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 PKOTECTOE PROTEST 31 taught than Phidias and 10 other sculptors. None of his works are extant. In his treatise " On the Gods," Protagoras started with the following proposition : " Respecting the gods, I am unable to know whether they exist or do not exist." For this he was banished from Athens, and his books were burned. PROTECTOR, in English history, a title several times conferred by parliament upon the chief officer of the kingdom during the king's mi- nority, in place of that of regent. The most celebrated protectors were John, duke of Bed- ford, and Humphrey, duke of Gloucester, in the minority of Henry VI. ; Richard, duke of Gloucester, whose protectorate ended in his becoming king as Richard III. after the death of Edward V. ; and Edward Seymour, duke of Somerset, in the minority of his nephew Ed- ward VI. Oliver Cromwell, as well as his son Richard, bore the title of lord protector. PROTEIDS. See PKOTEINE. PROTEINE (Gr. Trpwrof, first), a name given by Mulder to a product obtained by the action of potash on albuminoids, such as fibrin e, albu- men, and caseine, of which he considers it the base, the other factor being varying quantities of sulphimide, (NH 2 ) a S, and phosphimide, NH 2 P. It has, however, never been procured free from sulphur, and Liebig regarded Mulder's theory as not established, considering it only an albu- minous substance somewhat modified. But the bodies of which Mulder considered it the base are commonly called proteine bodies, or proteids, and are divided, according to Hoppe- Seyler, into seven classes, vi?. : 1. Albumens (soluble in water) : a, serum albumen ; 5, egg albumen. 2. Globulines (insoluble in water, but soluble in dilute acids and alkalies, and very dilute solutions of chloride of sodium and other neutral salts) : a, myosine ; ft, globuline ; c, fibrinogen; <?, vitelline. 3. Derived albu- men (insoluble in water and solutions of chlo- ride of sodium, but soluble in dilute acids and alkalies) : a, acid albumen ; ft, alkali albumen or caseine. 4. Fibrine (insoluble in water, sparingly soluble in dilute acids and alkalies and in neutral saline solutions). (See FIBRINE.) 5. Coagulated proteid, formed by heating neu- tral solutions of proteids, or by the action of alcohol. 6. Amyloid substance, or lardaceine, a substance deposited in the liver and other organs in certain diseases. 7. Peptones, bodies formed from albuminous substances by the ac- tion of the gastric juice ; they are found only in the stomach and small intestines, disappear- ing as soon as they enter the lacteal vessels. PROTESILAUS, a legendary Thessalian prince, the first Greek slain in the Trojan war. It is said in the Iliad that he was the first who leaped from the ships upon the Trojan shore, and according to the ancient tradition recount- ed in Lncian he was killed by Hector. The great affection toward Protesilaus of his wife Laodamia is celebrated by the poets. After his death she prayed to be permitted to con- verse with him only for the space of three 687 VOL. xiv. 3 hours ; the prayer being granted, Mercury con- ducted Protesilaus to the upper world, and when he died a second time his wife died with him. PROTEST (Lat. protestari, to testify or de- clare against), a term used in many ways and for many purposes. One who is called upon to pay an import duty, a tax, a subscription, or the like, which he thinks he ought not to be required to pay, but is unwilling to encoun- ter the delay and expense of a lawsuit at that time, pays the sum demanded under protest ; that is, he accompanies the payment by a writ- ten and attested declaration of what he deems the illegality of the demand, and of his rights of defence and denial. This protest preserves all those rights ; and in any subsequent suit or other effort to get the money back, the pro- test will prevent him from being impeded by his payment. In legislation, the members of a deliberative body who dissent from the views of a majority, and have no power to prevent those views from going into effect, sometimes ask leave to put on the record of the body a declaration of their views, drawn up and signed by them. This is called their protest against the measure ; and leave to record it is usually given, if it is decent and temperate in its terms, and does not state what the majority regard as wilfully false or impertinent. If a vessel is wrecked, or meets with other injury from any peril of the sea, it is an ancient and nearly universal custom for the master, on his arrival at port after the injury, to appear be- fore a competent magistrate, and enter his protest against the accident or peril. In this protest he details the circumstances with suffi- cient fulness to sustain his declaration that the injury occurred, not through the fault of the vessel, but by reason of the peril stated. In the absence or disability of the master, the protest is made by the officers, or even by the seamen ; and when it is made by the master, he is usually accompanied by one or more of the officers, and by some of the seamen. A very important use of protest is made in the case of dishonored bills of exchange. (See EXCHANGE, BILL OF.) It is a universal law that a foreign bill of exchange, if not accepted, or if not paid at maturity, must be protested in order to hold all the parties to it. In this sense, the states of the Union are foreign to each other. Inland (or domestic) bills and promissory notes are often protested in the same way ; but this usage, so far as it exists, has grown up from the convenience of it, and not from any requirement of the law merchant. The protest should be made by a notary pub- lic ; and full faith is given in all countries to all the official acts verified by his seal, which acts are required by law merchant. He can- not properly delegate this power to any clerk or substitute. An acceptance or payment supra protest takes place when, a bill having been protested, a third person intervenes, and accepts or pays the bill for the honor of the party whose duty it was to accept or pay it ;