vernility (verniliti)

[ Blount, 1670. [Rare.] vernisht, v. An obsolete form of varnish. vernix (ver'niks), n. [NL., varnish: see var nish.] In med., used in the phrase vernix caseo sa, a fatty matter covering the skin of the fetus. Vernon i a (ver-no'ni-ä), n. [NL. (Schreber, 1791), named after William Vernon, an English botanist, who collected plants in Maryland near the end of the 17th century.] A genus of com verricule to Calvary, and that the likene of the face was miraculously impre ed upon the cloth. Also vernicle.-2. [ cap.] [NL. (Rivinus, 1690; earlier, about 1554, by Mattioli).] A genus of gamopetalous plants, of the order Scrophularineæ and tribe eæ, type of the subtribe Veroniceæ. It is characterized by opposite lower leaves, a wheel shaped corolla with a very short tube and spreading lobes, and by two stamens with their anther-cells confluent at the apex. About 220 species have been described, perhaps to be reduced to 180. They are widely scattered through temperate and cold regions, and are usually low herbs, their stem-leaves almost always plainly opposite, but the floral leaves always alternate, and commonly diminished into bracts. V. Virginica is exceptional in its whorled leaves. The flowers are blue, often penciled with violet, and varying to purple, pink, or white, but never yellow; they form terminal or axillary racemes, or are solitary and se ile in the axils. The fruit is a loculicidal or four-valved subtribe Euvernonieæ. It is characterized by a polymorphous inflorescence, usually with a naked receptacle, ten-ribbed achenes, and a pappus of two or three series, the inner slender, copious, and elongated, the outer much shorter, often more chaffy, sometimes absent. There are about 500 species. They are chiefly tropical, abundant in America, numerous in Africa, and frequent in Asia. A few occur beyond the tropics, in North and South America and South Africa. One Asiatic species, V. cinerea, is very common also in Australia, and is naturalized in the West Indies. None occurs in Europe. They are shrubs or herbs, usually with straight, crisped, woolly or tangled hairs, rarely stellate or scurfy. The leaves are alternate, entire or toothed, feather-veined, petioled or se ile, but not decurrent; in V. oppos it i folia and V. eupatorifolia of Brazil they are opposite. The fruit consists of smooth or hirsute achenes, commonly glandular between the ribs. The flowers are purple, red, bluish, or rarely white; they form terminal flower heads, which are usually cymose and panicled, or corymbose, sometimes solitary or glomerate. The large Lepidoploa includes over 200 American species, chiefly with many-flowered sub spherical corymbed heads; to this belong the 10 or more species of the United States, which are known as ironweed, perhaps from the hardne of their stems, and are peculiar in their usually crimson flowers, brown or rusty-colored pappus, and resinous-dotted achenes. They are polymorphous, and disposed to hybridize. V. Noveboracensis, also known as flattop, extends north to New England; V. alti ima, to Pennsylvania; and V. fasciculata, to Ohio and the Dakotas; the others are chiefly southwestern. V. arbores cens is the fleabane of Jamaica. A decoction of V. cinerea is used in India as a febrifuge. The small black seeds of V. anthelmintic a, a common annual of India, yield by pre ure a solid green oil known as khatzum- or kink a - oil, esteemed of value in the arts. Vernon i aceæ (ver-nō-ni-ā'sē-ē), n. pl. [NL. (C. H. F. Le ing, 1829), positæ, it is further distinguished by its sagittate anthers and its subulate style-branches, which are usually much elongated, stigmatose along the inner side, and minutely hispid externally. It includes 41 genera, cla ed in 5 groups or series-one of these series, the subtribe Lych nophoreæ, peculiar in its densely glomerate small flower heads, the others composing the subtribe Euvernoniex, with the flower-heads separate, and usually panicled or solitary. They are herbs or shrubs, rarely trees. Their leaves are alternate (except in 3 species), not opposite, as commonly in the Eupatoriaceæ, and are entire or toothed, not di ected, as often in other composite tribes. Their flowers are purple, violet, or white, never yellow, frequent as that color is in the order. One genus, Stokesia, is blue-flowered. Two genera, Elephant opus and Vernon i a (the type), extend into the middle United States. The tribe abounds in monotypic genera, chiefly Brazilian, with two confined to the West Indies, one to Australia, and three or four to tropical Africa.