M I S
M I S
MISERICORDIA in Cibis & Potu, in out old writers, Is ufed for any gratuitous portion of meat and drink, given to the re- ligious in convents beyond their ordinary allowance. Matt. Paris. And in fome convents they had a ftated allowance of thefe over- commons upon extraordinary days, which were cal- led Mijericordia Rcgutares, Mon. Angl. T. r. p. 149-
MISGUM, in zoology, the name of a filh of the anguilliform kind, but broader and flatter than the eel, and of much the fame fize from the head to the tail. It has five black lines, one on the back, two which are fomewhat broader, in the middle of the fides, and two others which are narrower lower down j Ihefe are all extended from the head to the tail. The intermediate fpaces, and the belly, are of a fomewhat bluifti "white, dotted with black fpots. The fins are alfo fpotted in the fame manner. The mouth is fmall and round, like that of the lamprey, and is furrounded with beards, fix on the up- per jaw, and four on the under. And there are two other very flender ones near the noflrils. The eyes are fmall ; the gills four on a fide; and befide the back fin there are four, two near the gills, and two lower on the body. This is a common fifh about the German mores, and is efteemed a very delicate one at the table. It lays its fpawn in March, and is in beft feafon for eating in January and February. It is caught principally in ftanding and muddy waters ; and it is faid, that when out of water, it makes a fort of hilling noife. Willughby, Hift.Pifc. p. 119. MISLETOE {Cycl)~ It has been formerly fuppofed that the Mijletoe was produced as a fort of excrefcence from the tree it is found on ; but time and experiments have (hewn, that it is raifed like other plants from feeds. Its berries are of a vifcous nature, and flicking to the beaks of the birds that eat them, they may be rubbed off againft the branches of other trees, and there take root and grow, but this is not neceffary for their propagation, for the great numbers of plants of it ufually found on the fame trees, feem to prove very plainly, that it is produced by the falling of its ieeds, like all other plants, but that the matrix for thefe is not earth, but the brandies of a living tree.
The trees on which Miflctoe is principally found, arc the ap< pie, the afh, and other fmooth-rind'd ones. It is very rarely found upon the oak ; and though it may eafily be propagated by its feeds on other trees, yet it has not been found to take readily upon the oak. Miller, Gardener's Diet. Ariftotle thought that Mijletoe was not a plant produced from feeds, but a mere excrefcence of the trees on which it was found, produced either by an extravafation of the nutritive juices of the tree, or by a tranfpiration of it ; and many au- thors who have written of it, have been of the fame opinion, But Theophraftus and Pliny were of opinion that it ow'd its origin to feeds, but that they muft neceilarily pafs through the bowels of a bird before they were in a condition to grow. The feeds of Mijletoe are fo foft, that one would imagine they would be digefted by the ftomach of a bird. Bonone, how- ever, has obferved, that they are voided entire ; but there is no necefiity of fuppofmg their pafiing this ftate, in order to their germinating. Malpighi has very perfectly defcribed the 'feeds of Mijletoe ; he fays, that it germinates by pufhing out 'two horns from two of its angles ; and Camerarius has made 'the very fame obfervation. But the firft account we have of Mijletoe's being regularly raifed by planting the feeds, is from Mr. Ray, who mentions its having been done by Mr, Doody. The fruit of the Mijletoe are roundifh foft berries, fattened by a fhort pedicle to the bottom of a flelhy cup. That part of the berry which flands oppofite to this pedicle, is fomewhat Batted, and there may be feen there a fmall Chining brown body of an oval figure, which is that part of the piftillum cal- led by Linnaeus, the jligma ; and round about this ftigma there are four longifh marks, which mew the places where the leaves of the flower have been fattened. The fkin of the fruit, when ripe, is very fmooth, tranfparent, and tough, and on examining it by the microfcope, it is feen very full of veflels produced from the pedicle, and making frequent anaftomofes with one another. Within this is the feed wrapped up in a vifcous matter, and of a flatted fhape, and greenifli colour ; they are beft feparated from this vifcous mat- ter by fteeping in warm water, and are ufually found to be triangular, fometimes oval.
