Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/282

 POP

POR

different manner of their working. Reaumur's Hift. Inf. Vol. VI. p. 39, feq.

POPUTffiUS, (Cycl.) a fmall mufcle, obliquely pyramidal, fituated under the ham. It is fixed above, by a ftrong nar- row tendon, to the outer edge of the inner condyle of the os femoris, and to the neighbouring pofterior ligament of the joint ; from thence it runs obliquely downward, under the inner condyle of the os femoris ; its flat and pretty thick flefhy body increafing gradually in breadth, till it is fixed in the backfide of the head of the tibia all the way to the oblique line obfervable on that fide. Winjlow's Anat. p. 216.

POPPY, (Cycl.) Papaver, in botany. See Papaver. We have many fpecies of this plant cultivated in gardens for the beauty of the flowers. They are all eafily propagated by fowing the feeds in autumn. When the young plants come up, they are to be cleared from weeds, and thinned to a pro- per diftance by pulling fome up where they ftand too thick ; for they never thrive well if they are tranfplanted. They are to be left, according to their fizes, at fix, eight, or ten inches diftance.

They are very fhowy flowers, and make a fplendid appear- ance in gardens ; but they are but of fhort duration, and are of anoffenfive fmell, which makes themlefs valued atprefent than they have been.

Some fow thefe plants in fpring, but it is not fo well ; becaufe they then have not time to get ftrength before autumn, when they are to flower ; and for that reafon thofe fown in fpring ufually flower weakly. Miller's Gard. Diet.

Red-Poppy. Thecommonwild red/w#>yisoneof the moft trouble- fome and mifchievous weeds the farmers are plagued with a- among their corn, and it is the moft difficult to thoroughly de- ftroy of almoft any other. Its feed will He a long time in land unploughed, without ever mooting; but they will be fure to grow with the firft crop of corn. Mr. Tull gives an inftance of the feeds of this plant being buried four and twenty years in a field of faint-foin, and at the end of that time, the land being ploughed for wheat, they all grew up among the corn, tho' they had Iain dormant fo long before. Tull's Horfehoing Husbandry.

It has been the general opinion of authors, that the narcotic quality of the red poppy lay in its flowers ; but Mr. Boul- duc, in his courfe of experiments for the finding out an European plant which mould yield us a juice of the nature of the opium of the Eaft, without its bad effects, found that the virtue of this plant, which is very great, lay much more in the heads than the flowers ; and from four ounces of thefe heads, while frefh and green, he obtained five drachms of a folid extract, of the nature of opium, two, three, or four grains of which were a full dofe ; and which poflefled the virtues of opium, and might be given with great fuccefs and fafety in obftinate coughs and other fuch cafes. Hift. Acad. Par. 1712.

It is faid, that the extract of Britim f.oppies is, in fome cafes., preferable to the opium brought from Turkey. We have, in the medical elfays of Edinburgh, the method of preparing ai extract and fyrup of poppies, by Mr. Arnot. See Vol. 5 Art. 11.

Yellow Poppy. The yellow horned poppy, called by authors pa paver arnkulatum luteum, is one of thofe vegetable poifons of our own growth, which may be very mifchievous by their not being generally known, or fufpected to be fo. We have an account of the effects of this plant in the philofophical tranfactions, in an inftance of a family in Cornwall, Who eat of a pye made of the roots of this inftead of thofe of eryngo, orfea-holly, which it is the cuftom of the poorer people theie to make into a coarfe fort of pye for their food. The man of the houfe, on eating of this pye while hot, was feized immediately with a violent delirium, one effect of which was his thinking every thing he faw of a yellow colour, and taking every utenfil of the houfe to be made of gold. The man and maid fervant eat of the pye after their mafter, and were foon after as mad as he, coming into the room where his friends were attending him, ftripped naked, and dancing together. Thefe people alfo took every thing they faw to be gold ; and a child in the cradle, to whom a fmall piece of the pye had been given, was thrown into a drowfy diforder, and convulfed about the mouth ; but, after a few days, it recovered.

The grown people were all feized with moft violent purgings, and by that means efcaped, after being miferably worn down by this complaint.

The fymptom of fuppofing every thing gold, which ran through the whole family, and went even fo far as to the fup- pofing their ftools gold, and ordering them to be faved, may poflibly be in fome meafure owing to the idea they had of the plant whofe roots they had been poifoned by ; its flowers be- ing as large as a rofe, and of a fine yellow, and the juice of the whole plant being alfo yellow. Phil. Tranf. N°. 242.

Homed Poppy. See Glaucium.

VovvY-feeds. The poppy-feed is of a more delicious tafte than fweet almonds ; it is oily and farinaceous. Dr. Alfton fays, he has eaten large quantities of the black as well as the white

feed, and never found it fomniferous or noxious. See Med EffEdinb. Vol. 5-Art. 12.

