STAPHISAGRIA. 



STAR, DOUBLE STAR. 



every variation of measure or rhyme which is to be found in the whole 

 poem. There it a great variety of sUnaas in the poetry of modern 

 languages, according to the rhythm and structure of the poem. There 

 i* the tonina of three line*, used chiefly by the Italians and Spaniards; 

 the quartetto (quatrain, in French) of four lines ; the sestina, " sixain," 

 of six lines; the ottara, confuting of eight lines, used in epics, &c. 

 Each of these is susceptible of various combinations of measure and 

 rhyme. 



STAPHISAGRIA, or STAVESACRE, the seeds of the Delphinium 

 tlafihitayria. [DELHiisivii, in NAT. HIST. I>iv.] Stavesacre seeds 

 are not now used internally : when introduced into the stomach they 

 cause vomiting, purging, and local ulceration of the intestines, and they 

 may even produce serious general effects. When powdered, they are 

 employed externally for the destruction of lice, or they are dissolved 

 in vinegar and made into an ointment, which is employed for the cure 

 of scabies, which it is said to effect in seven or eight days, and which 

 has found favour in the eyes of some persons, as it does not stain the 

 linen, nor have the unpleasant smell of sulphur. Its external applica- 

 tion to abraded surfaces is not free from danger. The only case in 

 which its employment is justifiable is, not to remove, but cause revul- 

 sion of, the cutaneous eruption, when, by its sudden drying up, the 

 internal organs are oppressed, as, like most ranunculaceous plants, it 

 causes acute inflammation and pustulation of the skin. It contains 

 an alkaloid, delphine [ PKi.ritiNi: j, which is a powerful sedative against 

 rheumatic and neuralgic pains, its internal use requires great caution, 

 an. I still more its external use as a lotion or ointment, as its absorption 

 through chaps, cracks, or ulcerated places, makes an impression on the 

 nervous system more dangerous than when taken into the stomach. A 

 volatile acid also exists in it, which is powerfully emetic. As this is 

 dissipated at a low temperature, decoction is an objectionable form of 

 administration. 



STAPLE, " anciently written estaple, corneth," says Lord Coke, " of 

 the French word atape, which signifies a mart or market." It appears 

 to hare been used to indicate those marts both in this country and at 

 Bruges, Antwerp, Calais, &c., on the Continent, where the principal 

 products of a country were sold. Probably in the first instance these 

 were held at such places as possessed some conveniences of situation 

 for the purpose. Afterwards they appear to have been confirmed, or 

 others appointed for the purpose by the authorities of the country. On 

 the Continent in the staple-towns the goods had to be offered there for 

 sale, and if not bought within a prescribed time might be again 

 exported on payment of a certain toll, and the towns had to provide 

 warehouses where the goods were to be deposited. This rule, how- 

 ever, has been materially modified, and in many cases abolished. In 

 England the arrangement of the staple was made by the king 

 (:i Edw. III. c. 9). All merchandise sold for the purpose of exporta- 

 tion was compelled either to be sold at the staple, or afterwards 

 brought there before exportation. This was done with the double 

 view of accommodating the foreign merchants, and also enabling 

 the duties on exportation to be more conveniently and certainly 

 collected. Afterwards the word staple was applied to the merchandise 

 itself which was sold at the staple. The staple merchandise of 

 England at these early times, when little manufacture was carried 

 on here, is said by Lord Coke to have been wool, woolfells or sheep- 

 skins, leather, lead, and tin. Incident to the staple was a court 

 called " the court of the mayor of the staple." This court was 

 held for the convenience of the merchants, both native and foreign, 

 attending the staple. It was of great antiquity ; the date of its com- 

 mencement does not appear to have been certainly known. Many 

 early enactments exist regulating the proceedings at the staple and 

 the court held there. Most of these were passed during the reigns 

 of the two Edwards, the first and the third of that name. These 

 kings appear to have been extremely anxious to facilitate and 

 encourage foreign commerce in this kingdom ; and by these statues 

 great immunities and privileges are given, especially to foreign, but 

 also to native merchants attending the staple. The first enactment of 

 importance is called the statute of merchants, or the statute of Acton- 

 Burnel, and was passed in the llth year of Edw. I. A.D. 1283. 

 [ACTOX-BURSEL, STATDTK or.] But the statute more expressly 

 directed to this subject was passed in the 27th year of Edw. III. 

 cap. 8, and is entitled the Statute of Staple. One object of it was to 

 remove the staple, previously held at Calais, to various towns in 

 England, Wales, and Ireland, which are appointed by the statute 

 itaelf. 



Matters connected with the staple were not subject to the cognisance 

 of the king's courts, and the king's officers were prohibited from inter- 

 fering in places where the staple was held. The court consisted of a 

 mayor, who was to be acquainted with the law merchant, and was 

 elected every year by the merchants attending the staple, both native 

 and foreign ; he was attended by two constables, also elected by the 

 'tut*, and who held their office for life. Two alien merchants, 

 .1 the statute says, " towards the north," probably a German, " the 

 other towards the south," Italian, were to be chosen to be associate in 

 judgment with the mayor and constables, and also six mediators of 

 question! between buyers and sellers. Of these six persons, two 

 were to be Germans, two Lombards, and two English. 



In matters of doubt reference was to be had to the privy council. 

