he priming powder.

PANCAKES. Thin floating rounded spots of snow ice, in the Arctic seas,
and reckoned the first indication of the approach of winter, in August.

PANDEL. A Kentish name for the shrimp.

PANDOOR. A northern name for a large oyster, usually taken at the
entrance of the pans.

PANGAIA. A country vessel of East Africa, like a barge, with one
mat-sail of cocoa-nut leaves, the planks being pinned with wooden pins,
and sewed with twine.

PANNIKIN. A small tin pot.

PANNYAR. Kidnapping negroes on the coast of Africa.

PANSHWAY. A fast-pulling passenger-boat used on the Hooghly.

PANTOGRAPH. An instrument to copy or reduce drawings.

PANTOMETER. An instrument for taking angles and elevations, and
measuring distances.

PAOLO. A Papal silver coin, value 5-1/4_d._; ten paoli make a crown.

PAPS. Coast hills, with rounded or conical summits; the lofty paps of
Jura are three in number.

PAR, OR PARR. In ichthyology, the samlet, brannock, or branling. Also, a
commercial term of exchange, where the moneys are equalized.

PARA. A small Turkish coin of 3 aspers, 1-1/2 farthing.

PARABOLA. A geometrical figure formed by the section of a cone when cut
by a plane parallel to its side.

PARADE. An assembling of troops in due military order. Also, the open
space where they parade or are paraded. The quarter-deck of a man-of-war
is often termed the sovereign's parade.

PARALLACTIC ANGLE. The angle made at a star by arcs passing through the
zenith and pole respectively.

PARALLAX. An apparent change in the position of an object, arising from
a change of the observer's station, and which diminishes with the
altitude of an object in the vertical circle. Its effect is greatest in
the horizon, where it is termed the _horizontal parallax_, and vanishes
entirely in the zenith. The positions of the planets and comets, as
viewed from the surface of the earth, differ from those they would
occupy if observed from its centre by the amount of parallax, the due
application of which is an important element. The stars are so distant
that their positions are the same from whatever part of the earth they
are seen; but attempts have been made to detect the amount of variation
in their places, when observed from opposite points of the earth's
orbit, the minute result of which is termed the _annual parallax_; and
the former effect, due to the observer's station on our globe, is called
the _diurnal parallax_.

PARALLEL. A te