VEG'ETABLE, n. [L. vigeo, to grow.]

1. Belonging to plants; as, a vegetable nature; vegetable qualities; vegetable juices.
2. Consisting of plants; as, the vegetable kingdom.
3. Having the nature of plants; as, a vegetable body.

1. A plant; an organized body destitute of sense aud voluntary motion, deriving its nourishment through pores on its outer surface or vessels, in most instances adhering to some other body, as the earth, and in general, propagating itself by seeds. Some vegetables have spontaneous motion. Vegetables alone have the power of deriving nourishment from inorganic matter, or organic matter entirely decomposed.
2. In a more limited sense, vegetables are such plants as are used for culinary purposes and cultivated in gardens, or are destined for feeding cattle and sheep. Vegetables for these uses are such as are of a more soft and fleshy substance than trees and shrubs; such as cabbage, cauliflower, turneps, potatoes, peas, beans, &c.

1. Of or pertaining to plants; having the nature of, or produced by, plants; as, a vegetable nature; vegetable growths, juices, etc.
   
   

   Blooming ambrosial fruit
   Of vegetable gold. Milton.

2. A plant. See Plant.
3. Consisting of, or comprising, plants; as, the vegetable kingdom.
   
   

   Vegetable alkali (Chem.), an alkaloid. -- Vegetable brimstone. (Bot.) See Vegetable sulphur, below. -- Vegetable butter (Bot.), a name of several kinds of concrete vegetable oil; as that produced by the Indian butter tree, the African shea tree, and the Pentadesma butyracea, a tree of the order Guttiferæ, also African. Still another kind is pressed from the seeds of cocoa (Theobroma). -- Vegetable flannel, a textile material, manufactured in Germany from pine-needle wool, a down or fiber obtained from the leaves of the Pinus sylvestris. -- Vegetable ivory. See Ivory nut, under Ivory. -- Vegetable jelly. See Pectin. -- Vegetable kingdom. (Nat. Hist.) See the last Phrase, below. -- Vegetable leather. (a) (Bot.) A shrubby West Indian spurge (Euphorbia punicea), with leathery foliage and crimson bracts. (b) See Vegetable leather, under Leather. -- Vegetable marrow (Bot.), an egg-shaped gourd, commonly eight to ten inches long. It is noted for the very tender quality of its flesh, and is a favorite culinary vegetable in England. It has been said to be of Persian origin, but is now thought to have been derived from a form of the American pumpkin. -- Vegetable oyster (Bot.), the oyster plant. See under Oyster. -- Vegetable parchment, papyrine. -- Vegetable sheep (Bot.), a white woolly plant (Raoulia eximia) of New Zealand, which grows in the form of large fleecy cushions on the mountains. -- Vegetable silk, a cottonlike, fibrous material obtained from the coating of the seeds of a Brazilian tree (Chorisia speciosa). It us used for various purposes, as for stuffing, and the like, but is incapable of being spun on account of a want of cohesion among the fibers. -- Vegetable sponge. See 1st Loof. -- Vegetable sulphur, the fine highly inflammable spores of the club moss (Lycopodium clavatum); witch. -- Vegetable tallow, a substance resembling tallow, obtained from various plants; as, Chinese vegetable tallow, obtained from the seeds of the tallow tree. Indian vegetable tallow is a name sometimes given to piney tallow. -- Vegetable wax, a waxy excretion on the leaves or fruits of certain plants, as the bayberry.

   Vegetable kingdom (Nat. Hist.), that primary division of living things which includes all plants. The classes of the vegetable kingdom have been grouped differently by various botanists. The following is one of the best of the many arrangements of the principal subdivisions.

   I. Phænogamia (called also Phanerogamia

4. A plant used or cultivated for food for man or domestic animals, as the cabbage, turnip, potato, bean, dandelion, etc.; also, the edible part of such a plant, as prepared for market or the table.
   
   

   * Vegetables and fruits are sometimes loosely distinguished by the usual need of cooking the former for the use of man, while the latter may be eaten raw; but the distinction often fails, as in the case of quinces, barberries, and other fruits, and lettuce, celery, and other vegetables. Tomatoes if cooked are vegetables, if eaten raw are fruits.