y; has been charged with having led the life of a
debauchee and to have died of a disease brought on by his profligacy, but
it is now believed he has been maligned (1548-1597).

PEEPING TOM OF COVENTRY. See GODIVA.

PEERS, THE TWELVE, the famous warriors or paladins at the court of
Charlemagne, so called from their equality in prowess and honour.

PEGASUS, the winged horse, begotten of Poseidon, who sprung from the
body of Medusa when Perseus swooped off her head, and who with a stroke
of his hoof broke open the spring of Hippocrene on Mount Helicon, and
mounted on whom Bellerophon slew the Chimera, and by means of which he
hoped, if he had not been thrown, to ascend to heaven, as Pegasus did
alone, becoming thereafter a constellation in the sky; this is the winged
horse upon whose back poets, to the like disappointment, hope to scale
the empyrean, who have not, like Bellerophon, first distinguished
themselves by slaying Chimeras.

PEGU (6), a town of Lower Burma, in the province and on the river of
the same name, 46 m. NE. of Rangoon, is a very ancient city; the province
(1,162) is a rice-growing country, with great teak forests on the
mountain slopes.

PEI-HO, a river of North China, 350 miles long; formed by the
junction of four other rivers, on the chief of which stands Pekin; has a
short navigable course south-eastward to the Gulf of Pechili, where it is
defended by the forts of Taku.

PEIRCE, BENJAMIN, American mathematician and astronomer, born in
Massachusetts, U.S.; wrote on the discovery of Neptune and Saturn's
rings, as well as a number of mathematical text-books (1809-1880).

PEISHWAH, the name of the overlord or chief minister of Mahratta
chiefs in their wars with the Mohammedans, who had his head-quarters at
Poonah, the last to hold office putting himself under British protection,
and surrendering his territory; nominated as his successor Nana Sahib,
who became the chief instigator of the Mutiny of 1857, on account, it is
believed, of the refusal of the British Government to continue to him the
pension of his predecessor who had adopted him.

PEKIN (1,000), the capital of China, on a sandy plain in the basin
of the Pei-ho, is divided into two portions, each separately walled, the
northern or Manchu city and the southern or Chinese. The former contains
the Purple Forbidden city, in which are the Imperial palaces; surrounding
it is the August city, in which are a colossal copper Buddh