BITTERS, a collective term applied to those vegetable substances the most prominent sen sible quality of which is bitterness. It was at one time attempted to refer this quality to an hypothetical principle, which was termed bitter principle ; but it was soon perceived that sbu stances having a bitter taste were indebted for it to very different sources. A certain quan tity of bitter matter seems to promote the di gestion of all food; hence bitter substances are found abundantly distributed in the vege table kingdom. Where there is a deficiency of bitter matter, and the food is of a very watery kind, such as grows in wet pastures, cattle are known to suffer from various dis eases, especiallyfrom the rot. The best known bitters, perhaps, are quassia, wormwood, aloes, chamomile, colocynth, gentian, hop, rhubarl rue, trefoil, and briony. Bitters is also th name for a class of beverages. The Swiss pea sant, inhabiting high stations on the Alps which are almost constantly wrapped in thick and penetrating mist, uses a spirit dis tilled from gentian, called biller snaps. In the
West Indies, where languor of the system, witl weakness of the digestive organs, is produced be the excessive heat, the appetite is restored are the stomach invigorated by taking before din ner a few drops in a glass of water of an elish made of gentian, serpentaria, orange-peel, ani sweet flag-root; and in America the infusion 01 tincture of serpentaria is sometimes taken every morning in damp aguish situations to prevent intermittents. In England, the "bitters" of the spirit shops are made of brandy, orange peel, gentian, cassia, cloves or some other spice, sugar, and one or two other ingredients. BITTERSPAR is a crystallized mineral, sometimes colourless, but frequently presents tints of pink, yellow, brown, and green, derived from the presence of iron and manganese. It possesses various degrees of transparency, and has a somewhat pearly lustre, whence it has been called pearlspar.