PEPPER, in botany, a genus of the diandria trigynia class. It has neither calyx nor corolla; the berry contains but one seed. There are 20 species, all natives of warm countries.

**Piper**, in ichthyology. See **Trigla**.

**Piracy**, in Scots law. See **Law**, Tit. xxxiii.

**Pirate**, a person, or vessel, that robs on the high seas, without permission or authority of any prince or state.

**Pisa**, a city, of Italy, in the duchy of Tuscany, situated on the river Arno, four miles east of the sea, and ten miles north of Leghorn.

**Piscary**, in our ancient statutes, the liberty of fishing in another man's waters.

**Pisces**, in astronomy, the twelfth sign or constellation of the zodiac. See **Astronomy**, p. 487.

**Piscina**, in antiquity, a large bason in a public place or square, where the Roman youth learned to swim, and which was surrounded with a high wall, to prevent casting of filth into it.

**Pissaphaltum**, earth-pitch, a fluid, opake, mineral body, of a thick consistence, of a strong smell, readily inflammable, but leaving a residuum of greyish ashes after burning. It arises out of the cracks of rocks, in several places in the island of Sumatra, and in some other parts of the East-Indies, and is much esteemed there, in paralytic disorders.

**Pisellaeum Indicum**, Barbadoes tar, a mineral fluid, of the nature of the thicker bitumens, and of all others the most approaching in appearance, colour, and consistence, to the true pitchphalatum, though differing from it in other respects. It is very frequent in many parts of America, where it is found trickling down the sides of mountains in large quantities, and sometimes floating on the surface of the waters. It has been greatly recommended internally in coughs and other disorders of the breast and lungs.

**Pistacia**, in botany, a genus of the dioecia pentandra clas. The calix of the amentum in the male consists of five segments; it has no corolla: The calix of the female consists of three segments; it has no corolla; there are three styli; and the drupa contains one seed. There are five species, all natives of warm climates.

Pistachia-nuts abound with a sweet and well-tasted oil, which they will yield in great abundance, on being pressed after bruising them: they are reckoned wholesome and nutritious, and are very proper to be prescribed by way of reforatives, eaten in a moderate quantity, and to people emaciated with long illnesses.

**Pistol**, among botanists. See **Botany**, p. 637.

**Pistol**, the smallest piece of fire-arms, born at the saddle bow, on the girdle, and in the pocket.

**Pistole**, a gold coin, struck in Spain, and in several parts of Italy, Switzerland, &c.

The pistole has its augmentations and diminutions, which are quadruple pistoles, double pistoles, and half pistoles.

**Piston**, in pump-work, is a short cylinder of metal, or other solid substance, fitted exactly to the cavity of the barrel or body of the pump. See **Hydrostatics**.

**Pisum**, in botany, a genus of the diadelphia decandria clas. The stylus is triangular, carinated and downy above; and the two upper laciniae of the calix are shorter than the rest. The species are four, only one of them, viz. the marinum, or sea-pea, a native of Britain.

Peas are nutritive, and accordingly used for food; but rarely for any medicinal purposes, except to keep ulcers open; for which purpose they are rubbed with balsam, or linimentum Arcæi.

**Pitch**, a tenacious oily substance, drawn chiefly from pines and firs, and used in shipping, medicine, and various other arts: or it is more properly tar, inspissated by boiling it over a slow fire.

The method of procuring the tar, is by cleaving the trees into small billets, which are laid in a furnace that has two apertures, through one of which the fire is put, and through the other the pitch is gathered, which, oozing from the wood, runs along the bottom of the furnace into places made to receive it. When the smoke, which is here very thick, gives it blackness, this is called tar; which, on being boiled, to consume more of its moisture, becomes pitch.

There is another method of drawing pitch, used in the Levant: a pit is dug in the ground, two ells in diameter at the top, but contracting as it grows deeper; this is filled with branches of pine, cloven into shivers; the wood at the top of the pit is then set on fire, and burning downwards, the tar runs from it out of a hole made in the bottom; and this is boiled, as above, to give it the consistence of pitch.

**Pith**, in vegetation, the soft spongy substance contained in the central parts of plants and trees. See **Agriculture**, Part I.

**Pituitary gland**, in anatomy. See **Anatomy**, p. 286.

**Place**, in war, a general name for all kinds of fortresses where a party may defend themselves.

**Common Place**. See **Common place**.

**Placenta**, in anatomy and midwifery, a soft roundish mass found in the womb of pregnant women; which, from its resemblance to the liver, was called by the ancients hepar uterinum, the uterine liver. See **Midwifery**, p. 208.

**Placentia**, a city of Spain, in the province of Extremadura: W. long. 6°, N. lat. 39° 45'.

**Plagiarist**, in philology, the purloining another person's works, and putting them off for a man's own. Among the Romans, plagiarism was properly a person who bought, sold, or retained a freeman for a slave; and was so called, because by the Flavian law such persons were condemned, ad plagas, to be whipped.

**Plagiuri**, among ichthyologists, a class of fishes comprehending all those which have the tails not perpendicular, but placed in an horizontal direction.

**Plague**, Pestilence, or Pestilential Fever. See **Medicine**, p. 71.

**Plaise**, the English name of a species of the pleuronectes. See **Pleuronectes**.

**Plan**, in general, denotes the representation of something drawn on a plane: such are maps, charts, ichnographies, &c.

The term plan, however, is particularly used for a draught of a building, such as it appears, or is intended to appear, on the ground; shewing the extent, division, and distribution of its area, or ground-plot, into apartments, rooms, passages, &c.

**Plane**, in geometry, denotes a plain surface, or one that lies evenly between its bounding lines: and as a right line is the shortest extension from one point to another, so a plain plain surface is the shortest extension from one line to another.