VERBERINA. 
very good. 
good; and V. Bishopii is a purplish rose-coloured 
kind, which makes a good bed. Of the lavender- 
coloured varieties, V. Velliz is very good, but of 
V. Iveryana is a rosy purple, very 
a loose habit. V. Hydeana is a pale bluish lilac, 
very distinct; and V. Vangardii is of nearly the 
same colour. V. Zaconit is a deep bluish lilac, 
and a very good variety. 
The soil required by some of the old kinds is 
poor, light, and sandy, and that required by 
others, as well as by some of the hybrids, is rich 
and loamy, with a large admixture of mould; 
but any common garden soil, particularly of a 
light loamy nature, if kept in careful drainage, 
will suit excellently for most. The annuals and 
biennials, even the hardiest, are best raised from 
sowings on a gentle hotbed; the perennials are 
most readily multiplied from seeds or from radi- 
cal divisions; and the hybrids and fine varieties 
increase rapidly from cuttings, planted in sand 
under a glass, and, in the case of the tender 
kinds, in a little heat. All the kinds succeed 
well in the open ground during the summer and 
autumn months; and most of the chief beauties 
do admirably either in beds, in patches, or in 
pots. The trailing and stoloniferous sorts re- 
quire to be pegged down; and the climbing kinds 
must be trained on fancy wire trellises. 
VERBERINA. A diversified genus of exotic 
plants, of the sunflower division of Composite. 
Fifteen species have been introduced to the gar- 
dens and botanical collections of Britain, prin- 
-cipally from the two Indies and the hot parts of 
Continental America. They vary in height from 
2 to 10 feet. Three are evergreen shrubs, five 
are evergreen herbs, three are annual-stemmed 
perennial-rooted herbs, and four are annual- 
rooted herbs; five have alternate leaves, and 
the rest have opposite leaves; two have re- 
spectively white and orange flowers, and the rest 
have yellow flowers; a few are ornamental, and 
the rest have a weedy appearance. The marigold- 
like species, V. calendulacea, a yellow-flowered 
annual of about 2 feet in height, introduced up- 
wards of a century ago from Ceylon, is regarded 
in India as a medicinal plant, every part of it 
having a pleasant and somewhat aromatic taste, 
and either a decoction of it, or the powder of its 
seeds and leaves, being prescribed in cases of 
jaundice and of visceral obstruction. The culti- 
vated species, V. sativa, a yellow-flowered annual 
of about 6 feet in height, introduced from India 
in 1806, is cultivated in its native country for 
the sake of the oil produce of its seeds. Most 
of the kinds thrive well in any common soil. 
VERDIGRIS,—chemically Subacetate of Copper. 
A green mineral-like substance, used sparingly as 
a drug in medicine, and extensively as a pigment 
in the arts. A coarse and common kind of it is 
manufactured on a large scale in the South of 
France, by covering plates of copper with the 
refuse of the grape after the juice has been 
expressed for making wine,—and afterwards col- 
VERJUICH. 579 
lecting the accretion which forms on the plates, 
and beating it in wooden mortars, and press- 
ing it down in bags of white leather; but this 
always contains a greater or less degree of vege- 
table extractive, and of the stalks and husks of 
the grapes. A much better kind is prepared 
in Britain by covering copper plates with cloth 
soaked in pyroligneous acid, or by exposing cop- 
per plates to the fumes of vinegar. Pure verdi- 
gris has a beautiful bluish green colour, a fo- 
liaceous texture, and a hard and pulverulent 
consistence ; it is quite inodorous, and seems at 
first contact with the tongue or palate to be 
nearly insipid, but leaves a strong metallic taste 
in the mouth; and it consists, according to Dr 
Ure, of 52 per cent. of acetic acid, 39°6 of per- 
oxide of copper, and 84 of water. It is an useful 
external application, both in human and veteri- 
nary medicine, as a mild caustic for cleaning 
foul ulcers, reducing the callous edges of sores, 
and consuming fungous growths; and it serves 
also, in the form of ointment, as a remedy for 
chronic ophthalmia; but, in internal exhibition, 
though recommended as a good tonic in such 
cases as epilepsy in the human subject and farcy 
in the horse, it is very uncertain and extremely 
dangerous, and can seldom be wisely preferred by 
even the most skilful practitioner to some other 
drug. A safe dose of it for a strong man rarely 
can amount to half a grain; and an overdose of 
it proves rapidly fatal, producing hypercatharsis, 
excessive vomiting, convulsion, palsy, coma, 
and death. The best known antidotes are albu- 
men and the ferrocyanate of potash. 
VERDITER. A blue pigment, found native in 
Hungary, and also manufactured by decomposing 
nitrate of copper with chalk. It is an impure 
carbonate of copper. 
VERJUICEH. An acid liquor, used asa chief | 
ingredient in a cooling beverage, and for some of | 
the same purposes as vinegar. It may be pre- 
pared from gooseberries, from crab apples, from 
such grapes as are too coarse for yielding good 
wine, from such acidulous apples as are least fit 
for cyder, and from any other fruit of similarly 
sour character, containing a large proportion of 
either malic, citric, or tartaric acid. A good me- 
thod of preparing it from ripe gooseberries or | 
grapes is to express the juice without bruising 
the seeds,—to strain the expressed juice through 
a cloth, to bottle it, and to expose it uncorked 
for six or seven days to the sun,—to replace 
every morning with fresh liquid as much matter 
as has become converted into froth,—and, when 
the fermentation has ceased, to decant the liquor 
into other bottles, and to cork them, and place 
them in a cool cellar till they are wanted for 
use, Verjuice thus prepared is in great request 
in France as the sapid and cooling ingredient of 
a refreshing summer beverage,—a little of it be- 
ing well mixed with a little sugar or syrup, and 
then poured into a glass and filled up with water; 
and in a state of ready mixture with sugar, it is 
ee el 
Sete career eee 
