HIS 



VITALITY. 



VITIS. 



1116 



VITALITY, a term equivalent to that of Life, and applied to the 

 functions performed by living bodies, that in, plant* and animals. 

 Linnsruf defined the three kingdoms of nature as follows : Minerals 

 grow ; PlanU grow and lire ; Animals grow, live, and feel. Here the 

 fact of living U made to distinguish between minerals and plants, anil 

 the inquiry is naturally made for a definition of life. It is often 

 assumed to be a set of actions under the controlling influence of a vital 

 principle, but, as such a principle has never bren demonstrated, it must 

 be regarded only as an assumed cause. Some writers have supposed 

 that all the phenomena of life may be resolved into the action of 

 chemical and physical forces acting upon special forms of matter, and 

 that in plants and animals are presented the results of chemical and 

 physical activity in forms in which it does not exist amongst mineral*. 

 Coleridge, in his ' Idea of Life,' contends that the collective activities 

 of the material universe is as much a life, and its parts ne much 

 entitled to be regarded as living, as a plant in its special organs. 



Setting aside however the idea of a vital principle, or confining this 

 term to the force which regulates and produces the specific form in 

 each individual animal or plant, and which is then applicable as well 

 to minerals, there are a certain set of phenomena in plants and 

 animals to which the term ' vital ' seems especially applicable. This 

 term may be thus applied without in any manner assuming the exist- 

 ence of any force independent of those which are known to influence 

 all matter upon the surface of the earth. 



Thug, the growth and reproduction of cells may be regarded as a 

 vital process ; also the contractibility of the muscular tissue, and the 

 sensibility of the nervous tissue. These processes are called oollec- 

 tively Vital Processes. The force by which cells grow has been called 

 the Organising Force, the Plastic Force, the Assimilative Property, 

 and the Metabolic Property. The contractibility of the muscles has 

 been properly called Muscle-Force, whilst the sensibility of the nerves 

 has been called Nerve-Force. 



That these forces are dependent on physical forces is seen in the 

 fact that plant-cells will not grow without light Muscle-force and 

 nerve-force are not producible but by the assimilation of materials 

 that have been formed by chemical actions produced by heat and 

 light. 



The natural philosopher has demonstrated that electricity, galvanism, 

 and magnetism, are different manifestations of the twine force. He has 

 rendered it probable that motion, heat, light, and chemical affinity, are 

 also convertible forces. The physiologist has followed this train of 

 thought, and rendered it probable that, with regard to muscle-force 

 and nerve-force, they are but differentiations or other manifesta- 

 tions of the physical forces. Muscle-furce and nerve-force depend 

 upon the destruction (chemical change) of cells which ore formed out 

 of materials (protein) which have been formed by the influence of 

 brat and light upon the carbonic acid and ammonia supplied to the 

 cell of the plant. A certain amount of protein is the expression of a 

 certain amount of chemical change, and this again in decomposition 

 is the expression of the amount of vital force, which a part composed 

 of protein will exhibit. Vital phenomena are found to be but the 

 expressions of chemical and physical change, and result in one or 

 other of the physical forces. This view of the nature of vitality doe* 

 not lead to materialism, as the consciousness of man exists inde- 

 pendently of the physical changes which go on in bis body, and the 

 charachr of his mind is formed in virtue of its retaining impressions 

 from the ever-active changes which go on in his body through the 

 agency of the vital forces. [MUSCLE; NERVOUS SYSTEM; ASIMAI. 

 KmoiKix; MOTIONS or PLANTS; VEGETABLE KINGDOM; CELLS.] 



(Malteucci, EUrtro-I'liytiulwiical Retcarcha, in PhUotophical Tramt- 

 acttmt ; Mattvucci, On Ike P/iyiical Phenomena of Living Beinyt ; 

 Grove, On the Correlation of Ike Pliytical Force* ; Reynolds, Objecti 

 ai.il Scientific Petition of Phyiiolvyy ; Sritiili and Foreign Medical 

 Jtcriitr, vol. xxx.) 



