PUT 



P U T 



at the mouth of the Rionc, on the Black fea ; Jo miles 

 W.S.W. of Cotatis. N. lat. 42°. E. long. 41° 28'. 



PUTICULI, among the Romans, ditches or holes in 

 the earth, a little without the Efquiline gate, in which the 

 poorer fort of people were Ijiiriod. 



PUTIGNANO, in Geography, a town of Naples, in 

 the province of Bari ; 33 miles S.E. of Bari. 



PUTIVLI, a town of Rufiia, in the government of 

 Kurllc, on the'Sem ; 72 miles W.S.W. of Kurft. N. lat. 

 51'^' 20'. E. long. 34" 14'. 



PUTLACH, a town of Bavaria, in the bifhopric of 

 Bamberg; fivemiiesE. of GolTvveinftein. 



PUTLITZ, or PuDLiTz, a town of Brandenburg, in 

 the Mark of Pregnitz ; 10 miles N. of Perleberg. N. lat. 

 53° 16'. E. long. 12° 3'. 



PUTLOGS, or PuTLOCKS, in BuUdtng, fhort pieces of 

 timber, about feven feet long, ufed in building fcafFolds. 

 They lie at right angles to the wall, with one of their 

 ends bearing upon it, and the other upon the ledges or 

 poles which ftand parallel to the iide of the wall of the 

 building. 



PUTNA, in Geography, a town of Moldavia ; 32 miles 

 W. of Suczava. — Alfo, a river of Moldavia, which runs 

 into the Milcow, at Focfani. 



PUTNAM, a county of America, in the fouthern dif- 

 trift of Georgia, containing 6809 free pcrfons, and 3220 

 flaves. Its chief town is Eatonton. 



PUTNEY, a town of America, in Windham county, and 

 ftate of Vermont, containing 1607 inhabitants. 



Putney, a village and parirti in the weft half hundred 

 of Brixton, and county of Surrey, England, is fituated 

 on the fouth bank of the river Thames, at the diftance of 

 four miles from Hyde Park corner, London. The parifh 

 contains 1630 acres, of which the greater proportion is an 

 open common or heath. In the time of the civil wars it 

 was the fcene of fome very interefting tranfaftions. The 

 parliamentary army lay at Putney, for a confidcrable time, 

 in the year 1 747 ; and here the general officers, after long 

 debates in the church, completed their propofitions for the 

 future government of the kingdom, and fent them to the 

 king at Hampton Court. Here alfo were born two cele- 

 brated ftatefmen, Nicholas Weft, bifhop of Ely, and 

 Thomas Cromwell, earl of Eilex, the protegee of Wolfey, 

 and the fucceifor to his power and misfortunes. In this 

 parifh are many agreeable villas ; in one of which the late 

 Uluftrious William Pitt breathed his laft. The church was 

 originally built as a chapel of eafe to Wimbledon, not long 

 after the conquefl ; but was, in a great meafiire, re-ere£led 

 in the reign of Henry VII. It is a fmall edifice, with a 

 ftone tower at the weft end. A little chapel at the eaflern 

 extremity of the fouth aifle, built by bifliop Wefl, is, how- 

 ever, its chief ornament. Monuments and infcriptions are 

 numerous, but few of them deferve notice. Over the 

 Thames, in this parifh, is a wooden bridge, conftrufted in 

 the year 1729, at the expenc? of 23,975/. and yielding a 

 revenue, by tolls, to the proprietors, of above 3000/. per 

 annum. A fifhery here was poffefTed by the lord of the 

 manor, previous to the conquell ; and is now rented for a 

 confiderable fum. All flurgeons and porpufes are claimed by 

 the lord mayor of London, but the filhermcn receive 1 3^. 

 for each of the former, and a guinea for each of the latter, 

 when delivered to the water bailiff. On the common ftands 

 an obelifli, erefted, in 17S6, in memory of Hartley's in- 

 vention for fecuring buildings againfl fire. 



