PUS 



. verecl again from the same, and made pur- 

 lieu ; tiiat is to say, pure und free from 

 the laws of the forest. 



PURLUE man, or PURLIEU man, a per- 

 son who has ground within the purlieu, 

 and is qualified to hunt within the same, 

 though under certain restrictions. 



By a statute of Charles II. no man may 

 keep greyhounds within the purlieu, or 

 elsewhere within England and Wales, un- 

 less he have a free warrant, or be lord of 

 a manor, or such a freehold as is seized 

 in his own right, or in right of his wife, 

 of lands, tenements, or hereditaments, of 

 the clear yearly value of 40 over and 

 above all the charges of reprises of such 

 estate of inheritance ; or of lands, tene- 

 ments, &c. in his own right, or in the 

 right of his wife, for the term of life or 

 lives, of the yearly value of 80/. over and 

 above all charges and reprises ; or that is 

 worth, in goods or chattels, 400Z. Others, 

 that are not thus qualified, and yet have 

 land in the purlieus, if they find beasts of 

 the forest in their own ground, within 

 the purlieu, may chase them out with 

 little dogs, though not with greyhounds. 



PURPLE. See DYEING. 



PURPURE, POURPRE, or PURPLE, in 

 heraldry, according to some, is one of the 

 five colours of armories, compounded of 

 gules and azure, bordering on violet, and, 

 according to others, of a great deal of 

 red and a little black. But it was exclud- 

 ed by the ancient heralds as only an im- 

 perfect colour. In the coats of noble- 

 men, it is called amethyst ; and, in those 

 of princes, mercury. It is represented 

 in engraving by diagonal lines, drawn 

 from the sinister chief to the dexter base 

 point. 



PURSER, an officer aboard a man of 

 war, who receives her victuals from the 

 victualler, sees that it be well stowed, and 

 keeps an account of what he every day 

 delivered to the steward. He also keeps 

 a list of the ship's company, and sets 

 down exactly the day of each man's ad- 

 mission, in order to regulate the quantity 

 of provisions to be delivered out, and 

 that the paymaster or treasurer of the 

 navy may issue out the disbursements, 

 and pay off the men, according to his 

 book. 



PUS, in medicine. What is called 

 healthy pus is about the consistence of 

 cream, and of a yellowish- white colour, 

 an insipid taste, and when it is cold, with- 

 out smell. It produces no change on 

 vegetable blues. When pus is exposed 

 to a moderate heat, it dries and assumes 

 tke appearance of horn. By distillation 



it gives out water in considerable propor*- 

 tion, ammonia and some gaseous sub- 

 stance, and an empyreumatic oil ; a shin- 

 ing coaly matter remains behind, the 

 ashes of which, after being burnt, afford- 

 ed some traces of iron. The following 

 tests have been given to distinguish pus 

 from mucus, which is of considerable 

 importance in cases where the formation 

 of pus is suspected in the lungs. 1. Pus 

 is soluble in sulphuric acid, and precipi- 

 tated by water ; mucus swims. 2. Pus 

 may be diffused through water, diluted 

 sulphuric acid, and brine ; but mucus is 

 not. 3. Pus is soluble in alkaline solu- 

 tions, and is precipitated by water ; but 

 this is not the case with mucus. These 

 are the properties of pus when it is se- 

 creted from a sore which is said to be in 

 good condition, or in a disposition to heal. 

 Its properties are very different in what 

 are called ill-conditioned sores. In these 

 cases, the matter secreted is thin, fetid, 

 and acrid. Matter secreted by cancerous 

 sores, which has been examined, converts 

 the syrup of violets to a green colour; 

 and from this matter sulphurated hydro- 

 gen gas is separated by means of sul- 

 phuric acid. This gas is supposed to 

 exist in combination with ammonia. 



PUTAMINEJE, in botany, the name 

 of the twenty-fifth order in Linnseus's 

 Fragments of a Natural Method; the 

 fleshy seed-vessel of which is frequently 

 covered with a hard, woody shell : among 

 the genera of this, are the capparis, ca- 

 per-bush ; and the crescentia, calabash- 

 tree. Most of the plants of this order 

 are acrid and penetrating, and yield, by 

 burning, large quantities of alkali. The 

 flower-buds of the caper-bush, preserved 

 with vinegar, furnish the pickle well 

 known by the name of capers. The ca- 

 labash-tree is large and spreading, like 

 an apple-tree : the fruit, when largest, is 

 capable of holding, when the pulp is 

 cleared out, about two gallons of water, 

 and is used in the West Indies, as drink- 

 ing cups, punch-bowls, and other articles 

 of household furniture. 



PUTREFACTION, is that spontane- 

 ous process of decomposition which takes 

 place in all the soft parts of animals, and 

 some vegetables, by which they are final- 

 ly disorganized, and resolved into a va- 

 riety of gaseous and volatile substances 

 which mix with the atmosphere. See 

 PHYSIOLOGY. 



PUTTING in fear. See ROBBERY. 



PUTTOCKS, or PUTTOCK shrouds, in a 

 ship, are small shrouds which go from the 

 shrouds of the main-mast, fore-mast, and 



