Page:EB1911 - Volume 22.djvu/79

 Redistribution of Seats Act of 1885 one member only has been returned. Liquorice was largely grown as early as 1700–1701, when the corporation prohibited the sale of buds or sets of the plant. Richard III. by his incorporation charter granted the market rights in the borough to the burgesses, who still hold them under his charter.

See Victoria County History: Yorkshire; Eighth Report of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts (1870–1897); Book of Entries of the Pontefract Corporation, 1653–1726 (ed. by Richard Holmes, 1882); Benjamin Boothroyd, The History of the Ancient Borough of Pontefract (1807); George Fox, The History of Pontefract (1827).

 PONTEVEDRA, a maritime province of north-western Spain, formed in 1833 of districts taken from Galicia, and bounded on the N. by Corunna, E. by Lugo and Orense, S. by Portugal and W. by the Atlantic. Pop. (1900), 457,262; area, 1695 sq. m. Pontevedra is the smallest of the provinces of Spain except the three Basque Provinces; its density of population, 269.8 inhabitants per square mile, is only excelled in the provinces of Barcelona and Biscay (Vizcaya). Both of these are mining and manufacturing districts, while Pontevedra is dependent on agriculture and fisheries. The surface is everywhere mountainous, and consists almost entirely of arable land, pasture or forest. The coast-line is deeply indented; navigation is rendered difficult by the prevalence of fogs in summer and storms in winter. The river Miño (Portuguese Minho) forms the southern frontier, and is navigable by small ships as far as Salvatierra; and the province is watered by many smaller streams, all flowing, like the Miño, into the Atlantic. The largest of these are the Ulla, which separates Pontevedra from Corunna, the Umia and the Lerez. Pontevedra has a mild climate, a fertile soil and a very heavy rainfall. Large agricultural fairs are held in the chief towns, and there is a considerable export trade in cattle to Great Britain and Portugal, hams, salt meat and fish, eggs, breadstuffs, leather and wine. Vigo is the headquarters of shipping, and one of the chief ports of northern Spain. There are also good harbours at Bayona, Carril, Marin, Villagarcia and elsewhere among the deep estuaries of the coast. At Tuy the Spanish and Portuguese railways meet, and from this town one line goes up the Miño valley to Orense, and another northward along the coast to Santiago de Compostela.

 PONTEVEDRA, the capital of the Spanish province of Pontevedra; on the Tuy-Corunna railway, and on the river Lerez, which here enters the Ria de Pontevedra, an inlet of the Atlantic. Pop. (1900), 22,330. The name of the townis derived from the ancient Roman bridge (pons vetus) of twelve arches, which spans the Lerez near its mouth. Pontevedra is a picturesque town, mainly built of granite, and still partly enclosed by medieval fortifications. It contains handsome provincial and municipal halls erected in the 19th century, and many convents, some of which have been converted into hospitals or schools. Marin and Sangenjo are ports on the Ria de Pontevedra, which is the seat of a thriving sardine fishery. There is an active trade in grain, wine and fruit; cloth, hats, leather and pottery are manufactured.

 PONTIAC (c. 1720-1769), Indian chief of the Ottawa and leader in the “Conspiracy of Pontiac” in 1763-64, was born between 1712 and 1720 probably on the Maumee river, near the mouth of the Auglaize. His father was an Ottawa, and his mother an Ojibwa. By 1755 he had become a chief of the Ottawa and a leader of the loose confederacy of the Ottawa, Potawatomi and Ojibwa. He was an ally of France and possibly commanded the Ottawa in the defeat (July 9, 1755) of General Edward Braddock. In November 1760 he met Major Robert Rogers, then on his way to occupy Michilimackinac and other forts surrendered by the French, and agreed to let the English troops pass unmolested on condition that he should be treated with respect by the British. Like other Indians he soon realized the difference between French and English rule—that the Indians were no longer welcomed at the forts and that they would ultimately be deprived of their hunting grounds by encroaching English settlements. French hunters and traders encouraged Indian disaffection with vague promises of help from France; in 1762 an Indian “prophet” among the Delawares on the Muskingum preached a union of the Indians to expel the

English, and in that year (as in 1761) there were abortive conspiracies to massacre the English garrisons of Detroit, Fort Niagara and Fort Pitt (now Pittsburg). Pontiac seems to have been chief of a magic association (the Metai), and he took advantage of the religious fervour and the general unrest among the Indians to organize in the winter of 1762-63 a simultaneous attack on the English forts to be made in May 1763 at a certain phase of the moon. On the 27th of April 1763 before a meeting near Detroit of delegates from most of the Algonquian tribes, he outlined his plans. On the 7th of May, with 60 warriors, he attempted unsuccessfully to gain admission to Detroit, which then had a garrison of about 160 under Major Henry Gladwin (1730-1791); and then besieged the fort from the 9th of May to the end of October. On the 28th of May reinforcements from Fort Niagara were ambuscaded near the mouth of the Detroit. In June the Wyandot and Potawatomi withdrew from the siege, but on the 29th of July they attacked reinforcements (280 men, including 20 of Rogers's rangers) from Fort Niagara under Captain James Dalyell (or Dalzell), who, however, gained the fort, and in spite of Gladwin's, opposition on the 31st of July attacked Pontiac's camp, but was ambuscaded on Bloody Run and was killed, nearly 60 others being killed or wounded. On the 12th of October the Potawatomi, Ojibwa and Wyandot made peace with the English; with the Ottawa Pontiac continued the siege until the 30th of October, when he learned from Neyon de la Vallière, commandant of Fort Chartres (among the Illinois) that he would not be aided by the French. Pontiac then withdrew to the Maumee.

Fort Pitt with a garrison of 330 men under, Captain Simeon Ecuyer was attacked on the 22nd of June and was besieged from the 27th of July to the 1st of August, when the Indians withdrew to meet a relief expedition of 500 men, mostly Highlanders, under Colonel Henry Bouquet (1719-1766), who had set out from Carlisle, Pennsylvania, on the 18th of July, and relieved Fort Ligonier (on the site of the borough of Ligonier, Westmoreland county, Penn.) on the 2nd of August, but was surprised on the 5th, and fought (5th and 6th) the battle of Bushy Run (25 m. S.E. of Fort Pitt), finally flanking and routing the Indians after tricking them by a feinted retreat of a part of his force. Bouquet reached Fort Pitt on the 10th of August. At Michilimackinac (Mackinac), Michigan, on the 4th of June, the Indians gained admission to the fort by a trick, killed nearly a score of the garrison and captured the remainder, including Captain George Etherington, the commander, besides several English traders, including Alexander Henry (1739-1824). Some of the captives were seized by the Ottawa, who had taken no part in the attack; a part of these were released, and reached Montreal on the 13th of August. Seven of the prisoners kept by the Ojibwa were killed in cold blood by one of their chiefs. Fort Sandusky (on the site of Sandusky, Ohio) was taken on the 16th of May by Wyandot; and Fort St Joseph (on the site of the present Niles, Mich.) was captured on the 25th of May and 11 men (out of its garrison of 14) were massacred, the others with the commandant, Ensign Schlosser, being taken to Detroit and exchanged for Indian prisoners. On the 27th of May Fort Miami (on the site of Fort Wayne, Indiana) surrendered to the Indians after its commander, Ensign Holmes, had been treacherously killed. Fort Ouiatanon (about 5 rn. south-west of the present Lafayette, Indiana) and Fort Presque Isle (on the site of Erie, Penn.) were taken by the Indians on the 1st and 16th of June respectively; and Fort Le Boeuf (on the site of Waterford, 