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 Plumer gained a signal victory at Messines on the opening of the Flanders offensive, for which he was given the G.C.B. Three months later he assumed charge of the operations east of Ypres, which had been making slow progress, and his dispositions were for a time highly successful; but the recovery of the whole of the high ground could not be accomplished owing to the lateness of the season. Then, just as the Flanders offensive concluded, he was in Nov. selected to take charge of the British troops that were being sent to the basin of the Po after the Italian defeat at Caporetto. He commanded them until March, but he was then summoned back to Flanders to resume leadership of the II. Army just before the great German offensive started. During the later stages of the hostile effort his troops were forced back some miles, but they succeeded in checking the enemy. Then, when the general advance of the Allies began in Aug., his army took a very prominent part in the operations by which Belgian Flanders was recovered from the invaders. For his services in the war he was raised to the peerage as Baron Plumer of Messines and of Bilton, was promoted field marshal, and received a grant of £30,000. He subsequently commanded the British forces on the Rhine for a short time, and in June 1919 went out to Malta as governor and commander-in-chief.

PLUNKETT, SIR HORACE CURZON (1854- ), Irish politician (see 21.857), after his retirement in 1907 from the vice-presidency of the Irish Agricultural Department, took no prominent part in politics till the crucial year 1914. In Feb. of that year, when suggestions for an agreed settlement of the Irish difficulty were pouring in from all sides, he came out, in a long letter to The Times, with a scheme of his own, under which Ulster should accept the Home Rule bill, but should have a right to secede after a term of years, while the Ulster Volunteers should become a Territorial Force, partly as an ultimate safeguard of the Ulster Unionists. Hitherto he had been regarded as a moderate Unionist, but this suggestion rendered him suspect in Ulster eyes, and the suspicion was confirmed when he published in the third week of July a pamphlet entitled The Better Way: an Appeal to Ulster not to Desert Ireland, in which he announced his conversion to Home Rule and appealed to Ulster to give Home Rule a chance, re-stating the arguments of his previous letter, and suggesting a conference of Irishmen on the bill. This was his attempt to avert civil war; but the situation was revolutionized by the outbreak of the World War. Once again, in 1917, a year after the Dublin rebellion, he took the lead in an honest attempt to solve the Irish question. When Mr. Lloyd George set up a comprehensive convention of Irishmen to consider the matter, and report their conclusions, there was great difficulty in finding a suitable chairman; but the first meeting unanimously chose Sir Horace for the post. He was himself sanguine, and worked at his task with singular devotion; but the absence of Sinn Fein from the gathering, the impossibility of reconciling the views of the Ulstermen and the southern Unionists, and the occurrence of a number of tragic events in Ireland, prevented the adoption of any report with colourable unanimity. In 1920–1 he was a prominent advocate of “Dominion Home Rule” (see IRELAND: History).

PODMORE, FRANK (1856–1910), English psychologist, was born at Elstree, Herts, Feb. 5 1856. Educated at Haileybury and Pembroke College, Oxford, he became interested in psychical research, and was closely associated with Edmund Gurney and F. W. H. Myers in the telepathic and psychical investigations described in their joint publication Phantasms of the Living (1886). He also published Apparitions and Thought Transference (1894); Studies in Psychical Research (1897); Modern Spiritualism (1902) and other works on the subject. He was found drowned near Malvern Aug. 15 1910.

POINCARÉ, JULES HENRI (1854–1912), French physicist (see 21.892), was born at Nancy April 29 1854, and educated at the lycée in that town. As a boy he served in an ambulance corps during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, and later passed with distinction through the Ecole Polytechnique in mining, becoming a mining engineer, but soon abandoning practical work for teaching, first at Caen and later in the university of Paris. He won the King of Sweden's open prize for a mathematical treatise in 1889, and in 1908 was elected to the Academic Franchise. He was a voluminous writer on his own special subjects. Some details of his contributions to science are given in 19.859, 25.786 and 26.947. He died in Paris July 17 1912.

POINCARÉ, LUCIEN (1862–1920), French physicist (see 21.892), was born at Bar-le-Duc July 22 1862. After a distinguished academic career he became in succession inspector-general of physical science in 1902, director of secondary education at the Ministry of Public Instruction in 1910, director of higher education in 1914 and rector of the Académie de Paris in 1917. In that capacity he received President Wilson at the Sorbonne on the occasion of his visit to Paris for the Peace Conference. He died in Paris March 9 1920.

POINCARÉ, RAYMOND (1860–), French statesman and writer (see 21.892). After the fall of the Sarrien Ministry in 1906 M. Poincaré ceased for some years to take an active part in politics. On Dec. 9 1909 he was made a member of the French Academy. In 1911 he was invited to join the Monis Ministry, but refused. His opportunity came at the beginning of 1912, and on Jan. 13 he became head of what was popularly known as the “great” or “national” Ministry, in which he also held the portfolio of Foreign Affairs. As Prime Minister Poincaré aimed at safeguarding the interests of France abroad, especially against the menace of the Triple Alliance, and at strengthening her at home by firm government and the restoration of social discipline. In this he was helped by the revival of a strong national feeling in France, provoked by the international crisis of 1911. The fact that he was a Lorrainer prejudiced public opinion in his favour, and his popularity was increased by his foreign policy especially the successful establishment of the French protectorate over Morocco and the conclusion of the naval agreement with Russia. In Aug. 1912 Poincaré went to St. Petersburg to confer with the Tsar and his ministers about the Franco-Russian Alliance and the new developments of the Eastern question, a visit which countered the somewhat depressing effect in France of the meeting of the German and Russian Emperors at Baltic Port on July 4. The Balkan Wars, and Poincaré’s attitude towards the problem raised by them, greatly increased his prestige; he declared on Dec. 4 to the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Chamber that he was determined to secure respect for the economic and political interests of France, not only in the Balkan Peninsula, but in the Ottoman Empire generally, and especially in Syria.

At the beginning of 1913 he became a candidate for the presidency. This action excited strong personal as well as political feeling, and his election was hotly contested, the second and third ballots showing a majority for his most serious competitor, M. Pams. On appeal to the National Assembly, however, he was ultimately elected by a majority of 187 votes over M. Pams, his inauguration taking place on Feb. 18 amid great demonstrations of popular enthusiasm. Two days later he showed that he intended to exercise the right of the President to address Parliament direct a right which had fallen into desuetude by sending a message to the Chambers, in which he stated that it was his function as President " to be a guide and adviser for public opinion in times of crisis " and " to seek to make a rational choice between conflicting interests." His activities as President were still directed to strengthening the internal and external position of France. In June 1913, after inspecting the fleet at Toulon, he paid a State visit to England (24-27), during which he enlarged on the necessity of the perpetual association of the two nations "for the progress of civilization and the maintenance of the peace of the world." In the autumn he made a motor tour of the south of France, being greeted everywhere with popular acclamation, the bands playing the irredentist march "Sambre et Meuse," and attended the army manoeuvres at Toulouse. His State visit to Spain followed in October.

The President's activity and enormous popularity roused the anger of the Opposition parties, and the Radical-Socialist congress at Pau, on Oct. 17, passed a resolution condemning "the aspirations of personal policy." This had no effect, how-