 The mayors, sheriffs, and bailiffs of the towns where the staple was held, 



or. there adjoining, were also to attend the mayor and minister! of the 

 staple to execute their commando. Complaint* against the mayor* 

 were to be redressed by the chancellor and others of the privy 

 council. A prison also was to be provided for the use of the staple, 

 and the mayor and constables had power given tlu-m to keep the peace, 

 and to arrest and imprison, their authority extending throughout the 

 town in which the staple was held and the suburbs of it. 



The law administered in the court of the staple, so for as regarded 

 all matters connected with the staple, wan the law merchant [Lr.x 

 MKRCATOHIA], and not the common law of the land, nor the custom of 

 the place. If both parties in a suit were foreigners, all the jury were 

 to be foreigners. If one party was native, the other foreign, the jury 

 was to be naif native, half foreign. Upon the judgment of the court 

 execution was to be done in the manner provided for by the statute 

 merchant. The statute contains various other enactments relating to 

 the internal regulations of the staple. 



Several other statutes were passed in the same and succeeding 

 reigns, in some respect* confirming, in others altering the pro, 

 of the leading statute. As commerce became more extended, tin* 

 staples appear to have fallen into disuse. Lord Coke, a great 

 worshipper of antiquity, complains that in his time the staple had 

 become a shadow ; we have only now, he says, stapulam umbratilem, 

 whereas it was formerly said that wealth followed the staple. The 

 practice, however, of taking recognisances by statute staple, from 

 the many advantages attending them, long continued. (11 Kilw. 1.; 

 27 K.lw. III. caps. 1, 3, to 6, 8, 9; 2 Intt. 322; Com. Dig. tit. 

 ' Stat. Staple ;' 2 Saund. by Wins. 69 ; Reeves, Hitl. Eng. Law, v. '2, 

 pp. 161, 393.) 



STA It, DOUBLE STAR. We distinguish the stars from the planets 

 In much the same way as our ancestors did before us, though there is 

 hardly one point of difference which is now left to its full extent. A 

 contemporary of the publication of the ' Principia' (1687;, engaged in 

 writing an article like the present, would have stated that the only 

 notion out of which antiquity described a star was derived from its 

 fixedness in the heavens ; to which he would have added that these 

 stars present no appearance of systematic arrangement, that their dis- 

 tance is too great to be measured, and that they exert no sensible 

 attraction on the solar system. Not one point of this is now left . 

 the last : the speculation described in MILKY WAY gives a high pro- 

 bability to the theory that the universe is a collection of vast systems 

 of stars ; observations of double stars have rendered it certain that 

 many organised systems, regulated by mutual attraction, exist in 

 space, besides our solar system ; it is fully established that numbers of 

 stars, once called fixed, have slow motion of their own in the heavens ; 

 and in a few instances at least there is no room left for doubt that 

 [PARALLAX OF THE FIXED STABS] the distance of the stars has been 

 approximately ascertained. That no discoverable effect of attraction 

 upon our system con be traced, is the only point in which the stellar 

 astronomy of our own day coincides to the full extent with that of the 

 time of Newton. 



The apparent motions of the stars are first to be cleared of the effects 

 of PRECESSION AND NUTATION, and also of ABERRATION, which depend 

 on motions of our earth, as well as of the grand diurnal revolution. 

 From the REFRACTION of our atmosphere, and from the various 

 casualties to which the rays of light are subject in passing through it, 

 proceed, besides the increase of apparent altitude alluded to in the 

 article cited, a great many varieties of colour and general appearance, 

 particularly that decided size which most of the stars appear to have. 

 A good telescope reduces this phenomenon very much, in favourable 

 states of the atmosphere ; but even these instruments ore not so per- 

 fect as to show the stars to be what there is no doubt they ought to be, 

 mere luminous points. If the apparent diameter of 61 Cygni, the 

 earth's atmosphere being entirely removed, were only one-third of a 

 second, or one-thirtieth of that of Venus when smallest, it is now 

 known that the diameter of that star must be equal to that of the 

 earth's orbit. 



Independently of relative position, the stars are distinguished by 

 their colour and quantity of light, on which last in a great degree 

 depends their apparent magnitude. A casual observer would hardly 

 think that there was any dillerence of colour between one and another ; 

 but a little practice shows that a tinge of one or another colour pre- 

 dominates a little in the nearly white light which all the stars have in 

 common ; and a good telescope gives some stars an appearance which 

 observers have not scrupled to call "blood-red." And when tic 

 stars of a close double star are together in the field of a telescope, it 

 most frequently happens that each star differs sensibly in colour from 

 the other. But when we look at a star, we must remember that we 

 see only the result of the treatment which its light has received from 

 the atmosphere ; and with a telescope the matter is in some respects 

 worse, for there is no object glass which forms anything like a real 

 image. "When we look at a bright star," says Sir John Herschel, 

 "through a very good telescope with a low magnifying ppwi 

 appearance is that of a condensed brilliant uiiiss of light, of which it is 

 impossible to discern the shape for the brightness ; and which, let the 

 goodness of the telescope be what it will, is seldom free from sonie 

 Hmall ragged appendages or rays. But when we apply a magnifying 

 power from 200 to 300, the star is then seen (in favourable cinuni. 

 stances of tranquil atmosphere, uniform temperature, Ac.) as a per. 