According to the parliamentary returns of 1 8 1 1 , this 

 parifh contains 492 houfes, and 2881 inhabitants. Lyfons's 

 Environs of London, vol. i. 1795. Supplement, 181 1. 



Vol. XXIX. 



PUTNOK, a town of Hungary; 36 miles W.N. W. of 

 Tokay. 



PUTORIUS, in Zoology, the Pole-cat, a fpecies of 

 Muflela ; which fee. See alfo Pole-cat. 



PuToiutJS Serpens, a name given by fome to that fpecies 

 of ferpent called by others dryiniis. 



PUTREFACTION, or Putkifaction, in Chemjlry, 

 is a fpecies oi ferment al'wn (which fee) ; being the lad Hage 

 of the fermentatory procefs, and conliiling not merely in the 

 decompofition and tranfpofition of the particles of putrefying 

 fubflances, whether animal or vegetable, by which new 

 combinations are produced, but alfo in the extrication and 

 expulfion of fome of the conflituent parts of thefe fub- 

 flances. 



This decompofition or derangement of the conflituent 

 parts of vegetable fubflances is ufually called fermentation, 

 and that of animal bodies, is denomhrdled putrefaction. The 

 agents that produce both kinds of decompofition, and the 

 circumflances that attend them are, in various refpefts, very 

 fimilar, and the chief difference of the produfts that are 

 obtained from both depends upon the diverfity of their 

 conflituent parts. The procefs of putrefaflion, and its efFeft 

 in diffolving the combination of the conflituent parts of 

 bodies, are fufficiently obvious to fenfc ; but the rationale 

 of the procefs, and the mode in which gafeous and volatile 

 compounds are feparated from bodies that are diforganized 

 and afterwards form new combinations, are flill involved in 

 confiderable obfcurity ; and different writers have difagreed 

 in their explication of them. Several fafts, however, are 

 univerfally acknowledged ; and of thefe we fhall give a 

 brief account in the fequel of this article, together with a 

 detail of fome of thofe principles and theories that have 

 been adopted for explaining them. Becher long ago ob- 

 fervcd, in his " Phyf. Subt. 1. i. §. 5." that air is the 

 principal agent of decompofition, but that water and heat 

 very much facilitate its aftion. Thus he fays, " Fermen- 

 tatio ergo definitur quod fit corporis denfioris rarefaftio, 

 particularumque acrearum interpofitio ; ex quo conclu- 

 ditur debcre in acre fieri nee nimium frigido, ne rare- 

 fadlio imped iatur ; nee nimium calido, ne partes raribiles 

 expellantLir." 



An animal fubflance may be preferved from putrefaftiou 

 by depriving it of the contaft of the air ; and this procefs 

 may be accelerated or retarded by varying or modifying the 

 purity of the fame f^iiid. When we obferve putrefaftion 

 occurring without the accefs of atmofpherical air, the effeft 

 is produced by the water which impregnates the animal 

 fubftance, becomes decompofed, and affords the element 

 and the agent of putrefaction. Hence it appears, that 

 moiflure is an indifpenfible requifite to facilitate putrefac- 

 tion. A moderate degree of heat is alfo a condition favour- 

 able to animal decompofition. 



Dr. Hales, it is well known, afcribed the cohefion and 

 foHdity «f bodies .to the air, which exifls in them in a fixed 

 flate, and forms, as he expreffes it, the cement or bond of 

 union between their feveral conflituent particles. To this 

 purpofe he obfcrves, that air abounds much more in folid 

 than in liquid bodies ; and that folid bodies being generally 

 denfer than water, the attraftion of the air of thefe folid 

 bodies in a fixed flate, and its repulfion when in an elaflic 

 ftate, are greater than the attraftion and repulfion of the 

 lighter watery particles in a fixed and in an elaflic ftate ; 

 and hence the particles of air are fitter to be the principal 

 bond of union in folid bodies, than the particles of water. 

 This opinion was afterwards adopted by baron de Haller, 

 who maintains, that air is the vinculum elementorum prrma- 

 ritim, or the true cement which binds together the earthy 

 G particle* 