VI'I'KX, a genus of PlanU belonging to the natural order Verbena- 

 eta. It has a short campanulate 6 toothed calyx. The corolla is 

 irrrgular, somewhat labiate, divided into 6 lobes. Stamens 4, didy- 

 namouft, inserted into the corolla. Ovary superior, roundish ; style 

 the length of the stamens ; 2-pointed and diverging stigmas. The 

 fruit is a gl< bular berry, a little hard, with it* base covered by the 

 calyx, and divided into four single-seeded cell*. 



r. aynm-cfutiu, the longest-known species, and a native of the 

 south of Europe, has digitate leaves of 6 or 7 nearly entire leaflets, 

 something resembling those of the hemp-plant, and it forms a shrub 

 of about 12 feet in height The flowers are arranged in spiked 

 whorU, and have an agreeable fragrance. The fruit is globular, 

 rather smaller than black pepper, with au acrid and aromatic taste, 

 whence it is called Petit 1'oivre and Poivre Sauvage in the south 

 of France. It was wrll known to the ancients, and forms the Piper 

 agratit of tome authi n. In India the fruits of the species )'. n i- 

 l*yU and V. fiegmdo, which are indigenous there, have the same 

 properties ascribed to them, and are called Killil Iiurree(Wild Pepper). 

 The ancients considered the Viltj anti-aphrodisiac, but the berries, 

 from their warm aromatic taste, must be possessed rather of stimulant 



] : 



VITIS, a genus of Plants, the type of the natural order l'itact<r. 

 It powesne* the following characters : Calyx usually 6-toothid ; 

 petals 5, cohering at the top, resembling a cahptra, se]rating at the 



base and deciduous ; 5 stamens ; style none; berry 2-celled, 4 -needed ; 

 cells and seeds often abortive. The species are climbing shrul- 

 *i triple lobed, cut or toothed, rarely compound leaves, the thyroid 

 racemes of small greenish-yellow flowers. They are found principally 

 in Asia and America. 



The best known of the species of Vitit, and perhaps one of the most 

 extensively cultivated and useful of plants, is the V. n'ri'/f-n, thu 

 Common Vine or Grape-Vine. It is characterised among the other 

 species by possessing lobed, sinuately-toothed, naked or downy leave*. 

 A multitude of varieties of this plant have been recorded, both 

 occurring wild and resulting from its very extensive cultivation. 



4 2 35 



Grapc-Vinc ( ni'a rinifrra) . 



1, culling, with a bunch of fruit; 2, inflorescence; 3, transverse sccliun uf 

 berry in young state ; 4, vertical section of the flame ; 5, section of ripe fruit ; 

 6, section of teed, showing embryo. 



Like most extensively cultivated plant*, it U very difficult to ascer- 

 tain of what country the vine is originally a native. It is among the 

 plants of which we have the earliest records in the Books of Moses, 

 and from which it appears to have been made use of in the came 

 manner as at the present day. Although the vine is found in many 

 places wild, it may still be doubted whether it is indigenous there, 

 on account of its frequent cultivation. There can be little doubt of 

 its being truly indigenous in the East, in the district between the 

 Black and Caspian seas. In the forests of Mingrelia and Imiretia it 

 flourishes in all its magnificence, climbing to the tops of the highest 

 trees, and bearing bunches of fruit of delicious flavour. In these 

 districts no cultivation of the vine exists, and the inhabitants seldom 

 harvest the abundance of fruit that is produced. [VisK, in ARTS AHU 

 Sc. LHv.] 



In many spots in France, Germany, Portugal, and Italy, the vine is 

 found wild, but the fruit is very generally of an inferior kind, and it may 

 be doubted whether it is truly indigenous in any parts of Europe. 



The cultivation of the vine extends from near 55 N. lat to the 

 equator, but in south latitudes it only extends as far south as 40. 

 It is cultivated at various elevations. In middle Germany it ceases 

 from about 1000 to 1500 feet above the level of the sea. On the south 

 side of the Alps it reaches 2000 feet; in the Apennines and Sicily 

 5000 feet; and on the Himalayas as high as 10,000 feet above the 

 level of the sea. The point of the greatest importance in the ripening 

 of the fruit of the vine is the length of the summer. Thus, although 

 the maximum of summer heat is as great at Moscow as in Paris, yet 

 the vine will not ripen its fruit in the former place, and this arisen 

 from the fact that although the greatest heat of the months of .Tmiu 

 and July are as great as that of Paris, the months of August and 



