586 



PLEBIS-SCITA PLICA POLONICA. 



lar, who lived principally hy the largesses made by 

 the state, or the rich, or by their patrons, and by 

 the sale of their votes (which was forbidden by law), 

 were called plebeians. A distinction was made be- 

 tween the plebs rtistica and the plebs urbana; the 

 latter comprising the industrious classes, the me- 

 chanics and shopkeepers, as well as the numerous 

 idlers and paupers, &c., living in the city ; the for- 

 mer, the citizens residing in the country, who lived 

 by agriculture, and were the most respectable. (For 

 an account of the struggles of the patricians and ple- 

 beians, see Rome.) In the most flourishing period 

 of the republic, after the death of Sylla, the number 

 of Roman citizens was about 400,000, nearly half of 

 whom lived in Rome and its vicinity, and formed, after 

 deducting the senators and knights, the third estate. 



PLEBIS-SCITA. See Civil Law. 



PLEDGE, OR PAWN, is a species of bailment, 

 being the deposit or placing of goods as security for 

 the payment of money borrowed, or the fulfilment 

 of an obligation or promise. It is distinguished 

 from a mortgage of chattels, by the circumstance 

 that the legal property in the chattel mortgaged is 

 in the mortgagee, whereas the legal ownership of 

 goods pawned remains in the pawner, though ac- 

 cording to the definition of a pawn and pledge, the 

 pawnee not only has the right of possession, but 

 must be in possession. If the money is not paid at 

 the time stipulated, the pawn may be sold by the 

 pawnee, who may retain enough of the proceeds to 

 pay the debt intended to be secured. In some cases 

 the terms of the deposit are the forfeiture of the 

 pawn in case the pawner does not fulfil the pro- 

 mise or obligation to guarantee which the pawn is 

 given. 



PLEIADES; the seven daughters of Atlas, who, 

 being pursued by Orion, were changed, by Jupiter, 

 into doves. They were translated to the heavens, 

 and form the assemblage of the Seven Stars in the 

 neck of Taurus, called by the Latins VergiUae. There 

 are, however, only six stars visible in Pleiades, a 

 fact noticed by Ovid. The. Poetical Pleiades is a 

 name given by the Greeks to seven celebrated poets 

 of the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus. (See Alexan- 

 drian School.) A French Pleiades was formed in 

 imitation of it, in the reign of Henry II.; it con- 

 sisted of Ronsard, du Belloy, Jodelle, &c. 



PLEONASM (from a-Xsovaoywf, a redundancy), in 

 rhetoric, is a figure of speech by which we use more 

 words than seem absolutely necessary to convey our 

 meaning, in order to express a thought with more 

 grace or greater energy; it is sometimes also applied 

 to a needless superabundance of words. 



PLESIOSAURUS. See Organic Remains. 



PLESSIS is found in a number of French geo- 

 graphical names, and is derived from the Low Latin 

 plexitium, signifying a hedge, fence. 



PLEURISY (pleuritis); an inflammation of the 

 pleura, or membrane which lines the internal surface 

 of the cavity of the breast, and covers the external 

 surface of the lungs. The pleurisy is generally 

 caused by colds, rheumatism, bleeding, &c. It 

 comes on with an acute pain in the side, and is ac- 

 companied by a difficulty of breathing, attended 

 with pain, by coughing, and feverish symptoms. At 

 first the cough is dry, but is afterwards commonly 

 attended with expectoration. The inflammation then 

 disappears, but is sometimes succeeded by suppura- 

 tion, and the lungs sometimes become attached to 

 the walls of the breast. The disease is not danger- 

 ous if the patient has not been previously attacked 

 by it, nor in its first stages, nor if it is properly at- 

 tended to in season. The application of leeches and 

 other less antiphlogistic remedies, and blistering, are 

 recommended. 



PLICA POLONICA. The Weichselzopf, or 

 plica Polonica, derives its name from its most pro- 

 minent symptom the entangling of the hair into a 

 confused mass. It is generally preceded by violent 

 headaches, and tingling in the ears; it attacks the 

 bones and joints, and even the nails of the toes and 

 fingers, which split longitudinally. If so obstinate 

 as to defy treatment, it ends in blindness, deafness, 

 or in the most melancholy distortions of the limbs, 

 and sometimes in all these miseries together. The 

 most extraordinary part of the disease, however, is 

 its action on the hair. The individual hairs begin to 

 swell at the root, and to exude a fat, slimy substance, 

 frequently mixed with suppurated matter, which is 

 the most noisome feature of the malady. Their 

 growth is, at the same time, more rapid, and their 

 sensibility greater than in their healthy state ; and, 

 notwithstanding the incredulity with which it was 

 long received, it is now no longer doubtful, that, 

 where the disease has reached a high degree ol 

 malignity, not only whole masses of the hair, but 

 even single hairs, will bleed if cut off, and that, too, 

 throughout their whole length, as well as at the root. 

 The hairs, growing rapidly amidst this corrupted 

 moisture, twist themselves together inextricably, and 

 at last are plaited into a confused, clotted, disgust- 

 ing-looking mass. Very frequently they twist them- 

 selves into a number of separate masses, like ropes ; 

 and there is an instance of such a zopf growing to 

 the length of fourteen feet on a lady's head, before 

 it could be safely cut o<F. Sometimes it assumes 

 other forms, which medical writers have distin- 

 guished by specific names, as the bird's nest plica, 

 the turban plica, the Medusa head plica, the long-tail- 

 ed plica, the club-s/iaped plica, &c. The hair, how- 

 ever, while thus suffering itself, seems to do so 

 merely from contributing to the cure of the disease, 

 by being the channel through which the corrupted 

 matter is carried off from the body. From the mo- 

 ment that the hair begins to entangle itself, the 

 preceding symptoms always diminish, and frequently 

 disappear entirely, and the patient is comparatively 

 well, except that he must submit to the inconve- 

 nience of bearing about with him this disgusting 

 head-piece. Accordingly, where there is reason to 

 suspect that a Weichselzopf is forming itselT, medi- 

 cal means are commonly used to further its out- 

 breaking on the head, as the natural progress and 

 only true cure of the disease ; and, among the pea- 

 sants, the same object is pursued by increased filth 

 and carelessness, and even by soaking the hair with 

 oil or rancid butter. After the hair has continued 

 to grow thus tangled and noisome for a period which 

 is in no case fixed, it gradually becomes dry; iieuuuy 

 hairs begin to grow up under the plica, and at last 

 " push it from its stool." In the process of separa- 

 tion, however, it unites itself so readily with the 

 new hairs, that, if not cut off at this stage, it con- 

 tinues hanging for years, an entirely foreign appen- 

 dage to the head. There are many instances of 

 Poles, who, suffering under poignant ailments, which 

 were, in reality, the forerunners of an approaching 

 fVeichselzopf, have in vain sought aid in other coun- 

 tries from foreign physicians, and, on their return, 

 have found a speedy, though a very disagreeable 

 cure, in the breaking out of the plica. But till the 

 plica has run through all its stages, and has begun 

 of itself to decay, any attempt to cut the hair is 

 attended with the utmost danger to the life of the 

 patient ; it not only affects the body by bringing on 

 convulsions, cramps, distortion of the limbs, and 

 frequently death, but the imprudence has often had 

 madness for its result ; and, in fact, during the whole 

 progress of the disease, the mind is, in general, 

 affected no less than the body. Yet, for a long 



