Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume IX.djvu/143

 HYPERBOREANS HYPERTROPHY 135 HYPERBOREANS (from Gr. fatp, beyond, and ,3op&zf, the north wind), a legendary race, placed by the Greeks in the remote regions of the north. They first appear in Hesiod and in the traditions connected with the temples at Delphi and Delos. The poets conceived of them as dwelling in perpetual sunshine, pos- sessing abundant fruits, abstaining from the flosh of animals, and living for a thousand years. The supposed location of tho Hyperbo- reans changed with the progress of geographi- cal knowledge. At first placed in the north at the sources of the Ister (Danube), they were transferred by some to the west when this river was supposed to proceed from the western ex- tremity of Europe; while others transferred them to the extreme north of Europe, beyond the mythical Gryps and Arimaspi, who them- selves dwelt beyond the Scythians. The latter view at length prevailed ; the character of the Hyperboreans as a sacred nation was lost sight of; and their name became only a geographi- cal expression for the extreme north. Modern ethnologists designate as Hyperboreans a sub- division of the arctic races, inhabiting N. N". E. Asia. (See ETHNOLOGY.) HYPERIDES, one of the ten famous Attic orators, born probably about 395 B. C., died in ^Egina in 322. He was a pupil of Plato in philosophy, of Isocrates in oratory, began his career as an advocate, and was an associate of Demosthenes as leader of the anti-Macedonian party. In 358 he and his son equipped two triremes at their own expense to join the expedition against Euboea. Ho displayed an equal interest in the patriotic cause on an em- bassy to Rhodes (346), in the expedition against Byzantium (340), as ambassador with Demos- thenes to Thebes after the capture of Elatea by Philip (338), and after the battle of Cheero- nea, when he proposed, by a union of tho citi- zens, resident aliens, and slaves, to organize a desperate resistance to Philip. For his efforts on the last occasion he was prosecuted on an indictment for illegal proposition, but was ac- quitted. Of his defence there remain only the words : " The Macedonian army darkened my vision ; it was not I that moved the decree, but the battle of Chaoronea." The affair of Harpa- lus (324) for the first time broke his friendly relations with Demosthenes, against whom he appeared as public prosecutor. On the report of Alexander's death (323), it was chiefly by his exertions that the confederacy was formed which brought about the Lamian war. He fled after the battle of Crannon to ^Eginn, and was pursued and put to death by the emissaries of Antipater. The number of orations attrib- uted to him was 77, but the ancient writers rejected 25 of them as spurious. They agree in extolling his genius, and commend him for almost every excellence of style. Until late- ly only unimportant fragments of his orations were known to have been preserved. In 1847 A. 0. Harris, an English resident of Alexan- dria, purchased near the ruins of Thebes some fragments of papyrus written over with Greek, which were parts of the oration of Hyperides against Demosthenes on the charge of having been bribed by Harpalus. He published a fac- simile of them in 1848. They were edited by Churchill Babington, with an introduction and commentary, in 1850. Another Englishman, Joseph Arden, procured at the same place and nearly at the same time other fragments of papyrus, which were found to contain a largo part of his speech for Lycophron, prosecuted for adultery, and his complete oration for Eux- enippus, charged with making a false report of the oracle of Amphiaraus. These were edited by Mr. Babington in 1853. Another traveller, Mr. Stodart, brought from Egypt in 1850 another collection of papyrus fragments, among which were a large part of the funeral oration on Leosthenes and the Athenian soldiers who perished in the Lamian war. This was published by the same editor in 1858. His orations have been republisbed in Germany by Bockh, Kayser, and others, and in Paris in Didot's Jiibliotheca Grteca. The funeral ora- tion has been edited by Cobet (Leyden, 1858). HYPERTROPHY (Gr. imtp, over, and rpo<$, nourishment), an excess of growth of a part without degeneration or alteration in the struc- ture ; the exact opposite to atrophy. Hyper- trophy may depend on the excess of the mate- rials of certain tissues in the blood ; when this fluid contains habitually too much fat, there may bo an abnormal increase of the adipose tissue; similar hypertrophy may thus be in- duced in other tissues, but there is no evidence that tho muscles or nerves increase in bulk from the mere excess of their formative ma- terials. Though an increased supply of blood is generally rather the consequence than the cause of excessive nutrition in a part, hyper- trophy may arise from a mere increased circu- lation, and when one kidney cannot perform its functions, the other has been known to in- crease in size, owing to its increased activity as an excreting organ. This must be distin- guished from the augmented bulk of long con- gested parts, in which there is not normal hypertrophy, but an addition of altered and inferior tissue. Hypertrophy is in most cases dependent on a preternatural formative capa- city in the part, sometimes congenital (as in the abnormal growths of fingers and toes, and even entire limbs), but generally acquired. The most striking instances of acquired nutri- tive activity are seen in the muscular system, consequent upon the excessive exercise of its functional powers. Muscular hypertrophy is most often seen in the involuntary muscles, whose action is in some way impeded; thus stricture of the urethra or stone in the bladder, obstructing the exit of the urine and calling for extra exertion to expel it, causes hypertro- phy of the muscular coat of the bladder ; so it happens with the gall bladder when its ducts are stopped by calculi, and with the intestines when a stricture exists in any portion. Hyper-