The fairest of her sex, Angelica, His daughter, sought by many prowest knight. Id. These were the entertainments of the softer nations, that fell under the virtue and prowess of the two last empires.

Temple.

The vigour of this arm was never vain,
And that my wonted prowess I retain,
Witness these heaps of slaughter on the plain.

Dryden. PROWL, v. a. & v. n. The old dictionaries PROWLER, n. s. write prole, which Casaubon derives from poaλns, ready, quick. Skinner, from prosler, a diminutive formed by himself from proier to prey, French; perhaps,' says Johnson, it may be formed, by accidental corruption, from patrol.' Thomson, Fr. proioler,

to rove over.

Writing a theory of the deluge, we were to shew the proximate natural causes of it.

Burnet.

I can call to my assistance Proximity, mark that! and distance. Prior. The consideration of our mind, which is incorporeal, and the contemplation of our bodies, which have all the characters of excellent contrivance; these alone easily and proximately guide us to the wise author of all things. Bentley.

Must we send to stab or poison all the popish princes, who have any pretended title to our crown by the proximity of blood? Swift.

A syllogysm is made up of three propositions, and these of three terms variously joined: the three terms are called the remote matter of a syllogism, the three propositions the proxime,or immediate matter of it.

Watts's Logick.

PROX'Y, n. s. Contracted from procuracy. Agency of another; the substitution of another: hence the appearance of a representative, or person substituted.

We must not think that we, who act only as their proxies and representatives, may do it for them.

Kettlewell.

Some leathern buckles use

Of folded hides, and leathern shields of pruce. Dryden.

PRUDE, n. s. Fr. prude; Lat. prudentialPRU'DISH, adj. SA woman affectedly nice and scrupulous: affectedly grave or nice. The graver prude sinks downward to a gnome, In search of mischief, still on earth to roam. Pope Not one careless thought intrudes,

Less modest than the speech of prudes. Swift. I know you all expect, from seeing me, Some formal lecture, spoke with prudish face.

PRUDENCE, n. s. PRUDENT, adj. PRUDENTIAL, adj. PRUDENTIALLY, adv. PRUDENTIALS, N. s. PRUDENTLY, adv.

Garrrick.

Fr. prudence; Lat. prudentia. Wisdom in practice; discretion: prudent is the corresponding adjective: prudential is, accord

ing to rules of prudence, the adverb, and nounsubstantive corresponding: prudentials, maxims or principles of prudence: prudently, discreetly; judiciously.

I have seen a son of Jesse, that is a man of war, and prudent in matters. 1 Samuel xvi. 18. I wisdom dwell with prudence.. Proverbs. These laws were so prudently framed, as they are found fit for all succeeding times. Bacon.

apt, suiting, and disposing as well of actions as Under prudence is comprehended that discreet, words, in their due place, time, and manner.

Peacham.

If the probabilities on the one hand should somesiderable hazard on that side, which has the least what preponderate the other, yet if there be no conprobability, and a very great apparent danger in a mistake about the other in this case, prudence will oblige a man to do that which may make most for his own safety.

:

So steers the prudent crane Her annual voyage.

Wilkins.

Milton.

Prudence is principally in reference to actions to of doing or not doing. be done, and due means, order, season, and method Hale.

Being incapable rightly to judge the prudentiality and thereafter condemn or cry up the whole progresof affairs, they only gaze upon the visible success, sion.

Browne.

tive.
O'er them, whose cause he seems to take in hand;
Such deep designs of empire does he lay
And prudently would make them lords at sea,
To whom with ease he can give laws by land.

Motives are only prudential, and not demonstra-
Tillotson.

Dryden,

He acts upon the surest and most prudential grounds, who, whether principles which he acts u on prove true or false, yet secures a happy issue to his actions. South.

If he acts piously, soberly, and temperately, he acts prudentially and safely.

Id.

These virtues, though of excellent use, some prudential rules it is necessary to take with them in practice. Rogers.

Many stanzas, in poetick measures, contain rules relating to common prudentials, as well as to religion. Watts.

Prudent men lock up their motives; letting familiars have a key to their heart as to their garden. Shenstone.

Adieu, dear amiable youth! Your heart can ne'er be wanting: May prudence, fortitude, and truth, Erect your brow undaunting. Byron. PRUDENCE, in ethics, may be defined an ability of judging what is best, in the choice both of ends and means. According to the definition of Cicero, De Officiis, lib. i. c. 43, prudence is the knowledge of what is to be desired or avoided. Accordingly, he makes prudentia (De Legibus, lib. i.) to be a contraction of providentia, or foresight. Plato calls this the leading virtue; and Juvenal Stat. x. observes, Nullum numen abest si sit prudentia.

