781 



STAMPS, STAMP ACTS. 



STANZA. 



702 



engraved on two dies, one placed below and one above the plate ; and 

 the impression is given by the upper die being made to fall forcibly 

 upon, or being forcibly driven into, the plate. The lower die is 

 generally a reverse of the upper, the one being in cameo and the other 

 in intaglio ; that is, any part of the device which is convex or raised in 

 the one, is concave or sunk in the other. 



STAMPS, STAMP ACTS. Stamps are impressions made upon 

 paper or parchment by the government or its officers for the purposes 

 of revenue. They always denote the price of the particular stamp, or 

 in other words, the tax levied upon a particular instrument stamped, 

 and sometimes they denote the nature of the instrument itself. If 

 the instrument is written upon paper, the stamp is impressed in relief 

 upon the paper itself ; but to a parchment instrument the stamp is 

 attached by paste and a small piece of lead which itself forms part of 

 the impression. These stamps are easily forged, and at various times 

 forgeries of them upon a large scale have been discovered. The 

 punishment for the forgery of stamps was long a capital offence ; it is 

 now punishable by imprisonment or penal servitude. 



In France stamps are used both for the authentication of instruments 

 and aa a source of revenue : thus they constitute a large part of the 

 income of the municipality of Paris. 



The stamp tax was first introduced into this country in the reign of 

 William and Mary, such an impost having previously existed in 

 Holland. The act 5 W. & M., c. 21, imposes stamps upon grants from 

 the crown, diplomas, contracts, probates of wills and letters of 

 administration, and upon all writs, proceedings, and records in courts 

 of law and equity ; it does not however seem to impose stamps upon 

 deeds, unless these are enrolled in the courts at Westminster or other 

 courts of record. Two years afterwards, however, conveyances, deeds, 

 and leases were subjected to the stamp duty, and by a series of acts 

 in the succeeding reigns every instrument recording a transaction 

 between two individuals was subjected to a stamp duty before it could 

 be used in a court of justice. By the 33 Geo. 111. chap. 78, a stamp 

 duty was imposed on newspapers (which was only taken off a few 

 years ago), [NEWSPAPERS], and by an act of Geo. IV., inventories 

 and appraisements are required to be stamped. Stamps are also used 

 as a convenient method of imposing a tax upon a particular class of 

 persons : thus, articles of apprenticeship are subject to duty, and so 

 are articles of clerkship to a solicitor. Solicitors and conveyancers are 

 required to take out annually a stamped certificate, and before a 

 person commences practice as a physician, an advocate, a barrister-at- 

 law, or an attorney, he must pay a tax, under the form of a stamp 

 upon an admission. Notaries public, bankers, pawnbrokers, and others 

 must obtain a yearly licence in order to exercise their callings. 



It U only possible thus generally to point out the nature of the 

 things subject to stamps, as these have varied frequently, and are 

 subject indeed to constant change. It is enough to refer to the stamps 

 on newspapers and letters as an example. And it may be added here 

 that it is only recently that the system of levying a tax by means of 

 stamps on legal proceedings has been revived, after having been 

 abandoned for a great many years. 



The general principle which regulates the courts in the interpretation 

 of the stamp acts is, that on the one hand fraudulent evasion of the 

 stamp duties shall be punished by forfeiture of all benefit from the 

 document which ought to have been stamped ; and, on the other hand, 

 that a just claim shall not be evaded or a fraud be effected because the 

 just claimant has unintentionally violated the stamp laws. Accordingly 

 almost all instruments requiring stamps (except bills and notes) may 

 be stamped on payment of a penalty ; and all courts of civil justice are 

 authorised to receive the unstamped instrument when tendered in 

 evidence, on deposit of the amount of the stamp and penalty. Bills 

 and notes cannot be stamped after they are made ; a provision intended 

 to prevent fraud in the use of these important instruments of com- 

 merce. 



An unstamped instrument, though in general inadmissible, may be 

 used as evidence to defeat fraud, and, with certain limitations, to 

 establish a criminal charge. Thus, where an unstamped agreement 

 contained matter not requiring a stamp, it was used as evidence of that 

 matter, although invalid as evidence of the terms of the agreement. 

 An indictment for forgery likewise may be maintained, although the 

 instrument forged may be invalid for want of a proper stamp ; but 

 such an invalid instrument is not sufficient to support an indictment 

 for larceny. 



The stamp duties and the custody of the dies are placed under the 

 superintendence of commissioners, who transact their business in 

 Somerset House, London. It may not be out of place to remark that 

 the endeavour to impose stamp duties upon our American colonies 

 in 1735, was one of the proximate causes of the American revolution. 

 STANAMYL. [OROANOMETALLIC BODIES.] 

 STANDARD OF MEASURE, Ac. [WEIGHT, MEASURE, &c., 

 STATOARD OK.] 



STANDARD TEMPERATURE AND PRESSURE. In deter- 

 mining the specific gravity of solids and liquids, the standard of com- 

 parison is the weight of an equal bulk of distilled water at 60 Fahr. ; 

 and for gases and vapours atmospheric air is the standard at 60 Fahr., 

 and under a pressure of 30 inches. In France the standard tempera- 

 ture is 0C. (32 Fahr.), and the pressure is 760 millimetres, or 29'922 

 inches. The unit of density is the volume of an equal bulk of water, 



at its point of maximum density, namely, 39'2 Fahr. [SPECIFIC 

 GRAVITY ; HEAT.] 