When a berry of Mijletoe is crufhed and broken againft the fcark of a tree, the vifcous matter which furrounds the feed foon driesaway into a thick and tough fkin, which furroundsthefeed, and keeps it fall down to the bark j but the rains frequently wafli thefe off afterwards, efpecially when they have fallen upon the fmoother part of the bark, or upon fuch parts of a tree as are clean and free from mofs. And hence it is, that moft of the Mijletoe we find, is either found upon the under part of the branch of a tree from whence the rain could not fo eafily difl-idge it, or on fuch as have a rough bark, or are in part covered with the common tree-mofles. Mr. Du Hamel determined to invefligate the nature of this odd plant, put feveral of the feeds of it into fmall flits, which he cut in the barks of different trees, by that means to defend them from being walhed away by rains, and thefe all fuc- needed well and fhot, except thofe he planted on the fig, on which he made feveral unfuccefsful attempts ; the mifchief done
to the feeds by the milky juice of this tree, was probably the caufe of this. It is no wonder that Mijletoe grows equally on all forts of trees, fince there requires no more to make it grow than the effect of the rains and night dews ; and this au- thor found the feeds mooting on earthen pots and ftones, which he kept lhaded from the heat of the fun ; and from parallel experiments it mould feem alfo, that the tranfpiration of trees helps greatly the germination of thefe feeds. The feeds of Mijletoe fown, if we may fo call it, on the bark of trees in February, begin to moot in June, and at that time there are feen two little round bodies ifluing out at the two angles of the triangular feeds ; but as thefe feeds are fubject to fome irregularities in their figure, fo they alfo are in their ger- mination, for from the oval ieeds there is only one fhoot, and from thofe which are irregularly angular, there are fometimes four or five.
Each of thefe round bodies is faftened to a pedicle, which has its infertion in the flelhy part of the feed, in which there are a fort of grooves, which make it feem as if thefe pedicles came out of a fort of cafe.
This fort of germination is peculiar to Mijletoe, no other feed mooting out fo many radicles. Thefe alio are often found of very different lengths, tho' coming from the lame feed, nor do they all appear at the fame time, but feem to vegetate dif- ferently and diftinctly.
The length of thefe radicles is in a great meafure owing to the pofition of the feed on the branch of the tree, for they always grow in length till they reach the bark ; fo that if the feed be io placed that the germ iffues out clofe to the tree, it is pro- portionably fhort; but if it happens to proceed from the upper part of the feed, it bends and grows in length till it reaches the bark to which it is to be fixed.
Mr. Du Hamel, willing to try how far this elongation of the radicle might be carried, placed two feeds of Mijletoe, which had already germinated, upon a fmall fupport, railing them from the branch of the tree. In the one of thefe the radicle was turned toward the branch, tho' at an unnatural diltance, in the other it was directed a contrary way. The confequence was, that the firft grew to twice its natural length, and then the blacknefs of the round body at the end fhewed it began to decay j after which it grew no more ; the other turned its germ back to the fupport, and fixing there, pcrifliexl for want of nourilhment. Another time, making a hole in the branch of a nut-tree, juft when the radicle of a Mijletoe feed was ftriking, he caufed the radicle to grow to twice its natural length, and it finally reached the bottom of the hole, and ftuck there, and produced a vigorous plant. It is to be ob- ferved alfo, in regard to the germination of thefe feeds, that they are the only ones in which the radicle takes indifferently any direction, in all other feeds it points ever downwards only. The feeds of Mijletoe will fhoot equally well on the upper and under fides of a branch of a tree, and thofe on the upper will bend their radicles downward, while thofe on the under will ftrike theirs directly upward with the fame eafe. The radicles of Adijletoe are, as has been already obferved, compofed of a little round body, fuftained by a pedicle. When this pedicle has grown to fuch a length that the round body touches the bark, it opens before into the fhape of the trunks of flies, and other infects, and by this means touching clofely at all its edges, it becomes faften'd extremely firm to the tree. From this refemblance in fhape to the trunks of fmall animals, Dr. Du Hamel calls thefe radicles the trunks of the feed of Mijletoe. The ends of thefe trunks of the radicles are alfo faftened to the bark of the tree by a vifcous matter, which, when the trunk is gently raifed, draws out into firings on all fides to fome length.
In the inner part of this trunk, or open button, there are two fubftances to be diflinguifhed ; in the center there is a white granulated matter, and round that a greenifli one ; both thefe are juicy, but the outer lefs fo than the central white part ; the outer one is plainly the fame with the outer rind of the root of the Mijletoe, or the fecond bark of its trunk. Thefe both very quickly adhere to the tree, ftriking their feveral granular into it, and thefe furnifh afterwards the roots of the Mijletoe. The outer bark of Mijletoe is thin, of a deep green, and fomewhat rough ; it is ltronger than that which it covers; and this is not extended to the roots of the plant, but fpreads over the bark of the tree at the bottom of the ftalk, juft as the feet of the corals and other fea plants do over flones. The \ licous matter, by which the trunk adheres to the tree, is furnifhed from all parts of the radicle, but principally from its outer bark, and is not at all owing to the juices of the tree, fince it is found as abundantly on thofe radicles which have been mads to adhere to flones, as on thofe which have been on trees. A little time fixes thefe trunks very firmly ; but it is obfervable, that though the outer bark or edge of thefe open balls adheres equally all round to the bark of the tree, the granule of the inner fubftance always direct themfelves to and infinuate in the little clefts or cracks of the rind of the tree. While the feeds of Mijletoe are in this ftate, they may be tranfplanted to other places, and fet on other trees, and feldom fail to thrive. Seeds of this plant may be made to fhoot on ftones, and will fix their trunks to them, but here they naturally fbon perifti ; they may however be removed from thefe ftones to the 2 branches
