbline in every position of the instrument, when the axis is truly vertical. [CIRCLE.] But though Troughton's plumbline is exceedingly beautiful and accurate, we greatly doubt whether it is so effective as a spirit-level. It is much more troublesome to adjust, there are no means of measuring its deflexions (these might be given), it is a longer time in coming to rest, is more liable to cause and to receive injury, and unless the instrument be reversed after every observation, it is as likely to vary from temperature as the level. We should therefore strongly dissuade any one from applying the plumbline to any instrument except the zenith sector, as it may in all other cases be either advantageously replaced by a level or superseded by observations from mercury. [ZENITH SECTOR.]

(Pearson's Astronomy, vol. ii., p. 285, and most of the circles described in that work; Pond, On the Westbury Circle, Phil. Trans., 1806, p. 420; Circle,' Brewster's Cyclopædia.)

PLUTARCHUS was a native of Charonea in Boeotia. The time of his birth is uncertain, and can only be approximately ascertained from the circumstance stated by himself, that he studied philosophy under Ammonius at Delphi, at the time when Nero was making his progress through Greece, which was in the twelfth year of the emperor's reign, or A.D. 66 (IIepì toũ Ei èv Aeλpois, c. 1). The family of Plutarch was one of some consideration in Charonea, and had held the chief offices in that city. Plutarch mentions his great-grandfather Nicarchus, who told him what the citizens of Charonea suffered from Antony's soldiers; and he speaks of his grandfather Lamprias as a good-humoured man and an agreeable companion. He has not mentioned his father's name in his extant works. He had two brothers, Timon and Lamprias, to whom he was much attached. When a young man, he was sent with another person on a mission to the proconsul of the province. His companion was from some cause left behind, and Plutarch executed the business himself (Пoλτικά παραγγέλματα, 6. 20).

It has sometimes been asserted that Plutarch visited Egypt, but there is no authority for this assertion, and such a conclusion cannot be drawn, as it sometimes has been, from such slender premises as are furnished by the fact of his writing an essay on Isis and Osiris. Plutarch visited Italy and Rome, perhaps more than once, and he spent some time there, as appears from his own writings (Life of Demosthenes, c. 2); but he did not learn the Latin language in Italy, according to his own account; and the reason that he gives for not then learning it is a curious one: he had so many public commissions, and so many people came to him to receive his instruction in philosophy.' It was therefore,' he adds, 'not till a late period in life that I began to read the Latin writers.' It appears clearly enough from his own writings that he never thoroughly mastered the Latin language, and was very imperfectly acquainted P. C., No. 1139.

with the antient institutions which formed the groundwork of the Roman polity and the Roman character. It has been conjectured with reasonable probability that his moral writings contain much of the matter which he delivered in his public lectures in Italy. He wrote his Life of Demosthenes at Charonea, after he had visited Rome, but whether he wrote any of his Lives during his long residence in | Rome is uncertain. It may be that they are the work of his old age, and that all of them were written or finished in his native city.

It is generally said that Plutarch was the preceptor of Trajan, and was raised by him to the consular rank; but these facts rest on the assertion of Suidas (IIλouraρxos), and on an extant letter addressed to Trajan, which is attributed to Plutarch. It is true that in the dedication of the Apophthegms (Αποφθέγματα βασιλέων καὶ στρατηγών) το Trajan, Plutarch says nothing about either of these circumstances; but then it is argued that the Apophthegms are not by Plutarch, for he says in the dedication, that he had already written the lives of illustrious Greeks and Romans; and if we admit that he wrote the Lives at Charonea when he was an old man, and that he did not return there till after Trajan's death, it follows that he did not write the Apophthegms, or at least the dedication prefixed to them. But the letter to Trajan, which is attributed to Plutarch, bears conclusive internal testimony of being a fabrication. Besides this, it only exists in Latin, and in the Policraticus' of John of Salisbury; the Greek original has never been produced, and it is not known where John found this letter.

Plutarch seems to have enjoyed considerable distinction at Rome, and his lectures, which of course were delivered in the Greek language, were attended by most of those who affected philosophy. His lectures were given as early as the reign of Domitian, or perhaps even in the reigns of Vespasian and Titus, as we learn from a curious anecdote of his own (Tepi roλνπρаɣμоσvvηs, c. 15); and he enjoyed the friendship of several distinguished Romans, as Arulenus Rusticus, whom Domitian put to death (Tacit., Agr., 2), and Sossius Senecio, a man of consular rank, whom he addresses in the introduction to the Life of Theseus, and elsewhere in his writings.

