PI8CI8 VOLAXS. 



PLAIK3. 



Tb principal star* are * follow* : 







Mo. ID Catalogue 



. 



9 

 10 

 17 

 18 



9.4 



No. la Caulogne 

 of Briiuh 

 AMocUUon. 

 7557 



. -1 



WA 



Mifultudc. 

 4 

 4 

 8 



N 



I'ISCIS VOLANS (the Flying-Fish), one of Bayer's toiilhera con- 

 itfillsti'Ti-, situated between the South 1'ole and Argo. It contains 

 u,i tars of conspicuous magnitude. 



PISTOL. [Aims.] 



PISTOLE. [Mossr.] 



rivroX. rHiDBAiiucs; STEAM-ENGINE.] 



mvil. [TAR.I 



PITCH IN Ml sir. [ACOUSTICS; Ti-siKo.] 



T1TTACAL. [T*K.] 



I'l VOT, in military nnnaeuvres, U the officer or soldier stationed on 

 the (link of a Motion, company, battalion, &c., un which it wheel*. 

 TK1AL OF THE. [CoiSA 



PLACES OF ARMS, in fortification, are the enlargements in the 

 covered way [ BASTION] at the re-entering and aalient angles of the 

 counterscarp ; the latter are termed talitat places of anna, and are 

 simply made by rounding the counterscarp ; and the former, the 

 rr iKtrriny places of arms, are formed by setting off demi-gurges of 

 atiout thirty yards, and making the faces form angles of 100 with the 

 adjoining branches of the covered way, as in Vauban'a first system. 

 These places of arms receive a considerable development in various 

 systems, as in the modern system, where they are large and furnished 

 with redoubts, and in the system invented by Chasseloup de Laubat, 

 and called after him, where they form one of the principal poinU of 



PLAOAL, a term in old ecclesiastical music, relating solely to the 

 Canto-Fermn, or PLAix-Soxo, and signifying collateral. When the 

 octave was so divided that the fifth was above the fourth, the mode or 

 key was said to be Ptaijal. 



PLAQUE. [PESTILENCE.] 



PLAID, a chequered woollen cloak or mantle, the garb of the high- 

 landers of Scotland, but worn also in that country by many of the 

 lowUnders. In Gaelic it is termed breaeun-ftile, the chequered, spot- 

 ted, or striped covering. The chequered patterns, by thuir \.m. d 

 colours, indicated among the highlanders the peculiar clan to which 

 they belonged, and a detailed account of the patterns U given by SI r. 

 11. M'lan, in his ' Clans of Scotland Illustrated.' It was a part of the 

 dress proscribed by the act of parliament of 1747, after the rebellion 

 of 1745. The restriction was, however, afterwards repealed, and the 

 plaid was made part of the uniform of what were called the highland 

 regiments. It is also worn by the pipers of the CohUtream guards. 



But the term plaid was not confined to the chequered cloth. Mr. 

 Logan, in his ' History of the Gael,' says that it was frequently " woven 

 nf one colour, or an intermixture of the black and white, so often seen 

 in Scotland to the present day." This was the shepherd's plaid, worn 

 even yet by lowlanders. and sometimes called the maude. Jamiesou, 

 in his ' Popular Puling,' calls it a sort of blanketing. It was also used 

 by females, both as a shawl or mantle, and for other parts of dress. 

 Thus Hamsay, in his ' Gentle Shepherd,' says that his heroine, Peggy, 

 shall " change her plaiding coat for silk." The old " belted plaid" of 

 the highlanders consisted of twelve yards of stuff, wound round the 

 body, and girdled round the waist by a leathern belt, the upper end 

 being left loose and thrown over the left shoulder, to which it wns 

 frequently fastened by an ornamental brooch. 



PLAI.N -CHANT. [1'LAIX SONO.J 



PLAIN SONG, or Canlat Krmut (Lat,), or Canto Fermo (Ital.), a 

 name given by the Church of Rome to the ecclesiastical chant The 

 Plain-Song is an extremely simple melody, if melody it may be called ; 

 it admits but one measure, the duple, and only notes of equal value. 

 It is rarely allowed to extend beyond the compass of an octave, and 

 never exceeds nine note* ; and the staff on which the notes are placed 

 consist* of but four line*. The clefs are those of c and r. T<> St. 

 Ambrose, archbishop of Milan, the church is supposed to be indebted 

 for the regular form of the Plain-Song, and to the Pope St. Gregory, 

 surnamed the Great, for having perfected and brought it into that state 

 in which it still continues to be used in the Roman Church. 



PLAINS. All those parts of the dry land which cannot properly bo 

 called mountainous are plains, and such compose by far the greater 

 part of the earth's surface. Thus, for instance, it has been estimated 

 that in South America the plains are to the mountainous country as 

 4 to 1. We are not aware that a similar calculation has been made for 

 the other parts of the world, nor are there perhaps materials sufficiently 

 exact fur the purpose. 



The word plain has but an indefinite meaning of itself, and seems to 

 be rightly understood only when used in opposition to the word 

 mountains, or when conjoined to the name of some known place, in 

 which case it moans the country itself so designated, or the environs of 

 Home (articular spot. Thus we speak of the cities of the plains, the 

 valleys of the plains, the plains of Lombard/, the plains of Quito, Ac. 