PRUDENTIUS, or AURELIUS PRUDENTIUS CLEMENS, a celebrated Christian poet, under Theodosius the Great, born in Spain, A. D. 348. He was first an advocate, and afterwards a judge; he then became a soldier, and at length obtained an honorable employment at court. We have a great number of his poems, which, from the choice of his subjects, may be termed Christian Poems; but the style is barbarous, and very different from the purity of the Augustan age. The best editions of his works are those of Amsterdam, in 1667, with Heinsius's notes, and Paris in 1687, in usum Delphini. PRUNE, v. a., v. n., & PRUNER, [n. s. PRUNINGHOOK, PRU NINGKNIFE.

of unknown derivation. Johnson.

Fr. provin, of Latin

propago, an exuberant shoot.-Thomson. To lop; divest trees of their superfluities; dress; prink: a dried plum; one who crops trees: pruning-hook and pruning-knife are instruments of his art. His royal bird

Prunes the immortal wing, and cloys his beak. Shakspeare. Many birds prune their feathers; and crows seem to call upon rain, which is but the comfort they receive in the relenting of the air. Bacon.

In drying of pears and prunes in the oven, and removing of them, there is a like operation. Id. So lopped and pruned trees do flourish fair. Davies. Some sitting on the beach to prune their painted Drayton.

breasts.

Lest thy redundant juice Should fading leaves, instead of fruits, produce, The pruner's hand with letting blood must quench Thy heat, and thy exub'rant parts retrench.

What we by day

Denham.

Lop overgrown, or prune, or prop, or bind,
One night with wanton growth derides,
Milton's Paradise Lost.

Tending to wild.

Horace will our superfluous branches prune, Give us new rules, and set our harp in tune.

The cyder land obsequious still to thrones, Her pruninghooks extended into swords. Philips. You have no less right to correct me than the same hand that raised a tree has to prune it. Pope.

PRUNELLA, in botany, self-heal, a genus of the gymnospermia order, and didynamia class of plants; natural order fortieth, verticillatæ. The filaments are bifurcated, with an anthera only on one point; the stigma is bifid. The chief species is

P. vulgaris, the herb self-heal. The stem is erect, and eight or ten inches high. The leaves grow on foot-stalks, are ovato-oblong, slightly indented and somewhat hairy. The bractea flowers are white and purplish, grow in dense are heart-shaped, opposite, and fringed. The spikes, and are terminal. The plant is perennial; grows wild in meadows and pasture grounds, and flowers in June and July. It is recommended as a mild astringent and vulnerary, in spitting of blood and other hæmorrhagies inflammations of the fauces. Its taste is slightly and fluxes; and in gargles against aphthæ and austere and bitterish; and this is more perceptible in the flowery tops than in the leaves, though the latter are chiefly prescribed. kind of stuff of which clergymen's gowns are PRUNELLO, n. s. Barb. Lat. prunella. A

made.

trees.

The rest is all but leather or prunello. Worth makes the man, and want of it the fellow; Pope. PRUNING, in gardening and agriculture, is the lopping off the superfluous branches of Pruning, or the amputation of part of a plant with the knife or other instrument, says Mr. Loudon, is practised for various purposes, but chiefly on trees of the fruit-bearing kinds. the same tree, if the one be cut off, that remainOf two adjoining and equal sized branches of ing will profit by the sap which would have

nourished the other, and both the leaves and the fruits which it may produce will exceed their natural size. If part of a branch be cut off which would have carried a number of fruits, those which remain will fix better, and become larger. The objects of pruning may be reduced to the following: promoting growth and bulk; lessening bulk; adjusting the stem and branches to the roots; renewal of decayed plants or trees; and removal or cure of diseases.

Pruning, for promoting the growth and bulk of a tree, is the simplest object of pruning, and is that chiefly which is employed by nurserymen with young trees of every description. The art is to cut off all the weak lateral shoots, that the portion of sap destined for their nourishment may be thrown into the strong ones. In some cases, besides cutting off the weak shoots, the strong ones are shortened, in order to produce three or four shoots instead of one. In general, mere bulk being the object, upright shoots are encouraged rather than lateral ones; excepting in the case of trained trees, where shoots are encouraged.

Pruning for lessening the bulk of the tree is also chiefly confined to nursery practice, as necessary to keep unsold trees portable. It consists in little more than what is technically called heading down; that is, cutting off the leading

P

shoots within an inch or two of the main stem, leaving, in some cases, some of the lower lateral shoots. Care is taken to cut to a leaf bud, and to choose such from among the side, upper, or under buds of the shoot, according as the succeeding year's shoots may be wanted, in radiated lines from the stem, or in oblique lines in some places to fill up vacancies. It is evident that this unnatural operation persisted in for a few years must render the tree knotty and unsightly, and in stone-fruits, at least, it is apt to generate canker and gum.