Among his contemporaries at Rome were Persius, Lucan, the younger Pliny, Martial, Quintilian, and others, but none of them have made any mention of Plutarch, though he must have been known to them. Sossius Senecio, one of his intimate friends, was also a friend of the younger Pliny, who addresses him in his Letters. He retired to Charonea in the decline of his life, where he appears to have lived in comfort. He faithfully discharged various magisterial offices in his native town, and he had also the honour and emoluments of a priesthood.

Plutarch had a wife, Timoxena, to whom he was tenderly attached, and four sons, and a daughter, Timoxena. Two of his sons died before him, and he lost his daughter while an infant. It was on the occasion of this child's death that he wrote that affectionate letter of consolation, full of good sense, in which he has perpetuated the virtues and fortitude of a most exemplary wife and mother (ПapaμvenτIKÒS TPÒS rv idíav yvvaïka).

The time and circumstances of Plutarch's death are unknown, and indeed the events of his life, as will appear from this sketch, are imperfectly ascertained; but the character of the man is as familiar to us from his own writings as if we possessed the most elaborate biography of him.

The great work of Plutarch is his Parallel Lives' (Bíoɩ Пapáλλnλot), which contains the biography of forty-six distinguished Greeks and Romans, besides the Lives of Artaxerxes Mnemon, Aratus, Galba, Otho, and Homer, which last is probably not by him. The forty-six Lives are arranged in pairs or sets, each of which contains a Greek and a Roman, and the two lives in each pair are followed by a comparison of the characters of the two persons. These Lives are-Theseus and Romulus, Lycurgus and Numa, Solon and Valerius Publicola, Themistocles and Camillus, Pericles and Fabius Maximus, Alcibiades and Coriolanus, Timoleon and Æmilius Paulus, Pelopidas and Marcellus, Aristides and Cato Major, Philopoemen and Flamininus, Pyrrhus and Marius, Lysander and Sulla, Cimon and Lucullus, Nicias and Crassus, Eumenes and Sertorius, Agesilaus and Pompeius, Alexander the Great and Julius Cæsar, Phocion and Cato Minor, Agis and Cleomenes and the two Gracchi, Demosthenes and Cicero, Demetrius Poliorcetes and M. Antonius, Dion and M. Brutus. The biographies of VOL. XVIII.-2 P

In the department of biography, Plutarch is the only writer of antiquity who has established a lasting reputation. The plan of his biographies is briefly explained by himself in the introduction to the Life of Alexander the Great, where he makes an apology for the brevity with which he is compelled to treat of the numerous events in the lives of Alexander and Cæsar. For,' he says, 'I do not write Histories, but Lives; nor do the most conspicuous acts of necessity exhibit a man's virtue or his vice, but oftentimes some slight circumstance, a word or a jest, shows a man's character better than battles with the slaughter of tens of thousands, and the greatest arrays of armies and sieges of cities. Now, as painters produce a likeness by a representation of the countenance and the expression of the eyes, without troubling themselves about the other parts of the body, so I must be allowed to look rather into the signs of a man's character, and thus give a portrait of his life, leaving others to describe great events and battles. The object then of Plutarch, in his Biographies, was a moral end, and the exhibition of the principal events of a man's life was subordinate to this his main design; and though he may not always have adhered to the principle which he laid down, it cannot be denied that his view of what biography should be, is much more exact than that of most persons who have attempted this style of composition. The life of a statesman or of a general, when written with the view of giving a complete history of all the public events in which le was engaged, is not biography, but history. This extract from Plutarch will also in some measure be an apology for the want of historical order observable in many of the Lives. Though altogether deficient in that critical sagacity which discerns truth from falsehood, and disentangles the intricacies of confused and conflicting statements, Plutarch has preserved in his Lives a vast number of facts which would otherwise have been unknown to us. He was a great reader, and must have had access to large libraries. It is said that he quotes two hundred and fifty writers, a great part of whose works are now entirely lost.

