and a supporter of combustion. Of the analogy between combustion
and respiration—both true phlogistic processes in his view—he had
convinced himself three years before, and his paper, “On Different
Kinds of Air” (Phil. Trans., 1772) described experiments which
showed that growing plants are able to “restore” air which has
been vitiated, whether by being breathed or by having candles
burnt in it. Priestley displayed much ingenuity in devising
apparatus suited to his requirements and in carrying out and varying
his experiments; it was in the interpretation of results that he
was deficient. Had this not been the case he could scarcely have
remained a firm believer in the phlogistic doctrine. At one time
indeed, he found Lavoisier's views so specious that he was much
inclined to accept them, but he overcame this wavering, and so
late as 1800 he wrote to the Rev. Theophilus Lindsey (1723-1808),
“I have well considered all that my opponents have advanced and
feel perfectly confident of the ground I stand upon. . . . Though
nearly alone I am under no apprehension of defeat.”
His chief books on chemistry were six volumes of Experiments and Observations on different Kinds of Air, published between 1774 and 1786; Experiments on the Generation of Air from Water (1793); Experiments and Observations relating to the Analysis of Atmospheric Air, and Considerations on the Doctrine of Phlogiston established and that of the Composition of Water refuted (1800). He also published (1767) a treatise on the History and Present State of Electricity, which embodies some original work, and (1772) a History of Discoveries relating to Vision, Light and Colours, which is a mere compilation.
PRIEUR, PIERRE (c. 1626-c. 1676), French enamel painter. He married Marie (1610-1677), sister of Jean Petitot, as her second husband. In 1669 he was in England, painting a miniature of Charles II. and another of Lady Castlemaine, both after Cooper, for the king of Denmark. In 1670 he was in Poland, painting for the Danish monarch a portrait of King Michael, and in the following year was in Denmark executing a remarkable series of portraits of the children of Frederick III. All these, with some beautiful enamel badges for the Order of the Elephant, are in the Danish royal collection. By Christian V. he is said to have been sent to Spain and Russia, where several examples of his work, dated 1676, are to be seen in the Hermitage. In the following year he died in Denmark. He was a Huguenot, and was said to possess secret colours in enamel, especially a blue, which were not known to his Petitot relations. His work in England is of great rarity, Lord Dartrey possessing the finest example, and there are two remarkable works in the Pierpont Morgan collection and one at Windsor Castle. Two in the Propert collection have been lost sight of. (G. C. W.)
PRIEUR DE LA MARNE [Pierre Louis Prieur] (1756-1827), French politician, was born at Sommesous (Marne) on the 1st of August 1756. He practised as a lawyer at Châlons-sur-Marne until 1789, when he was elected to the states-general. He became secretary to the Assembly, and the violence of his attacks on the ancien régime won him the nickname of “Crieur de la Marne.” In 1791 he became vice-president of the criminal tribunal of Paris. Re-elected to the Convention, he was sent to Normandy, where he directed bitter reprisals against the Federalists. He voted for the death of Louis XVI., and as a member of the committees of national defence and of public safety he was despatched in October 1793 to Brittany, where he established the Terror. In May 1794 he became president of the Convention. The counter-revolutionaries drove him into hiding from May 1795 until the amnesty proclaimed in the autumn of that year. He took no part in public affairs under the directory, the consulate or the empire, and in 1816 was banished as a regicide. He died in Brussels on the 31st of May 1827.
See Pierre Bliard, Le Conventionnel Prieur de la Marne en mission dans l'ouest 1793-1794 d'après des documents inédits (1906).