Thefe feeds are ufed in food in fome places, as is their ex- prefled oil, which is as wholeforne as olive oil. Vid. Matthiol. p. 746. Gcffr. Mat. Med. Vol. z. p. 713.

POPULAGO, marjh-marygold, in botany, the name of a genus of plants, the characters of which are thefe : The flower is of the rofaceous kind, being compofed of feveral petals ar- ranged in a circular form ; from its center ar;fes a piftil, which afterwards becomes a membranaceous fruit, confuting as it were of feveral thin capfules collected into a head. Thefe capfules all bend a little downwards, and contain oblon^ feeds.

The fpecies of populago, enumerated by Mr. Tournefort, are thefe: 1. The common large flowered populago. 2. The fmaller flowered populago. And, 3. The populago with double flowers. Tourn. lnft. p. 273.

POPULARIA, among the Romans, were fteps or places where the people fat and beheld the games and horfe-races. Pitifc. Lex. Ant. in voc,

PORCALA, a name given by fome of the later Latin writers to the herb purfelain, as if it had its name from being loved by the hogs.

PORCELAIN (Cycl)— The moft juft and regular idea we can form of the porcelain or china-ware is, that it is an half vitri- fied fubftance or manufacture, in a middle ftate between the common baked earthen ware of our vulgar manufactures, and true glafs. This is the eflential and diftinctive character of porcelain, and it is only by confidering it in this light, that we are to hope to arrive at the perfect art of imitating it in Europe.

This attempt is to be made on thefe principles in two differ- ent manners: the one by finding fome appropriated matter on which fire acts with more than ordinary ftrength in the time of its paifing from the common baked ftate of earthen ware into that of glafs. The other is, to compofe a pafte of two fubftances reduced to powder; the one of which lhall be of force to refift a very violent fire, fo as not to become vi- trified in it; and the other a matter very eafily vitrifiable. In the firft cafe, the matter is to be taken out of the fire at the time when it' is imperfectly vitrified ; and in the other the compound mafs is to remain in the furnace till the one fubftance, which is the more eafily vitrifiable, is truly vitri- fied ; and being then taken out, the whole will be what por- celain is, a fubftance in part vitrified, but not wholly Co. The firft method is that by which the European porcelain has generally been made, and tho' that of St. Cloud, and fome other places, has been very beautiful, yet it is always eafy to diftinguifh even the fineft of it from the china-ware, and the nature of the two fubftances appears evidently different : thefe owing all their beauty to their near approach to vitrification, are made to endure a long and violent fire, and are taken from it at a time when a very little longer continuance would have made them perfect glafs ; on the contrary, the china- ware being made of a pafte, part of which is made of a fub- ftance in itfelf fcarce poifible to be vitrified, bears the fire in a yet much more intenfe degree than ours, and is in no dan- ger of running wholly into glafs from it. The two fubftances ufed by the Chinefe are well known by the names of peiunje and kaolin, and on examining thefe it appears very evident, that we have in Europe the very fame fubftances, or at leaft fubftances of the very fame nature and capable of being wrought into a porcelain equally beautiful and fine. Mem. Acad. Scienc. Par. 1739. See the articles Kaolin and Petunse.

Thefe are the two different femi-vitrifications, on one or other of which all the European manufactures have hitherto been founded ; and it is eafy from the knowledge of thefe principles to determine, on breaking a piece of the china of any of our manufactures, by which of the two procefles it is made. If it is made by fiezing the half- vitrified mafs of a fubftance which would foon after have been wholly vitrified, then the putting it in a crucible, into an equal degree of fire] will foon turn it wholly into glafs. This is the cafe of moft of our European porcelain \ but if it be made of two ingre- dients, the one of which is not vitrifiable, or at leaft not by fuch fires, then the matter will melt, but will not vitrify ; this is the cafe with the Chinefe p-rcelain, which, if kept in" fufion a long time, yet when cold is china-ware ftill ; fo that this is evidently made of two fuch different ingredients. Befides thefe methods, there is yet another, of late invention, which makes a very beautiful china; and which, if it does not afford veflels equal to thofe of China, yet will afford them, nearly approaching to thofe, and at a confiderable fmaller price. _ This method confifts in reducing glafs to china. See the article GLAss-porcelain.

The fine deep blue of the old porcelain-wzre of China, is much valued by the curious ; and it is much lamented, that the fame colour is not ufed at this time. The art feems at prefent to be loft; but perhaps it might be recovered by trials; It is certain that the Chinefe have cobalt among them, 'and very probably they ufed a blue colour prepared from this be* fore they had any commerce with us : notwithstanding all the

con-