VISCONTI 235 VISHNU ices of Francesco Sforza, to •whom he gave his natural daughter Bianca in marriage; and on his death in 1447 the Visconti family was succeeded by that of Sforza in the lordship of the Milanese. MATTEO VISCONTI VISCONTI, ENNIO QUIRINO, an Italian archaeologist; born in Rome, Italy, Nov. 1, 1751. In his 14th year he translated into Italian verse the "He- cuba" of Euripides. His greatest work is "Grecian Iconography" (3 vols. 1808). He visited London at the invitation of Lord Elgin to inspect the Elgin Marbles, 1817, and wrote "Memoirs on the Works of Sculpture from the Parthenon" (1818). He died Feb. 7, 1818. VISCOSITY, stickiness; in physics, resistance of a fluid to relative change in its particles; capability of a solid to yield continually under stress. VISCOUNT, a degree or title of no- bility ranking next below an earl, and above a baron. It is the most recently established English title of nobility, hav- ing been first conferred by letters patent from Henry VI. on John Lord Beau- mont, in A. D. 1440. The title of viscount is frequently held in England as the sec- ond title of an earl, and is borne by the eldest son as a courtesy title during the life of his father. The coronet of a viscount of England is composed of a circle of gold, chased, having on the edge 12, 14 or 16 pearls; the cap of crimson velvet, turned up with ermine, and closed at the top with a rich tassel of gold. VISCUM, the mistletoe; a genus of Loranthacese. Leaves opposite, whorled, or wanting; flowers unisexual; males with the calyx obsolete; four petals; ovate, fleshy, united at the base, and bearing each a single anther, adnate with its upper surface. Fertile flowers, with a superior calyx having an obscure mar- gin; four erect, ovate, very minute pet- als, and a sessile stigma. Known species believed to be about 100; from hot and temperate climates. VISHNU, in Brahmanism, the second person of the modern Hindu Trimurti. When he first appears in Vedic times, he is simply the God of the Shining Fir- mament, the younger brother of Indra, and inferior to him in dignity. By the time that the epic poems, the Ramayana and the Mahabharat, were composed, Vishnu had made a considerable advance to his present position, the full attain- ment of which, however, was reserved for the period of the Puranas. One of these books is called the Vishnu Purana. He is regarded as the member of the triad whose special function is to preserve. To do this he nine times successively became incarnate, and will do so once more. The first time he appeared, it was as a fish to warn a righteous king, Manu, of an approaching deluge, and save the sacred Vedas from being lost. His second ap- pearance was as a tortoise to support the world, vhile the gods and goddesses churned the sea; the third, as a boar, to lift up the submerged world on his tusks; the fourth, as a man-lion, to tear to pieces an impious king; the fifth, as a dwarf, to recover for the gods their su- premacy lost by their neglect; the sixth, as Parasurama, to wash away the sins of the earth by the destruction of the Kshatriya race — probably an allusion to the historic fact that when the Aryan Brahman and Kshatriya warriors had well established themselves in India, jealousies arose between them, and the Kshatriyas were vanquished, and in large measure destroyed, by the Brah- mans; the seventh, was as Rama, the hero of the Ramayana; the eighth, as Krishna; the ninth, as Buddha ; and the tenth, as Kalki, or the White Horse, is still to come. When it arrives, Vishnu shall appear on a white horse, with a drawn sword, wherewith he shall destroy the wicked, and thus prepare the way for a renovated world. Vishnu himself is generally represented as a dark-blue man, with four, arms, the first holding a war club, the second a conch shell, the third a quoit-like weapon called Chakra, and the fourth a water lily. His two most popular incarnations are as Rama and Krishna. His most enthusiastic fol- lowers are generally drawn from the middle classes of Hindu society. His mark on their foreheads is a trident, with a yellow fork in the center, and a white one on each side. Many monastic sects worship him almost exclusively.