PRIEUR-DUVERNOIS, CLAUDE ANTOINE, Comte (1763-1832), French politician, was born at Auxonne on the 2nd of December 1763, and was commonly known as Prieur de la Côte d'Or, after his native department. As an officer of engineers he presented to the National Assembly in 1790 a Mémoire on the standardization of weights and measures. In 1791 he was returned by the Côte d'Or to the Legislative Assembly, and in 1792 to the Convention. After the revolution of the 10th of August 1792 he was sent on a mission to the army of the Rhine to announce the deposition of Louis XVI., for whose death he voted in the Convention. In 1793 he was employed in breaking up the Federalist movement in Normandy, but he was arrested by the Federalist authorities of Caen, and only released in July 1793 after the defeat of their forces at Vernon. On the 14th of August 1793 he became a member of the committee of public safety, where he allied himself closely with Lazare Carnot in the organization of national defence, being especially charged with the provision of the munitions of war. Under the Directory he sat in the Council of the Five Hundred, retiring after the coup d'état of 18 Brumaire (November 9, 1799). In 1808 he was created a count of the empire, and in 1811 he retired from the army with the grade of chef de brigade. He was one of the founders of the École Polytechnique, and shared in the establishment of the Institute of France; the adoption of the metric system and the foundation of the bureau of longitude were also due to his efforts. Prieur died at Dijon on the 11th of August 1832.
See J. Gros, Le Comité de salut public (1893); and E. Charavay, Correspondance de Carnot, vol. i., which includes some documents drawn up by Prieur.
PRIM, JUAN, Marquis de los Castillejos, Count de Reus (1814-1870), Spanish soldier and statesman, was the son of Lieut.-Colonel Pablo Prim, and was born at Reus in Catalonia on the 12th of December 1814. He entered the free corps known as the volunteers of Isabella II. in 1834, and in the course of the Carlist War he rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel and had two orders of knighthood conferred upon him. After the pacification of 1839, as a progressist opposed to the dictatorship of Espartero, he was sent into exile. However, in 1843 he was elected deputy for Tarragona, and after defeating Espartero at Bruch he entered Madrid in triumph with Serrano. The regent Maria Christina promoted him major-general, and made him count of Reus. Narvaez, the prime minister, failed to understand what constitutional freedom meant, and Prim, on showing signs of opposition, was sentenced to six years' imprisonment in the Philippine Islands. The sentence was not carried out, and Prim remained an exile in England and France until the amnesty of 1847. He then returned to Spain, and was first employed as captain-general of Porto Rico and afterwards as military representative with the sultan during the Crimean War. In 1854 he was elected to the cortes, and gave his support to O'Donnell, who promoted him lieutenant-general in 1856. In the war with Morocco he did such good service at Los Castillejos or Marabout, Cabo Negro, Guad al Gelu and Campamento in 1860 that he was made marquis de los Castillejos and a grandee of Spain. He commanded the Spanish army in Mexico when he refused to consent to the ambitious schemes of Napoleon III. On his return to Spain he joined the opposition, heading pronunciamentos in Catalonia against Narvaez and O'Donnell. All his attempts failed until the death of Narvaez in April 1868, after which Queen Isabella fell more and more under the influence of the Jesuits, and became increasingly tyrannical, until at last even Serrano was exiled. In September 1868 Serrano and Prim returned, and Admiral Topete, commanding the fleet, raised the standard of revolt at Cadiz (see Spain). In July 1869 Serrano was elected regent, and Prim became president of the council and was made a marshal. On the 16th of November 1870 Amadeo, duke of Aosta, was elected king of Spain, but Prim, on leaving the chamber of the cortes on the 28th of December, was shot by unknown assassins and died two days later. The cortes took his children as wards of the country; three days afterwards King Amadeo I. swore in the presence of the corpse to observe the new Spanish constitution.
Two biographies of Prim down to 1860 were published in that year by Gimenez y Guited and Gonzalez Llanos. See also L. Blairet, Le Général Prim et la situation actuelle de l'Espagne (Paris, 1867); Guillaumot, Juan Prim et l'Espagne (Paris, 1870); and Prim, by H. Leonardon (in French, 1901), which contains a useful bibliography.
PRIMAGE (adopted from the Fr. primage, from prime, recompense, Lat. praemium, reward), a commercial term
