in a
hole. Ha! ha! ha!"--Dibdin, _The Farmer's Wife_ (1780).

[Asterism] Colman's "Ollapod" (1802) was evidently copied from Dibdin's
"Doctor Pother."

=Potiphar= (_Mr._), freshly-made man intensely uncomfortable in his plated
harness. His ideas of art are grounded upon a dim picture in his wife's
drawing-room, called by him "Giddo's Shay Doover."

_Mrs. Potiphar_, shoddy of shoddys. Purse-proud, affected, pretentious
and ambitious, and even less fit for her position than her husband for
his.--George William Curtis, _Potiphar Papers_ (1853).

=Potiphar's Wife=, Zoleikha or Zuleika; but some call her
Ra[:i]l.--Sale, _Al Kor[^a]n_, xii. note.

=Pott= (_Mr._), the librarian at the Spa.

_Mrs. Pott_, the librarian's wife.--Sir W. Scott, _St. Roman's Well_
(time, George III.).

=Potteries= (_Father of the_), Josiah Wedgewood (1730-1795).

=Pounce= (_Mr. Peter_), in _The Adventures of Joseph Andrews_, by Fielding
(1742).

=Poundtext= (_Peter_), an "indulged pastor" in the covenanters' army.--Sir
W. Scott, _Old Mortality_ (time, Charles II.).

=Pourceaugnac= [_Poor-sone-yak_], the hero of a comedy so called. He is a
pompous country gentleman, who comes to Paris to marry Julie, daughter
of Oronte (2 _syl._); but Julie loves Eraste (2 _syl._), and this young
man plays off so many tricks, and devises so many mystifications upon M.
de Pourceaugnac, that he is fain to give up his suit.--Moli[`e]re, _M. de
Pourceaugnac_ (1669).

=Poussin= (_The British_), Richard Cooper (*-1806).

_Poussin_ (_Gaspar_). So Gaspar Dughet, the French painter, is called
(1613-1675).

=Powell= (_Mary_), the first wife of John Milton.

=Powheid= (_Lazarus_), the old sexton in Douglas.--Sir W. Scott, _Castle
Dangerous_ (time, Henry I.).

=Poyning's Law=, a statute to establish the English jurisdiction in
Ireland. The parliament that passed it was summoned in the reign of
Henry VII. by Sir Edward Poynings, governor of Ireland (1495).

=Poyser= (_Mrs._), shrewd, capable and ready-tongued wife of a British
yeoman, and aunt of Hetty Sorrel.--George Eliot, _Adam Bede_.

=P. P.=, "Clerk of the Parish," the feigned signature of Dr. Arbuthnot,
subscribed to a volume of _Memoirs_ in ridicule of Burnet's _History of
My Own Times_.

Those who were placed around the dinner-table had those feelings of
awe with which _P. P._, _Clerk of the Parish_, was oppressed when
he first uplifted the psalm in presence