It were a great error to Imagine that by the word plain a perfectly 

 horiionUl surface is always understood. In ita usual acceptation it 

 means a greater or less extent of country, il.it in ita (?!, 

 compared with a mountainous country. The more perfectly even and 

 horisonUl tlie surface, the butter does it deserve to be called a plain, 

 such as the plains of Venezuela and of the lower Orinoco, Jl 

 tamia, &c. But the surface of the ground i. v waving, as 



Salisbury plain and the Ukraine; or more prominently undulated, as 

 the plain round 1'uria; or it may be studded with hills, as the plains of 

 the CaatiqHiare ; or it may be traversed by valleys more or le.a wide 

 and deep, like that part of France which lies between the Loire and 

 the Garonne ; or intersected with deep ravines, as the central plains of 

 Russia, without ceasing on such accounts to be a plain. 



Plains have been divided into t .1 ! lw ; l,t a 



moment's reflection will show that such denmuii. > :;>i'0' 



rigorously only to the two extremities of a scale ii at the 



bottom of which would stand, for example, the deli .>r the 



llanos of South America (which latter are raised only al 

 above the level of the ocean, and in some places even less), anil 

 top the plain of Antisana. 13,435 feet above the scale, 

 the greater miml r >'>' plains are found at intermediate heights, as the 

 following will show : 



Fool above the Ocean. 



Th plslns of Hungary 



The e&tentire plain* nn the north of the old cou- 

 timm fimu tin- ^i li> lil< to tiic Y:iivi. . . 

 Plain from which the Himalaya* rl*c (avenge) . 

 Plains of Moscow . . . . 



Prairie in lower parts of Illinois . . . . 

 Plains of Lombard)' . . . . . . 



Plains of Lithuania 



Suabis 



Tht plateau of Valdai' 



Aurcrgnc ........ 



Prairie of Southern Wisconsin . 

 Plains of India skirting the Himalaya', highest . 

 Kuitzrrlumi between the Alps and Jura . . 

 Steppes of the KirgbU ..*... 

 Bavaria ........ 



1'Liini of the two Castries 



Mysore .. 



Table-land of Persia 



\Veaternmost Prairies of Missouri . . , 

 Ivintcrn edge of the table-land oi Ah) -".ini. i . . 

 Plain of Antisana ...... 



TaWe-land of Asia in Tibet 



100 to SiO 



SCO 



5JO 



550 to 



300 



400 



400 to 



5"0 



000 



9)0 

 1000 

 lluO 

 1100 

 1100 

 1100 



ISuO to 1COO 

 1650 

 isou to 2100 



zsiir i. 



3800 to 4400 



5000 



7000 to 9000 

 13,435 

 14.000 



Though we generally regard those plains which arc the least raised 

 above the surface of the ocean as the. lowest, it uiuat not be forgotten 

 that round the Caspian and Aral there are plains of many tlmusninl 

 square miles considerably depressed below the. sea-level ; as is also the 

 case with the plain or vadcy of the .! 



The term jilatcau has often been given exclusively to elevated plains; 

 but this also is incorrect, inasmuch as by a plateau is sometimes meant 

 u great extent of country considerably raised above the rest of tli< 

 and having its mountains, its plains, and its valleys, as is particularly 

 exemplified in the minor plateau of Albania, and in the great plateau of 

 Central Asia, described I 



Table-land, properly so called, is an elevated plain rising more or less) 

 abruptly from the general level of the country, and being, as ii 

 the broad and horizontal or gently undulating top of an in 

 mountain, as the Nilgherry district of India. Sometimes there are 

 several such, set one upon the other, at least or. one or two sides, u h< u 

 they ore called platforms or terraces, as thoae on the eastern slope of 

 the Cordillera of New Mexico. 



Some writers regard the words plateau and table-land as merely the 

 French and English names for the same sort of elevation. Humlioldt 

 is of opinion that these names should be con lined to elcvatii : 

 ilucing a sensible diminution of temperature, and, accordingly, to such 

 heights only as attain to 1800 or 2400 feet Some again, as lialbi, give 

 the name of plateau to all high and extensive mountain-tracts. 



Generally speaking, the plains of Europe are of middling elevation, 

 the extremes of high ami low luini; pniu-ipnlly found in Asia and 

 America. Thus while the great plains of Central Asia, about Ladak, 

 Tibet, and Katchi, and round Koukounoor and elsewhere, attain a 

 height similar to those of Quito and Titioaca, or from BOOO to 12,000 

 and 14,000 feet, the great marshy plains of Siberia along the borders of 

 the Frozen Ocean are very slightly raised above the sea-level, as is also 

 the case with the plains of Bengal at the mouths of the Ganges, tho 

 whole of Mesopotamia, the Tehotna of Arabia, Ac. 



The plains of India which skirt the foot of the southern face of the 

 Tibetan table-land, for an extent of 1600 miles, nowheru have an ele- 

 vation exceeding 1200 feet above the sea, the average lining much less. 

 "The greater part of the country between" the Sikkitn Hi 

 forming part of that face, ami tlie sea, as we are . I oseph 



I). Hooker, " is a dead level, occupied by the delta of the Gauges and 

 Brahmaputra, above which the slope is so gradual to the base of the 

 mountains that the surface of the plain from whicli Mi- Himalayas 

 immediately rise is only 800 feet above the sea." We have every 

 reason to suppose that the plateau of Yorkeud and Khotan, on the 