STANDARDS are those trees or shrubs which stand singly, without 

 being attached to any wall or support. In gardening and planting 

 they are distinguished into three kinds, the full standard, the half 

 standard, and the dwarf standard. The full standards are trees whose 

 stems are suffered to grow seven or eight feet or more without allowing 

 side branches to be developed, but at this point are allowed to spread 

 in all directions. In this way most fruit-trees, with the exception of 

 the vine, may be grown, though many of those of the almond tribe, as 

 the peach, apricot, &c., are best grown against a wall. The various 

 kinds of apple, pear, and plum trees are grown as full standards. In 

 fruit-trees the primary branch or stem is often cut off at a certain 

 height for the purpose of favouring the lateral growth ; but in forest- 

 trees grown for the sake of timber or for ornament, this treatment is 

 never resorted to. 



Half standards are those plants which are allowed to run up three 

 or four feet and then permitted to branch out. The height at which 

 it is desired a tree should branch out may be frequently secured by 

 cutting off the lower branches up to that point, or by cutting down 

 the primary branch and allowing the highest lateral branches to de- 

 velope themselves. Many shrubs grow naturally in this manner, and 

 when fruit-trees are grown in this way, it is done as a matter of 

 convenience for gathering the fruit, or ensuring their growth under 

 particular circumstances. 



Dwarf standards are those plants whose stems are only allowed to 

 reach a height of one or two feet before they are permitted to branch, 

 and this object is effected in the same manner as in the last. All kinds 

 of fruit-trees, as apple, pear, plum, and cherry trees, may be grown as 

 dwarf standards, but these trees do not bear so good fruit under such 

 treatment as when allowed to grow as half or full standards. Goose- 

 berry and currant trees are best treated in this way, and when care is 

 taken to thin them well, they produce by far the finest fruit when 

 grown as dwarf standards of about a foot high. It is in this way that 

 the fruit of the gooseberry has been brought to so great perfection in 

 Lancashire and elsewhere. Many shrubs may be trained as dwarf 

 standards, although in most instances they are more ornamental when 

 allowed to grow as bushes with several stems direct from the ground. 

 STANETHYL. [ORGANOMETALLIC BODIES.] 

 STANMETHYL. [ORGANOMETALLIC BODIES.] 

 STANNARY, from the Latin Stannum, "tin." This term some- 

 times denotes a tin-mine, sometimes the collective tin-mines of a dis- 

 trict, sometimes the royal rights in respect of tin-mines within such 

 district. But it is more commonly used as including, by one general 

 designation, the tin-mines within a particular district, the tinners 

 employed in working them, and the customs and privileges attached 

 to the mines, and to those employed in digging and purifying the ore. 



The great stannaries of England are those of Devon and Cornwall, 

 of which the stannary of Cornwall is the more important. The stan- 

 nary of Cornwall, and also that of Devon, were granted by Edward III. 

 to the Black Prince, upon the creation of the duchy of Cornwall, and 

 are perpetually incorporated with that duchy. Both stannaries are 

 under one duchy-officer, called the lord warden of the stannaries, with 

 a separate vice-warden for each county. 



All tin in Cornwall and Devon, whoever might be the owner of the 

 land, appears to have formerly belonged to the king, by a usage pecu- 

 liar to these counties. King John, in 1201, granted a charter to his 

 tinners in Cornwall and Devonshire, authorising them to dig tin and 

 turves to melt the tin anywhere in the moors and in the fees of bishops, 

 abbots, and earls, as they had been used and accustomed. (Madox, 

 ' Exch.,' 279 t, 283 1.) This charter was confirmed by Edward I., 

 Richard II., and Henry IV. 



In Cornwall the right of digging in other men's land is now regulated 

 by a peculiar usage, called the custom of bounding. This custom 

 attaches only to such land as now is or anciently was wmtftfj that is, 

 land open or uninclosed. By this mode the bound-owner acquires a 

 right to search for and take all the tin he can find, paying the lord of 

 the soil one-fifteenth, or to permit others to do so ; and to resist all 

 who attempt to interrupt him. The bounds must be renewed annually, 

 by a bounder employed on behalf of the bound-owner, or the lord may 

 re-enter. 



As part of the stannary rights, the duke of Cornwall, as grantee of 

 the crown, has or had the pre-emption of tin throughout the county, 

 a privilege supposed to have been reserved to the crown out of an 

 original right of property in tin-mines, but which in modern times is 

 never exercised. 



The stannary courts were remodelled by the 6 & 7 Wm. IV. c. 106. 

 The duties payable to the duke of Cornwall on the stamping or coinage 

 of tin were abolished by 1 & 2 Viet. c. 120 ; and further regulations 

 for these courts were introduced by 2 & 3 Viet. c. 58 ; and the juris- 

 diction was extended, and the procedure amended and improved by 

 the 18 & 19 Viet. c. 32. 

 STANNIC ACID. [Trs.] 



STANNIC ETHYLOMETHIDE. [OROANOMETALLIO BODIES.] 



STANZA (Stance, in French), an Italian word which means room or 



dwelling-place, is used in poetry to designate certain parts or divisions 



of a poem, each forming a complete period within itself, and consisting 



of a number of lines regularly adjusted to each other, and containing 



