venulosehinoid

Bot.: The same as Hinoid (q.v.). ( Link .) Vē-nūs, subst . [Lat. the godde of love, love; allied to Sansc.van=to love; Eng. win .] 1. Roman Mythol .: The godde of beauty and love, and more especially of sensual love, her principal seats being the islands of Cyprus and Cythera. This godde is generally supposed to have been of eastern origin, and to have been the same as the Phoenician Astarte. Before her identification with the Greek Aphrodite, the daughter of Zeus and Dione, who, according to some accounts, arose from the foam of the sea, Venus was one of the least important divinities ( Macrob .: Sat. i. 12.) The Romans regarded her as the progenitre of their nation, which was fabled to have sprung from Æneas, the offspring of her union with the Trojan Anchises. She was married to Vulcan, but was not remarkable for fidelity to her husband, and her armour with Adonis has been celebrated by cla ic poets and by Shakespeare. The rose, myrtle, and apple were sacred to her; among birds, the dove, swan, and sparrow were her favorites. She is generally represented with her son Cupid in a chariot drawn by doves, or, at other times, by swans or sparrows. Among the most famous statues of Venus are the Venus of Cnidus, by Praxiteles (of which the Venus de Medici, found at Tivoli, is sup posed to be a copy), the Venus of Capua, and the of Milo or Milos, found in the island of Milos. In the best days of art she was always represented as draped, in later times nude. 2. Astrom.: The second of the known inferior planets, if the arrangement be made according to their relative distances from the sun. With the exception of the moon, Venus is the nearest of all the heavenly bodies to the earth, and, when near its extreme eastern or western elongation, is much brighter than even the largest of the fixed stars. It stands first in this respect also of all the planets, the nearest approach to it being that made at certain times by Jupiter. When Venus is at its maximum of brightne , it can sometimes be seen by the naked eye in sunlight within an hour of noon. Its comparative nearne to the sun causes it to be for six months a morning and for the other six months an evening star. In the first state, it is the Lucifer of the Latins and the Phosphor of the Greeks; in the latter, it is the Hesperus of cla ical antiquity and of modern poetry. It undergoes phases like the moon. Father Castelli, a famous Florentine philosopher, reasoned this out, and, questioning Galileo on the subject, induced him to look with his telescope and see. On December 30, 1610, he was able to announce to Castelli that the phases had been actually discerned. They are not visible to the naked eye, to which the planet is simply a brilliant speck, too small to reveal its actual form, which is much more globular than that of the earth. Its diameter is about 7,826 miles, or about 93 miles le 'than that of the earth. Were man placed on the surface of Venus, the earth would look a trifle larger and brighter than Venus does to us in our sky. The ma of Venus is about three-quarters that of the earth, or 125000 that of the sun; its density is about 0850 that of the earth; its specific gravity 4.81, as against5-66, that of the earth. While a stone falling toward the earth pa es through a little more than sixteen feet in the first second, it would, if falling to the surface of Venus, pa through about thirteen feet only in the same time. The exce ive brightne of Venus makes the time of its rotation somewhat doubtful; it is provisionally placed at 23 hours 21'. Its mean distance from the sun is 67,000,000, its greatest distance 67,500,000, and its least 66,600,000 of miles. These numbers show that its orbit departs but slightly from a circle. Its periodic time is 2217 mean solar days. Observation on the pa age of the planet over the sun's disc is the best method of ascertaining the distance of the great luminary [TRANSIT]; it has also revealed the fact that Venus has an atmosphere, but its composition is as yet uncertain. Old observers thought they detected a satellite; modern astronomers have not confirmed this view, and believe it to have been founded on optical delusion. 3. Her .: The green tincture in coat-armor when borne by princes; vert. *4. Old Chem .: A name given to copper. 5. Zool. & Palæont .: The type-genus of Veneride (q. v.), with 176 recent species, universally distributed, from low water to 140 fathoms, Shell is thick, ovate, smooth, sulcated, or cancel a ted; pine, pit, sïre, sir, marine; gō, põt, Venus's basin margins minutely crenellated; hinge teeth 3-3; pallial sinus small, angular; ligament prominent, lunule distinct. Animal with mantle-margins fringed; siphons unequal, more or le separate; foot tongue-shaped. All the species are edible. Venus mercenaria is known on the east coast of North America as the Round Clam, and from the sea-worn fragments of the shell of this species the Red Indians used to make coinage, by perforating and stringing them on leather thongs. Fo il species 200, from the Oolite onward. Venus's basin, bath, or cup, 8 . Bot.: Dipsacus sylvestris. [TEABEL.] Venus's basket, s . Zoology : A popular name for any species of the genus Euplectella (q. v.). Called also Venus's Flower basket. The species figured is Euplec tell a suberea , from the Philippines. Venus's comb, s . 1. Bot.: Scandix Pecten Veneris . [SCANDIX.) So named because the slender, tapering beaks of the seed ve els are set together like the teeth of a comb. Venus's Basket. 2. Zool.: Murex tribulus , a beautiful and delicate shell, with long thin spines, from the Indian Ocean. Venus's fan, s. Zool.: Gorgon i a flabellum , a much branched and reticulated zoophyte, which has been found, but only accidentally, on the British coast. Venus's fly-trap, s. (DIONEA.] Venus's girdle, s . Zool.: Cestum veneris , a free-swimming Hydrozoon, from the Mediterranean. It is a long, narrow, strongly-compre ed, active creature, covered with cilia, and swims with a graceful undulatory motion. IMG:content-0453.png:[blocks in formation] (q. v.).] vě-nu-şi-a, subst . [Mod. Lat., from Lat. Venus Entomology : A genus of Geometer Moths, family Acidalidæ. Antenne of the male slightly pectinated; abdomen slender; wings entire, rounded. *vě-nŭst', adj . [Latin venustus , from venus = beauty.] Beautiful, amiable. "As the infancy of Rome was venust , so was its manhood notably strenuous.". Water house: Comment., Fortescue, p. 187. *ven-ym, *ven-yme, s . [VENOM, 8. & v.] vě-prěc-u-læ, s . pl . [Lat., pl. of veprecula =a little thorn or briar bush, dim in. from vepres a thorn-bush.] Bot.: The fifty-fourth order in Linnæus' Natural System. Genera: Rhamnus, Lycium, Daphne, . *ver, s. [Lat.) The spring. (Chaucer.) věr-ą, adv. [VERY.] ( Scotch.)