Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 11.djvu/708

 PENOBSCOT

644

PENOBSCOT

Under rorlnin circuiiistances, a iiiarriod woman may bring a suit witliout the intervention of a trustee, but husband and wife cannot sue one another. A married woman may loan money to, and take security from, her husliand. A liusband is not Hable for the wife's debts incurred before her marriage. Ab.solute di- vorces may be granted for impotence, bigamy, adul- ter}', cruelty, desertion, force, fraud, or coercion, and for conviction of forgery or infamous crime. The plaintiff must reside within the state for at least one whole year i)revious to the filing of the petition. A person divorced for adultery cannot marry the para- mour during the life of the former husband or wife. Divorces from bed and board are allowed for practi- callj- the same causes as absolute divorces. Marriages may be annulled for the usual causes, but proceedings must be taken under the Divorce Acts.

A Board of Public Charities, consisting of five commissioners, is appointed by the governor with the duty of visiting all charitable and correctional institu- tions at least once a year, examining the returns of the several cities, counties, wards, boroughs, and town- ships in relation to the support of paupers and in re- lation to birtlis, deaths, and marriages, and make an annual report as to the causes and best treatment of pauperism, crime, disease, and insanity, together with all desirable information concerning the industrial and material interests of the commonwealth bearing upon these subjects. They have the power of examining the various charitable, reformatory, and correctional institutions, including the city and county jails, pris- ons, and almshouses, and are required to submit an annual report to the Legislature. Institutions seeking state aid are expected to give notice to the Board, which is to inquire carefully into the grounds for the request and report its conclusions to the Legislature. Before any county prison or almshouse shall be erected the plans must be submitted to the Board.

Prisoners confined in any prison, reformatory, or other institution have the privilege of practising the religion of their choice, and are at liberty to procure the services of any minister connected with any reli- gious denomination in the state, providing such service shall be personal and not interfere with the established order of the religious service in the institution. E.s- tablished services shall not be of a sectarian character. By an Act of Assembly passed in 1903, the active or visiting committee of any society, existing for the pur- pose of visiting and instructing prisoners, are consti- tuted official visitors of jails and penitentiaries, and are permitted under reasonable rules and regulations to make visits accordingly.

Intoxicating liquors cannot lawfully be sold in Penn.sylvania except under a licence granted by the Court of Quarter Sessions. The sale of liquor on Sunday is forbidden. It is a misdemeanor for any person engaged in the sale or manufacture of intoxi- cating liquors to employ an intemperate person to assist in such maiuifacture or sale, or by gift or sale to funiish liquor to anyone known to be of intemper- ate habits, or to minors, or insane persons. Disregard of a notice not to furnish liquor to intemperate persons issued by a relative renders the party so selling liable for damages. Any judge, justice, or clergyman who shall perform the marriage ceremony between parties when either is intoxicated shall be guilty of a mis- demeanour.

Every person of sound mind who has attained the age of twenty-one years may dispose of his or her real and personal property by will. This includes married women, reserving to the husband his right as tenant by the courtesy and his right to take against the will, and to the wife her right to take against the will. Wills must be in writing and signed at the end either by the testator himself or, in case he is prevented by the extremity of his hist illness, by some person in his presence and by his express direc-

tion; and in all cases shall be proved by oaths or affirmations of two or more conipclcnt witnesses, who need not be attesting witnesses except in the case where the will makes a charitidtlr <iivi.--c or bequest. In the case of the extremity of the testator's last ill- ness, he may make an oral or nuncuiiative will for the disposition of his ])ersunal property, such will to be made during the last illness in the house of his habita- tion, or where he has resided for the space of fen (lays be- fore making his will, or any local ion where he has been surprised by sickness and dies before returning to his own house. No estate, real or personal, can be be- queathed, devised, or conveyed to any person in trust for any religious or charitable use, except by deed or will, attested by two credible, disinterested witnesses, at least one calendar month before the decease of the testator or alienor. No literary, religious, charitable, or beneficial society, congregation, or corporation may hold real and personal estate to a greater yearly value than $30,000 without exjjress legislative sanction, or on decree of court in special circumstances.

Anmml Report Secretary of Internal Affairs (Pa.), pts. Ill, IV; Report of Superinletident of Public Inslruclion (Pa.) (190S); Crop Report Secretary of Agriculture (Pa.) (1909); Pennsylvania Ar- chives; HxZAnu, Annals of Pa. (Philadelphia, iS50); Idem, Register of Pennsylvania 1828-38; Colonial Records (1790) ; Pbodd, History of Pennsylvania (1797); Bark Febbee, Pennsylvania, a Primer (1904); Franklin, Historical Review of the Constitution ami Gov- ernment of Pennsylvania (1759); Jenkins, Pennsylvania (Phila- delphia, 1903); Fisher, Pennsylvania, Colony and Commonwealth (1897); Idem, Pennsylvania, Province and State (1899); Idem. The Making of Pennsylvania (189(i); Kiblin, Catholicity in Philadel- phia (1910); BUENS, The Catholic School System in the United States (1908); The Catholic Directory (1910); Wickersham, His- tory of Education in Pennsylvania (1886); Griffin, Catholics in the American Revolution; BouviER. Law Dictionary (1897); Bhiohtlt-Pcbdon, Digest (1905); Du Bois, The Philadelphia Negro (Philadelphia. 1899) ; Janney, Life of William Penn (1852) ; Fisher, The True William Penn; Facst, The German Element in the United States (1909); Jacobs, Guarantees of Liberty in Penn- sylvania (1907).

Walter George Smith.

Penobscot Indians, the principal tribe of the famous Abnaki confederacy of Maine, and the only one still keeping its name, territory, and tribal iden- tity. The Abnaki confederacy, to which the Penob- scot belonged, consisted of a number of small tribes of Algonquian linguistic stock, holding the greater part of the present stale of M;iinc, ;in(l closely connected linguistically and politically with tli<> Penn;icook of the Merrimac region on the south and with the Maliseet or Etchimin of the St. John river on the north, and more remotely with the Micmac of eastern New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. In all the colonial wars they were active allies of the French against the Eng- lish, and suffered correspondingly, having dwindled from perhaps 3000 souls in 1600 to about 785 in 1910. Of these the Penobscot number 425, while the rest, all of mixed blood and including the descendants of the broken and incorporated Pennacook, reside, under the name of Abnaki, in the two mission settlements of Saint Francis (335) and Bdcancourt (25) in Quebec province, Canada.

The beginning of missionary work among the Ab- naki was by the Jesuits Pierre Biard and Enemond Masse, of the French post of Port-Royal (Annai)olis, Nova Scotia), in 1611. Two years later a mission establishment was attempted, in connexion with a French post, on Mount Desert island, Maine, but was destroyed by the English commander, Argall, before it was fairlv completed. From 1641) to 1657 the Jesuit Fr. Gabri('l I>ruillettes, of the Montagiiiiis Mission, spent much time with the Abnaki, est:iblishing a tem- porary chapel on the Kennebec, and later drew off many of them to the mission settlements of Canada. In 1688 the Jesuit Fr. Jacques Bigot again took up the work on the Kennebec while in the same year Fr. Louis-Pierre Thury, of the Foreign Missions, estab- lished the first regular mission at Panawambskek ("it forks on the white rocks" — Vetromile) or Penobscot, at the falls near the present Oldtown. Here he laboured