PENSIONS, OLD AGE 177 PENTECOST responsibility of the state in regard to the welfare of its more handicapped citi- zens. In this country it may be said that the sentiment for mothers' pensions first found practical expression in 1912, when the State of Washington passed a law granting a subsidy to widowed women with dependent children. Divorced and deserted women were excluded from the benefits of the law, on the theory that it tended to encourage divorce and deser- tion on the part of the husbands. This law was amended in 1919 to include divorced and deserted women as well. The example of Washington was rapidly followed by other State legislatures, un- til, in 1920, thirty-six States made more or less provision for unsupported women with dependent children. As illustra- tions: in California only widows are in- cluded; in Colorado any parent unable to care for its children is included; in Illinois pensions are granted to widows or women with incapacitated husbands; in Idaho the recipient must be a widow, or a woman with a husband in the peni- tentiary or in an insane asylum; in Kan- sas pensions are granted to women widowed, divorced, or with husbands physically incapacitated or in the peni- tentiary or in an insane asylum, or de- serted by her husband for more than three months. Throughout all the States the pensions average from $21 to $24 a month. PENSIONS, OLD AGE. See Old Age Pensions. PENTACRINUS, in zoology, the typi- cal genus of the Pentacrinidss. The column is pentagonal. P. caput viedusse is found in the Caribbean Sea; P. euro- pasus is the larva of Antedon rosacea. In palaeontology, seven species are kno^vn in the Lias, seven in the Jurassic, three in the Cretaceous, and three in the Eocene strata. Of these, P. {extracri- niis) briareus, from the Lower Lias of Lyme Regis, has extraordinarily ramified arms or rays. PENTAGON, a figure of five sides and five angles; if the sides and angles be equal it is a regular pentagon; other- wise, irregular. PENTAMERA, one of the primary sections into which coleopterous insects (beetles) are divided, including those which have five joints on the tarsus of each leg. PENTAMETER, a verse of five feet, used especially in Latin and Greek poetry, in which the first two feet may be either dactyls or spondees, the third must be a spondee, and the last tw^j ana- paests; or it may be considered as con- sisting of two parts, each containing two feet and a syllable; the first half consists of two dactyls or spondees and a long syllable, the second half must con- sist of two dactyls and a syllable. Hexam- eter and pentameter verses used alter- nately constitute what is called elegiac measure. PENTATEUCH, a term applied ex- clusively to the first five books of the Old Testament collectively, termed in Hebrew torah=the law. The first mention of the five-fold division is made by Josephus. It seems to have been made by the Septuagint translators, who then be- stowed on the volume a Greek name ex- pressive of what they had done. Samar- itan Pentateuch, the Pentateuch in use among the Samaritans. Words which have in them d and r, and again i and v, letters unlike in the Samaritan, but very similar in Hebrew 1(d) and (r), also (i) and (v)], are sometimes inter- changed, showing that the work was de- rived from a Hebrew original. The pas- sages attributed to Ezra are in it. It substitutes Mount Gerizim for Mount Ebal in Deut. xxvii: 4. The text in various places differs from the Hebrew, generally however agreeing with the Septuagint. The chronology also is in places at variance with that of the He- brew Bible. If Josephus is correct as to the date of the building of the Temple on Mount Gerizim, the Samaritan Penta- teuch was made probably about 330 b. c, though the popular belief is that it is much older. PENTECOST, one of the three great- est Jewish festivals. Its Greek name was given because it was held on the 50th day, counting from the second of the Passover (Lev. xxiii: 15, 16), whence it was called in Hebrew the Feast of Weeks (Deut, xvi: 9, 10). It was called also the Feast of Harvest, or Firstfruits of Wheat Harvest (Exod. xxiii: 16; xxxiv: 22). When it came every Jewish male had to present himself before Jehovah (Exod. xxiii: 17; xxxiv: 23). Meat or wave offerings, especially two wave loaves, and sacrifices were presented at the festival (Lev. xxiii: 16, 17, etc.; Num. xxviii: 26-31; Deut. xvi: 9-12). The Holy Spirit descended on the mem- bers of the infant Christian Church on the day of Pentecost, imparting the gift of tongues (Act. ii: 1-20). In ancient times the pentecost lasted but a single day, but modern Judaism extends it to two. Also, Whitsuntide, a feast which, reckoned inclusively, is 50 days after Easter.