There are two purposes for which the Lives of Plutarch may be read. We may read them for the pleasure of the perusal, which arises from a conviction of the integrity of the writer, and his graphic representations, his benevolent disposition, and the moral end which he always keeps before him. We may also read them for the purpose of a critical investigation into the facts which he has recorded, and for the purpose of supplying from him the defects of other antient authorities. With this latter object we must institute a searching inquiry into the authorities for the several Lives, which vary greatly in value; and above all we must be careful in reading his Lives of the Romans not to be misled by any notions that he had formed of the institutions of a people with whose language he was imperfectly acquainted, and to whose antient history he was nearly a stranger. On the sources of Plutarch's Lives the reader may consult an essay by A. H. L. Heeren, De Fontibus et Auctoritate Vitarum Parallelarum Plutarchi Commentationes IV, Goettinge, 1820, 8vo.

Besides the Lives, a considerable number of Plutarch's essays may be styled historical. They may all be read with pleasure and some of them with instruction, not so much for their historical value as for the detached curious facts that are scattered so profusely through Plutarch's writings, and for the picture which they exhibit of the author's own mind. In one of these essays, entitled On the Malignity of Herodotus' (wepì rýc 'Hpočórov kakoŋýriaç), he has, unfortunately for his own reputation, attacked the veracity and integrity of the father of history, and with the same success that subsequent writers, more ignorant and less honest, have made their puny attacks on a work the merit of which the closest criticism may enhance but can never depreciate. (Journal of Education, vol. vi., p. 128.) The Lives of the Ten Orators,' which are attributed to Plutarch, are of little value, and may not be his; still they bear internal evidence, at least negatively, of not being of a later age than that of Plutarch.

The Lives of Pluta on first appeared in a Latin version by several hands, at Rome, in 2 vols. fol., about 1470. This

lian translations. The first Greek edition was printed by Philip Giunta, Florence, 1517, fol. Among more recent editions are those of Bryan, London, 1729, 5 vols. 4to., In Greek and Latin, which was completed by Moses du Soul, after Bryan's death; that of Coray, Paris, 1809-1815, 6 vols. 8vo.; and that by Schaefer, Leipzig, 1826, 6 vols. 8vo. The translations are very numerous. The best German translation is said to be by Kaltwasser, Magdeburg, 1799-1806, 10 vols. 8vo. Another German translation appeared at Vienna, in 1812. The best Italian translation is by Pompei. The French translation of Amyot, which appeared in 1559, has considerable merit, and has been often reprinted. The English translation of Sir Thomas North, London, 1612, which is avowedly made from that of Amyot, is often very happy in point of expression, and is deservedly much esteemed. The Lives were also translated into French by Dacier, Paris, 8 vols. 4to., 1721. The translation sometimes called Dryden's, the first volume of which was published in 1683, was executed by a great number of persons. According to a note by Malone (Dryden's Prose Works, ii., p. 331), there were forty-one of them. Dryden himself translated nothing, but he wrote the ded cation to the duke of Ormond, and the Life of Plutarch, which is prefixed to the translation. The last English translation is by John and William Langhorne, an insipid and tasteless version, which has the merit of being tolerably correct in rendering the meaning of the original." It has a few notes of little value, and is prefaced by a very uncritical and ill-written Life of Plutarch. There is an edition of this version by archdeacon Wrangham, with corrections and additions, which add little to the value of the Langhornes' labours.

The other writings of Plutarch, which consist of about sixty essays, are generally comprehended under the title of his Moralia, or Ethical Works, many of them being entirely of an ethical character. The minor historical pieces already referred to, of which that on the malignity of Herodotus is one, are usually comprised in the collection entitled Moralia.' Plutarch was fond of the writings of Plato; he was strongly opposed to the Epicureans: if he belonged to any philosophical sect, it was that of the Academics. But there is nothing like a system of philosophy in his writings, and he is not characterised by depth of thought or originality. He formed for himself a system, if we may so name that which had little of the connected character of a system, out of the writings of various philosophers. But a moral end is always apparent in his 'Moralia' as well as in his Biographies. A kind humane disposition and a love of everything that is ennobling and excellent, pervade bis writings, and give the reader the same kind of pleasure that he has in the company of an esteemed friend, whose singleness of heart appears in everything that he says or does. Plutarch rightly appreciated the importance of education, and he gives many good precepts for the bringing up of children. His philosophy was practical, and in many of its applications, as for instance his Letter of Consolation to Apollonius,' and his Marriage Precepts,' he is as felicitous in expression as he is sound in his precepts. Notwithstanding all the deductions that the most fastidious critic may make from Plutarch's moral writings, it cannot be denied that there is something in them which always pleases, and the more the better we become acquainted with them; and this is no small merit in a writer.

