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Praed (WINTHROP MACK- WORTH)

WINTHROP MACK- WORTH, an English poet; born in London, July 26, 1802. He was educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he obtained for two years in succession the chancellor's prize for an English poem. He contributed both in prose and verse to "Knight's Quarterly Magazine." In 1829 he was called to the bar, and in 1830 and 1831 was returned for St. Germans to Parliament, where he opposed the Reform Bill. He sat subsequently as member for Yarmouth, and Aylesbury, and became ultimately recorder of Barnstaple and deputy highsteward for the University of Cambridge. His poems are mostly of a light and elegant character, belonging to the class known as vers de société. He died in London, July 15, 1839.

PRÆFECT, a common name applicable to various Roman functionaries. The most important was the Præfectus urbi, or warden of the city, whose office existed at an early period of Roman history, but was revived under Augustus, with new and greatly altered and extended author- PRAGMATSIM ity, including the whole powers necessary for the maintenance of peace and order in the city, and an extensive jurisdiction civil and criminal. The Præfectus prætorio was the commander of the troops that guarded the emperor's person. the official title of the Consuls at Rome. When the PRÆTOR, originally the official title patricians were compelled to acquiesce in the consulship being thrown open to the plebeians, they stipulated that a new curule magistrate should be appointed from the patricians exclusively, to act as supreme judge in the civil courts.

On this magistrate the title of prætor was bestowed.

PRÆTORIAN GUARD, a body of permanent troops, established by Augustus as Imperial Life Guards. The prætorian guards were kept up by successive emperors, and, being under special organization and enjoying several privileges, they became in time so powerful that they were able to raise and depose emperors at their will. They were reorganized by Septimius Severus, and were finally suppressed by Constantine the Great.