Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume I.djvu/841

 ASCIDIANS ASH 805 ASCIDIANS. See MOLLTJSCOIDS. ASCLEPIADES, called from his native country Bithynus, a physician, born at Prusa in Bithy- nia in the 2d century B. 0., flourished in Rome in the early part of the 1st. He first studied rhetoric and philosophy, but afterward aban- doned them for the study of medicine. Though his system contains some rules approved by modern science, such as reliance upon gentle measures, diet, fresh air, &c., he seems to have attained success rather by indulging the whims and caprices of his patients, flattering their prejudices, and caring for their comfort, than by any ability of his own. After successful practice in several Grecian cities, he went to Rome, where he gained great fame and wealth. He is said never to have been ill, and to have died at a great age by an accident. He left sev- eral disciples, who attained considerable promi- nence as teachers of his doctrines. ASCOLI. I. A city (anc. Asculum Picenum) of central Italy, capital of the province of Ascoli Piceno, on the right*bank of the Tronto, 18m. W. of the Adriatic and 87 m. N. E. of Rome ; pop. about 11,000. It is well built, and has a citadel, a Jesuit college, a museum, library, and a number of private palaces. Its harbor, Porto d' Ascoli, at the mouth of the Tronto, is de- fended by two forts, and is frequented by coast- ing vessels. II. Ascoli Piceno, a province of cen- tral Italy, formerly belonging to the papal territory, and now constituting one of the four provinces of the Marches ; area, 808 sq. m. ; pop. in 1872, 203,009. Part of the province is traversed by branches of the Apennines and by numerous valleys watered by the Tenna, Aso, Tesino, Tronto, and other rivers. The chief products are corn, wine, oil, honey, silks, wool, and fish. III. Ascoli di Satriano (anc. Asculum Apulum), a town of S. Italy, in the province of Capitanata, situated on the E. slope of the Apennines, 65 m. E. N. E. of Naples ; pop. about 6,000. Near it Pyrrhus in 279 B. 0. gained a great victory over the Romans ; and in 1190 Count Andrea, general of the emperor Henry VI., was defeated here by Tancred and slain. The ancient town was on a branch of the Appian way, and considerable remains ex- ist outside the modern town. ASCOT HEATH, a race course in Berkshire, England, 26 m. from London and 6 m. from Windsor, near the London and Southwestern railway. The annual meeting in June is one of the principal events of the turf. The first prize is a gold cup valued at 500. ASELLI, or Asellio, Gasparo, an Italian anato- mist, born in Cremona about 1580, died in Mi- lan in 1626. He was professor of anatomy in the university of Pavia. In 1622, while dem- onstrating the recurrent laryngeal nerves by the dissection of a dog, he first observed the lacteal vessels as a congeries of white cords disseminated through the mesentery; and on opening one of them with the point of the scal- pel, the milky chyle flowed out, and the dis covery of the absorbent vessels was accom- plished. Before that period the mesenteric veins were supposed, as in the time of Galen, to collect from the intestines all the nutritious products of digestion and to carry them to the liver, where they were worked up into the perfected blood, and the blood thence dissemi- nated, through the rest of the venous system, outward to the whole body. A part of the blood only, passing to the heart and lungs, was thought to be arterialized, and so sent out through the arteries from the left ventricle, as the venous blood was sent out through the veins. The discovery of Aselli consisted sim- ply in finding a new set of mesenteric vessels which took up from the intestines the chyle alone, and conveyed it toward the central or- gans. He did not detect their real ultimate course, but supposed them to terminate in the liver, which still remained the supposed organ for the elaboration and perfection of the blood. It was only some years later (see PEOQUET) that the independent course of the lacteals and lymphatics was ascertained, passing through the receptaculum chyli and the thoracic duct to the left subclavian vein. Aselli, however, was the pioneer in this discovery, and the sub- sequent success of others depended on the facts demonstrated by him. They are embodied in his dissertation De Lactibus sive Lacteu Venis (Milan, 1627). AS6ILL, John, an English lawyer and writer, born about 1655, died in London in 1738. After acquiring considerable reputation in Lon- don in his profession and as a political and legal pamphleteer, he went to Ireland in 1699, where he was elected to the Irish parliament. Before taking his seat, however, he was expelled, Oct. 11, 1703, for blasphemy in his pamphlet on the possibility of avoiding death, "An Argument proving that, according to the Covenant of Eternal Life revealed in the Scriptures, Man may be translated hence into that Eternal Life without passing through Death" (London, 1700), which was publicly burned. Returning to London in 1705, he was elected in 1707 to the English house of commons; but he was also expelled from this for the same cause. He passed the last 30 years of his life in prison for debt, continuing to transact professional busi- ness, and publishing numerous pamphlets. ASH, a name applied to four genera of forest trees. I. Fraxinus (Gr. 0p separation, from the wood being used for fences, or from the facility with which it splits), of the family oleacece, Juss., dic&cia diandria, Linn. Polyga- mous, calyx minute, 3 to 4 cleft ; corol deeply 4-parted or none. Stamens 2 to 4 ; pistillate flowers ; ovary superior, compressed, 2-celled, with 2 ovules each ; capsule with a membrana- ceous lanceolate wing (samara), 1 -seeded by abortion ; seed pendulous. Most of the species are indigenous in North America (more than 30 E. of the Mississippi), many in Europe, few in Asia (one in Nepaul). Most are large trees, affecting shady and moist places, banks of riv- ers, or marshes ; they prosper less in barren and