Plutarch's style bears no resemblance to the simplicity of the Attic writers. It has not the air of being much elabo rated, and apparently his sentences flowed easily from him. He is nearly always animated and pleasing, and the epithet pictorial may be justly applied to him. Sometimes his sentences are long and ill constructed, and the order of the words appears not the best that could be chosen to express his meaning: certainly it is not the order in which the best Greek writers of an earlier age would have arranged their thoughts. Sometimes he is obscure, both from this cause and the kind of illustration in which he abounds. lie occasionally uses and perhaps affects poetic words, but they are such as give energy to his thoughts and expression to his language Altogether he is read with pleasure in the original by those who are familiar with him, but he is somewhat harsh and crabbed to a stranger. It is bis merit, in the age in which he lived, treating of such subjects as biography and morals, not to have falien into a mercly rhetorical style, to have bre ses, and to have contented

himself with the inanity of commonplaces. Whatever he says is manly and invigorating in thought, and clear and forcible in expression. A word should be said of those digressions in which his Lives abound. I have always been pleased,' says Dryden, to see him and his imitator Montaigne, when they strike a little out of the common road; for we are sure to be the better for their wanderings. If we mark him more narrowly, we may observe that the great reason of his frequent starts is the variety of his learning; he knew so much of nature, was so vastly furnished with all the treasures of the mind, that he was uneasy to himself, and was forced, as I may say, to lay down some at every passage, and to scatter his riches as he went: like another Alexander or Adrian, he built a city or planted a colony in every part of his progress, and left behind him some memorial of his greatness.' (Life of Plutarch, by Dryden.)

The first Greek edition of the 'Moralia,' which is exceedingly incorrect, was printed by the elder Aldus, with the following title, Plutarchi Opuscula, lxxxxii.,' Gr., Venetiis, 1509, fol. It was afterwards printed at Basel, by Froben, 1542. fol., and 1574, fol. The only good edition of the 'Moralia' is that printed at Oxford, and edited by D. Wyttenbach, who laboured on it twenty-four years. This edition consists of six volumes of text (1795-1800), and two volumes of notes (1810-1821), 4to. There is a print of it which is generally bound in 5 vols. 8vo., with two volumes of notes. The remarks of Wyttenbach were printed at Leipzig, in 1821, in two vols. 8vo.

The first edition of all the works of Plutarch is by H. Stephens, Geneva, 1572, 13 vols. 8vo., which is said to be correctly printed. This edition was reprinted several times. A complete edition, Greek and Latin, appeared at Leipzig, 1774-1782, 12 vols. 8vo., with the name of J. J. Reiske, but Reiske did very little to it, for he died in 1774. An edition by J. C. Hutten, appeared at Tübingen, 1791-1805, 14 vols. 8vo. A good critical edition of all the works of Plutarch is still wanted.

PLUTO (Iλourwv), more frequently called by the Greeks Hades ("Aions), and by the Romans Orcus and Dis, was the brother of Zeus and Poseidon, and the deity that presided over the region where the departed souls of men were placed. Hades, which is also written without an aspirate, Ades, is a word of uncertain etymology. Pluto is supposed to be connected with the Greek word signifying wealth (λouros), since the precious metals are found beneath the earth's surface, below which the abode of Hades was generally placed. The Latin Dis has the same meaning. Orcus is probably connected with the words spy and arceo, and may signify 'bound or restrained.'

Pluto is represented by the antient writers as a gloomy deity, inexorable to the prayers of mortals, and hated by the human race above all the gods. (Il., ix. 159.) His wife was Persephone, called by the Romans Proserpina. [PROSERPINA.]

In the Iliad' (ix. 569 ; xx. 61 ; xxiii. 100) and in the 'Theogony' of Hesiod (455, 767), the abode of Hades is said, as has been already stated, to be beneath the earth; but in the Odyssey' it is placed in the regions of darkness beyond the stream of ocean. (Od., x. 508; xii. 81.)