In rearing trees planted for timber, it is desirable to throw the timber produced, as much as possible, into long compact masses; and hence pruning is employed to remove the side branches, and encourage the growth of the bole or stem. Where this operation is begun when the trees are young, it is easily performed every two or three years, and the progress of the trees under it is most satisfactory; when, however, it is delayed till they have attained a size, it will sometimes prove injurious. It is safer in such cases to shorten or lessen the size of lateral branches, rather than to cut them off close by the stem, as the large wounds produced by the latter practice either do not heal at all, or not till the central part is rotten, and has contaminated the timber of the trunk. Where timber-trees are planted for shelter or shade, it is evident, pruning must be directed to clothing them from the summit to the ground, with side branches; but in avenues, and hedge-row trees, it is generally desirable that "' lowest branches should be a considerable distance from the ground. In all cases, the superfluous parts are to be cut off with a clean section, near a bud or shoot if a branch is shortened, or close to the trunk if it is entirely removed, in order that it may more easily heal.

Pruning for adjusting the stem and branches to the roots is almost solely applicable to transplanted trees, in which it is an essential operation; and should be performed in general in the interval between removal and replanting, when the plant is entirely out of the ground; if the roots have been broken or bruised, in any of their main branches or ramifications, the pruner, estimating the quantity of root of which the plant is deprived by the sections of fracture and other circumstances, peculiar and general, will be able to form a notion of what was the bulk of the whole roots before the tree was undisturbed. Then he may state the question of lessening the top to adjust it to the roots, thus :— as the whole quantity of roots which the tree had before removal is to the whole quantity of branches which it now has, so is the quantity of roots which it now has to the quantity of top which it ought to have. In general, bearingwood and weak shoots should be removed, and the stronger lateral and upright shoots, with leaf or shoot-eyes, left.

Pruning for renewal of the head is performed by cutting over the stem a little way, say its own thickness above the collar, or the surface of the ground. This practice applies to old osierbeds, coppice woods, and to young forest-trees. Sometimes also it is performed on old, or ill

The

thriving fruit-trees which are headed down to the top of their stems. This operation is performed with the saw, and better after scarification, as in cutting off the broken limb of an animal. live section should be smoothed with the chisel or knife, covered with the bark, and coated over with grafting-clay, or any convenient composition, which will resist drought and rain for a year. Those who are advocates for pruning when the sap is dormant, will not of course be able to perform the operation of scarification, and covering the section with bark.

Pruning for curing diseases has acquired much celebrity since the time of Forsyth, whose amputations and scarifications for the canker, together with the plaster or composition which he employed to protect the wounds from air, are treated of at large in his Treatise on Fruit-Trees. Almost all vegetable diseases either have their origin in the weakness of the individual, or induce a degree of weakness; hence to amputate a part of a diseased tree is to strengthen the remaining part, because, the roots remaining of the same force, the same quantity of sap will be thrown upwards as when the head and branches were entire. If the disease is constitutional, or in the system, this practice may probably, in some cases, communicate to the tree so much strength as to enable it to throw it off; if it be local, the amputation of the part will at once remove the disease, and strengthen the tree.

PRUNUS, in botany, a genus of the monogynia order, and icosandria class of plants; natural order thirty-sixth, pomaceæ: CAL. quinquefid, inferior; there are five petals; the fruit is a plum, having a kernel with prominent sutures. There are thirty-three species, of which six are cultivated in Britain: they are originally natives of America and Siberia.

1. P. armeniaca, or apricot tree, grows twenty feet high, with a large spreading head, having reddish shoots, large nearly heart-shaped leaves, and close-sitting pale red flowers rising all along the sides of the young branches; succeeded by large roundish fruit of a yellow and reddish color in different varieties. The fruit and kernels excite when eaten a continued head-ache: the kernels, infused in brandy, communicate an agreeable flavor.

2. P. avium, the great wild cherry-tree, grows forty or fifty feet high, having oval spear-shaped leaves, downy underneath, with umbellate sessile clusters of white flowers, succeeded by small round fruit of different properties in the varieties.

3. P. Canadensis, the Canada dwarf bird cherry, grows but four or five feet high, branching horizontally near the ground with smooth branches; broad, spear-shaped, rough, downy leaves, without glands; and long clusters of white flowers, succeeded by small, round, berry-like, black fruit, ripe in autumn.

4. P. cerasus, the common cherry-tree, grows twenty feet or more in height, garnished with oval clusters of lanceolate, smooth leaves, umbellate flowers, succeeded by clusters of red roundish fruit of different sizes and properties in the varieties. The cherry trees afford an almost endless variety; all differing in some re