POPE 



POPLAR 



325 



of illustration, a brilliancy of wit, a command of 

 apt and terse expression, and a combined ease and 

 dignity of manner which have never been equalled 

 since. To have done this is to have well deserved 

 immortality as a man of letters ; whether it is also 

 to have established a title to the name of ' poet,' as 

 understood in these days, every man who frames his 

 own definition of poetry must decide for himself. 



The editions of Pope have been fairly numerous. The 

 first, by his friend Bishop Warburton, was an answer to 

 Bolingbroke's attack on Pope's memory, and appeared 

 within a few years of his death. Dr Joseph Warton's 

 was virtually a reply to Warburton's; and the controversy 

 on the power of the poet was revived in the 19th century 

 by Bowles and Roscoe, who each published an edition of 

 his works, and in whose polemics Byron took a memor- 

 able part. All other editions however, have been super- 

 seded by that of the Rev. Whitwell Elwin and Mr W_ 

 J. Courthope, which was founded on a mass of docu- 

 mentary material collected by the late J. W. Croker; 

 the concluding volume, containing Mr Courthope's 

 biography of the author, was published in 1889. The 

 annotations of the poems are rich and valuable, and the 

 Life disposes finally of many questions concerning Pope's 

 character and career which all his earlier biographers 

 had lacked the material and some the critical impartiality 

 to determine. 



Pope, JOHN, an American general, was born in 

 Louisville, Kentucky, 16th March 1822, graduated 

 at West Point in 1842, and entered the engineers. 

 He served in Florida ( 1842-44) and in the Mexican 

 war, and was brevetted captain for gallantry. He 

 was afterwards employed in exploring and survey- 

 ing in the west, until the outbreak of the civil 

 war, when he was appointed brigadier-general of 

 volunteers. In 1861 he drove the guerillas out of 

 Missouri ; in 1862 he captured New Madrid in 

 March and was made major-general, commanded 

 the Army of the Mississippi in the operations 

 against Corinth, and was assigned to the command 

 of the Army of ^Virginia, with the rank of brigadier 

 in the regular^army. For fifteen days in August 

 lie faced Lee, but was defeated at the second battle 

 of Bull Run, on the 29th and 30th. He then 

 requested to be relieved, and was transferred to 

 Minnesota, where he kept the Indians in check. 

 He held various commands until 1886, when he 

 retired. In 1882 he became major-general. Pope 

 attributed his defeat at Hull Hun to the conduct of 

 General Fitz-Jolm Porter, who was tried by court- 

 martial and cashiered; but this verdict occasioned 

 much controversy, in which General Grant ulti- 

 mately took Porter's side (American Review, 

 Deceml>er.l882), and in 1886 the latter was restored 

 to the army. Pope died September 23, 1892. 



Poperingh<\ an old commercial town of Bel- 

 gium, in the province of West Flanders, 4 miles 

 from the French frontier, and 8 miles W. of Ypres 

 by rail. The town has manufactures of lace, linens, 

 and woollen cloths. Pop. 11,065. 



Popinjay ( Fr. jmpcyai, Hal. papagallo, Low 

 ('r. pdjiiiijus), a parrot; a figure of a bird put up 

 as a mark for archers to shoot at (pajrinno being 

 another Scottish form for this sense) ; see KII/WIN- 

 SING. The green woodpecker is also sometimes 

 railed popinjay. 



Popish Plot, the name given to an imaginary 

 plot on the part of the Roman Catholics in England 

 during the reign of Charles II., the object of which 

 was believed to be a general massacre of the Pro- 

 teetants. See OATES. 



Poplar (Populiu), a genus of trees, forming 

 along with willows the whole of the natural order 

 Salicacere or Salicinete (by some regarded as a sub- 

 order of Amentacete), and having dioecious flowers 

 arranged in catkins, both male and female flowers 

 with an oblique cup-shaped perianth. The seeds 

 have silky hairs, as in willows, and are readily 



wafted about by the wind. The species are numer- 

 ous, chiefly natives of the temperate and cold 

 regions of the northern hemisphere. They are 

 large trees of rapid growth, with soft wood, and 

 broad, heart-shaped, ovate, triangular, or lozenge- 

 shaped, deciduous leaves, on rather long stalks. 

 Many of them are very, beautiful trees. The cat- 

 kins appear long before the leaves, and proceed 

 from distinct lateral buds. Few of the poplars are 

 of much value for their timber, which is generally 

 white, soft, and light ; but from their rapid growth 

 they are useful as yielding firewood, where the 

 scarcity of other fuel renders it necessary to plant 

 trees for this purpose, and they are often planted 

 as ornamental trees, producing an immediate effect 

 of emlrellishment in a bare situation more readily 

 than almost any other kind of tree. Besides the 

 species known by the name Aspen (q.v. ), or 

 Tremulous Poplar, the following seem the most 

 worthy of notice. The White Poplar, or Abele 

 (P. alba), a native of the southern parts of Europe, 

 and reckoned among British trees, but probably 

 not indigenous in Britain, is a tree of 80 feet or 

 upwards, with a fine spreading head, and round- 

 ish, heart-shaped, lobed, and toothed leaves, which 

 are smooth, shining, and dark-green above, downy 

 and silvery-white beneath. The wood is used by 

 cabinet-makers, turners, and toy-makers. It is 

 little liable to swell or 

 shrink, and this fact 

 adapts it for various 

 purposes. The tree loves 

 low situations and clay 

 soils. This tree has of 

 late years suffered in 

 Britain from some un- 

 known cause, like the 

 potato, dying where it 

 previously flourished ; 

 whilst other poplars, 

 the most nearly allied, 

 continue to flourish in 

 the same localities. The 

 Gray Poplar (P. cane- 

 teens) is very similar to 

 the white poplar, but of 

 more vigorous growth, 

 a large spreading tree, 

 the leaves similar to 

 those of the white 

 poplar, but not so dark 

 green above or so white 

 beneath. It is not of 

 so rapid growth as the Branch and Male Catkin of 

 white poplar; and its fopulu, alba cane,cent. 

 wood is harder and 



letter, makes good flooring, and is preferable to 

 pine-deal for the neighbourhood of fireplaces, being 

 less apt to take fire ; it is also used for coarse doors, 

 carts, barrows, &c., and, not being liable to warp, 

 is esteemed by woodcarvers. The tree generally 

 begins to rot in the heart when forty or fifty years 

 old. Like most of the other poplars, it fills the 

 ground around it with suckers. Like the white 

 poplar, it is a very doubtful native of Britain, and 

 belongs to the centre and south of Europe. The 

 Black Poplar (P. nigra), a native of most parts 

 of Europe, and perhaps of England, is a tree 50 to 

 80 feet high, with an ample spreading head, viscous 

 leaf-buds, and deltoid or unequally quadrangular, 

 perfectly smooth leaves. The wood is used for the 

 same purposes as that of the white and gray 

 poplars. The 'cotton' from the seeds has been 

 used in France and Germany for making cloth hats 

 and paper, but these uses of it were not found 

 profi table. The Lombard y Poplar (P. fastigiata 

 or dilatata ) is a mere variety of the black poplar, 

 with erect instead of spreading branches. It 



