army and with his brother Scipion founded a bank in Paris, the speculations of which he directed while Scipion occupied himself with its administration. He opposed the ruinous methods by which the duc de Richelieu sought to raise the war indemnity demanded by the Allies, in a pamphlet Réflexions sur le projet d’emprunt (1817), followed in the same year by Dernières réflexions . . . in answer to an inspired article in the Moniteur. In the same year he entered the chamber of deputies for Paris, taking his seat in the Left Centre with the moderate opposition, and making his first speech in defence of the freedom of the press. Re-elected for Paris in 1822 and 1824, and in 1827 for Paris and for Troyes, he elected to represent Troyes, and sat for that constituency until his death. Périer’s violence in debate was not associated with any disloyalty to the monarchy, and he held resolutely aloof from the republican conspiracies and intrigues which prepared the way for the revolution of 1830 Under the Martignac ministry there was some prospect of a reconciliation with the court, and in January 1829 he was nominated a candidate for the presidency of the chamber; but in August with the elevation to power of Polignac the truce ceased, and on the 15th of March 1830 he was one of the 221 deputies who repudiated the pretensions put forward by Charles X. Averse by instinct and by interest to popular revolution he nevertheless sat on the provisory commission of five at the hôtel-de-ville during the days of July, but he refused to sign the declaration of Charles X’s dethronement. Périer reluctantly recognized in the government of Louis Philippe the only alternative to the continuance of the Revolution; but he was no favourite with the new king, whom he scorned for his truckling to the mob. He became president of the chamber of deputies, and sat for a few months in the cabinet, though without a portfolio. On the fall of the weak and discredited ministry of Laffitte, Casimir Périer, who had drifted more and more to the Right, was summoned to power (March 13, 1831), and in the short space of a year he restored civic order in France and re-established her credit in Europe. Paris was in a constant state of disturbance from March to September, and was only held in check by the premier’s determination; the workmen’s revolt at Lyons was suppressed after hard fighting; and at Grenoble, in face of the quarrels between the military and the inhabitants, Périer declined to make any concession to the townsfolk. The minister refused to be dragged into armed intervention in favour of the revolutionary government of Warsaw, but his policy of peace did not exclude energetic demonstrations in support of French interests. He constituted France the protector of Belgium by the prompt expedition of the army of the north against the Dutch in August 1831; French influence in Italy was asserted by the audacious occupation of Ancona (Feb 23, 1832); and the refusal of compensation for injuries to French residents by the Portuguese government was followed by a naval demonstration at Lisbon. Périer had undertaken the premiership with many forebodings, and overwork and anxiety prepared the way for disease In the spring of 1832 during the cholera outbreak in Paris, he visited the hospitals in company with the duke of Orleans He fell ill the next day of a violent fever, and died six weeks later, on the 16th of May 1832.
His Opinions et discours were edited by A. Lesieur (2 vols., 1838); C. Nicoullaud published in 1894 the first part (Casimir-Périer, député de l’opposition, 1817–1830) of a study of his life and policy; and his ministry is exhaustively treated by Thureau-Dangin in vols i. and ii. (1884) of his Histoire de la monarchie de juillet.
His elder son, Auguste Victor Laurent Casimir Périer (1811–1876), the father of President Casimir-Périer (see Casimir-Périer), entered the diplomatic service, being attached successively to the London, Brussels and St Petersburg embassies, and in 1843 became minister plenipotentiary at Hanover In 1846 he resigned from the service to enter the legislature as deputy for the department of Seine, a constituency which he exchanged for Aube after the Revolution of 1848. On the establishment of the Second Empire he retired temporarily from public life, and devoted himself to economic questions on which he published a series of works, notably Les Finances et la politique (1863), dealing with the interaction of political institutions and finance. He contested Grenoble unsuccessfully in 1863 against the imperial candidate, Casimir Royer; and failed again for Aube in 1869. In 1871 he was returned by three departments to the National Assembly, and elected to sit for Aube. He was minister of the interior for a few months in 1871–1872, and his retirement deprived Thiers of one of the strongest elements in his cabinet. He also joined the short lived ministry of May 1873. He consistently opposed all efforts in the direction of a monarchical restoration, but on the definite constitution of the republic became a life senator, declining MacMahon's invitation to form the first cabinet under the new constitution. He died in Paris on the 6th of June 1876.
For the family in general see E. Choulet, La Familie Casimir-Périer (Grenoble, 1894).
PERIGEE (Gr. περί, near, γῆ, the earth), in astronomy that point of the moon’s orbit or of the sun’s apparent orbit at which the moon or sun approach nearest to the earth. The sun’s perigee and the earth’s perihelion are so related that they differ 180° in longitude, the first being on the line from the earth toward the sun, and the second from the sun toward the earth. The longitude of the solar perigee is now 101°, that of the earth’s perihelion 281°.
PÉRIGORD, one of the old provinces of France, formed part of the military government of Guienne and Gascony, and was bounded on the N. by Angoumois, on the E. by Limousin and Quercy, on the S. by Agenais and Bazadais, and on the W. by Bordelais and Saintonge. It is now represented by the
departments of Dordogne and part of Lot-et-Gaionne. Périgord
was in two divisions: Périgord blanc (cap. Périgueux) and
Périgord noir (cap. Sarlat). In the time of Caesar it formed
the civitas Petracoriorum, with Vesunna (Périgueux) as its
capital. It became later part of Aquitania secunda and formed
the pagus petragoricus, alter wards the diocese of Périgueux.
Since the 8th century it had its own counts (see the Histoire
généalogique of P. Anselme, tome iii), who were feudatories of
the dukes of Aquitaine and in the 13th century were the vassals
of the king of England. In the 15th century the county passed
into the hands of the dukes of Orleans, and in the 16th came
to the family of d’Albret, becoming Crown land again on the
accession of Henry IV.
See Dessalles, Histoire du Périgord (1888), the Bulletin of the Societé historique et archéologique du Périgord (1874 seq.), l’Inventaire sommaire de la “Collection de Périgord ” in the Bibliothèque nationale (1874); the Dictionnaire topographique du département de la Dordogne by the Vicomte de Gourgues (1873).
PÉRIGUEUX, a town of south-western France, formerly capital of the old province of Périgord, now chief town of the department of Dordogne, 79 m. E N E. of Bordeaux, on the railway between that city and Limoges. Pop. (1906), 28,199. The town, situated on an eminence on the right bank of the Isle, is divided into three parts. On the slope of the hill is the medieval town, bordered south-east by the river and on the other three sides by esplanades and promenades; to the west is the modern town, which stretches to the station; to the south of the modern town is the old Roman town or cité, now traversed by the railway.
Three bridges connect Périgueux with the left bank of the Isle, where stood Vesunna, the capital of the Petrocorii. Hardly a trace of this old Gallic town remains, but not far off, on the Plateau de la Boissière, the rampart of the old Roman camp can still be traced On the right bank of the Isle, in the Roman city, there have been discovered some baths of the 1st or 2nd century, supplied by an aqueduct four miles long, which spanned the Isle. A circular building, called the “Tower of Vesunna,” 68 ft. in diameter and 89 ft. in height, stands at what was formerly the centre of the city, where all the chief streets met It is believed to have been originally the cella or main part of a temple, probably dedicated to the tutelary deities of Vesunna. Of the amphitheatre there still remain huge fragments of wall and vaulting. The building had a diameter of 1312 ft., that of the arena being 870 ft.; and, judging from its construction.