In later writers the word Hades also signifies the abode of the dead, as well as the deity who presided over it. The temples and statues of Pluto appear to have been very few. Pausanias relates (i. 28, §6), that there was a statue of Pluto in the temple of the Eumenides on the Areiopagus of Athens; and the same writer also informs us (v. 20, §1) that there was a statue of this god in the temple at Olympia, but he mentions no temple sacred to Pluto in any part of Greece.

term is not synonymous with the word Hypogene, as defined by Mr. Lyell.

PLUTUS (Пouroç), the god of wealth, is said by Hesiod (Theog., 969) to have been the son of Demeter and the hero Jasius. He appears as an actor in the comedy of Aristophanes named after him; but we have no particulars respecting his worship. In the temple of Fortune at Thebes, Plutus was represented as a child in the arms of Fortune (Paus., ix. 16, §1), and at Thespeia in Boeotia there was a statue of Plutus placed by the side of one of Athena Ergane. (Paus., ix. 26, § 5.) PLUVIÄ'LIS. [PLOVERS.]

PLYCTO'LOPHUS. [PSITTACIDE.]
PLYCTOLOPHI'NÆ. [PSITTACIDE.]

PLYMOUTH, a seaport, corporate, and market town in Devonshire, 192 miles in a direct line west-south-west of St. Paul's, London, and 216 miles from the General Post-Office, London, by the South-western Railroad to Basingstoke, and from thence by mail-road through Whitchurch, Andover, Amesbury, Wincanton, Ilminster, Exeter, and Ashburton; in 50° 17' N. lat. and 4° 8' W. long. It is the easternmost of the three towns which lie on the north shore of the Sound. The others are Stonehouse and Devonport. [DEVONPORT; STONEHOUSE.]

Plymouth was originally inhabited by fishermen. By the Saxons it was called Tameorworth; after the Conquest it was called Sutton (i.e. South-town), which name is retained by an inlet of the Sound, Sutton Pool, on the shore of which the town is partly built. In the time of Edward I. the northern part of the town, built on the land of the priory of Plympton, was distinguished as Sutton-Prior, and the southern part, built on the estate of the Valletorts, as Sutton-Valletort. In the reign of Henry VI. these names were superseded by that of Plymouth, which the town still retains. Plymouth was attacked by the French in the reign of Edward III., but without success. In the reign of Henry IV. the attempt was repeated, and the town partly burnt, but the castle and the highest part of the town were not taken. In 1438, in the reign of Henry VI., the town was incorporated by charter, and walled in; but it is supposed to have been a borough by prescription at an earlier period. On the dissolution of the monasteries, the lordship of the town and other immunities of the priors of Plympton were granted to the mayor and corporation. In the reign of Elizabeth a new charter was bestowed on the corporation on the solicitation of Sir Francis Drake, who further benefited Plymouth by bringing water to the town from Dartmoor by a winding channel twenty-four miles in length. In A.D. 1579 and 1581 the town suffered much from the plague. In 1588 the Sound was the rendezvous of the fleet destined to oppose the Armada; and in 1596 of the fleet destined to attack Cadiz. In 1626 the plague again broke out, and carried off two thousand persons. In the civil war of Charles I. the town, which had embraced the parliamentary side, was besieged by the royalists under Prince Maurice, but held out until relieved by the earl of Essex (A.D. 1643). It was soon after attacked by the king in his march into Cornwall, and subsequently blockaded by Sir Richard Grenville, but both attempts failed of success.

The town of Plymouth is on the north side of Plymouth Sound, between the two great arms of that harbour, Catwater on the east, and Hamoaze on the west, but at some distance from both. The small inlet of Sutton Pool is close to the town on the east side, and Mill Bay, another inlet, not far from it on the west. On the point at the entrance to Sutton Pool is the citadel, and to the north of this lies the town, consisting of a number of streets, of which the older are irregularly laid out, while those of modern date are on a more regular plan. The limits of the borough comprise the two parishes of St. Andrew and Charles the Martyr, having a joint population, in 1831, of 31,080: part of each parish, lying beyond the corporation boundary, is not included in this statement. The older streets are narrow and ill built, and some of them steep. Up

done in the way of local improvement, but since that period great improvements have been made. Building has been extensively carried on; many handsome houses have been built in the suburbs, a new and handsome road formed to connect Plymouth with Stonehouse, and several additions made to the public buildings. The town is well lighted with gas; the supply of water is under the direction of the corporation, and is still furnished by Sir F. Drake's channel