Also 6, 8 vessicle. [ad. F. vésicule, or L. vēsīcula VESICULA.]
1. a. Anat. and Zool. A small bladder-like vessel in an animal body; a cavity or cell with a membranous integument; a small sac or cyst.
Freq. with defining terms, as blood-, food-, germinal, seminal, umbilical vesicles; see also GRAAFIAN, PURKINJEAN.
1578. Banister, Hist. Man, V. 64. The intrels, which receiue the dryer excrement, as the Vessicle of Choler.
1607. Walkington, Opt. Glass, ix. 103. Those men which want the vesicle of cholor, are both strong and couragious.
1664. Power, Exp. Philos., I. 4. If you divide the Bee near the neck, you shall see the heart beat most lively, which is a white pulsing vesicle.
1691. Ray, Creation, II. (1692), 63. That the Lungs should be made up of such innumerable Air-pipes and Vesicles interwoven with Blood Vessels in order to purifie, ferment, or supply the sanguineous Mass with Nitro-aerial Particles.
1713. Cheselden, Anat., I. i. (1726), 12. The marrow in the larger cells is also contained in their membranous vesicles.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1862), I. ii. 156. The vesicles, that go to form the brain.
1797. M. Baillie, Morb. Anat. (1807), 390. The small vesicles which make a part of the natural structure of the ovaria.
1843. R. J. Graves, Syst. Clin. Med., xxii. 260. These cells may be represented as so many minute vesicles.
1870. Rolleston, Anim. Life, Introd. p. xxxvi. The brain [of Amphioxus] consists of three primary vesicles.
Comb. 1870. Rolleston, Anim. Life, 155, note. Contractile Polian vesicle-like sacs are developed.
b. Similarly in Bot.
1670. Phil. Trans., V. 1176. There are found many leaves of other trees, on which grow Vesicles, or small baggs.
1673. Grew, Anat. Trunks, I. i. § 3. A simple, white, and close Parenchyma or Barque; made up of Vesicles … hardly visible without a Glass.
1760. J. Lee, Introd. Bot., III. v. (1765), 183. Pappillose, nipply: when it is covered with Vesicles, little Bladders.
1766. Compl. Farmer, s.v. Vegetation, All the roots becoming longer, put forth new branches out of their sides, the second leaf withers, and its vesicles are emptied.
1832. Lindley, Introd. Bot., 158. This third envelope always begins by being a mass of cellular tissue,… and generally finishes by becoming a vesicle.
1882. Vines, Sachs’ Bot., 59. The older hypothesis of a deposition of new layers from within presupposes that the starch-grains were at first hollow vesicles.
c. Physics. A minute bubble or spherule of liquid or vapor, esp. one of those composing a cloud or fog.
1731. Miller, Gard. Dict., s.v. Dew, The thin Vesicles of which Vapours consist. Ibid., The Warmth … forms those Vesicles that are specifically lighter than the Air.
1794. G. Adams, Nat. & Exp. Philos., IV. lii. 446. Clouds are composed of a mass of vesicles like soap-bubbles.
1854. Brewster, More Worlds, iii. 61. The aqueous vapour which it [sc. the atmosphere] contains, whether it exist in minute vesicles, or in masses of clouds.
1869. Phipson, trans. Guillemin’s Sun (1870), 42. When the vesicles which constitute clouds are cooled they unite to form drops.
1884. J. Tait, Mind in Matter (1892), 87. The salt is brought by the travelling clouds, each vesicle charged with a precious burden.
d. Geol. A small spherical or oval cavity produced by the presence of bubbles of gas or vapor in volcanic rocks.
1811. Pinkerton, Petralogy, II. 328. The vesicles are sometimes of an oblong form, but often spherical.
1849. Dana, Geol., vi. (1850), 346. Occasionally we see fragments in which the vesicles are thickly disseminated.
1879. Rutley, Stud. Rocks, xi. 191. In some of the obsidians of Hawaii the vesicles are quite spherical.
2. A hollow swelling. rare–1. (Cf. next.)
1672. Marvell, Reh. Transp., II. 11. He demonstrates at large how impossible it was … for Mankind to be produced at first from certain Vesicles or Pimples of the Earth.
3. Path. A small, generally round, elevation of the cuticle containing fluid matter.
1799. Jenner, Further Obs. Variolæ Vaccinæ (1801), 33. The patient felt no general indisposition, although there was so great a number of vessicles.
1801. Med. Jrnl., V. 338. He has twice scratched off the surface of the rising vesicle.
1847. Youatt, Horse, viii. 204. Vesicles will sometimes appear along the under side of the tongue.
1867. Baker, Nile Tribut., viii. (1872), 107. Small vesicles rose above the skin.
1876. Bristowe, Th. & Pract. Med. (1878), 295. The amount of fluid relatively to the solid constituents of vesicles varies very much.
b. Without article.
1845. Encycl. Metrop., VII. 755/1. The vaccine pustule runs a given course of varus and of vesicle.
