STAG. 



STEAM. 



broad, as they admit the air most fully, and are 

 besides the most convenient to cut from in 

 trussing hay for sale at the market. 



STAG. A term applied provincially in Eng- 

 land to a young horse. Also to the male of the 

 deer kind. See DEEH. 



STAGGER- BUSH (Andromeda Mariana"). 

 This American plant grows in the Middle 

 States, with a stem 2 to 3 and 4 feet high. It 

 is very abundant in New Jersey, where the 

 farmers are of opinion that it is destructive to 

 sheep, when eaten by them, producing a disease 

 called the staggers. 



STAGGERS. See APOPLEXY. 



STALL-FEEDING. The process of fatten- 

 ing cattle in the stall. The best practice in 

 this mode of fattening is probably that of 

 wholly confining them to the stalls, as by this 

 means they are kept quiet, and free from inter- 

 ruption, and of course feed more quickly and 

 with greater -regularity, which seem to be 

 points of great importance in this system of 

 management. There are, however, many other 

 methods adopted in different situations and cir- 

 cumstances. 



In regard to the sorts of food that may be em- 

 ployed in the way of winter-fattening animals, 

 they are very numerous, but the principal suc- 

 culent kinds are carrots, parsnips, potatoes, 

 Swedish turnips, cabbages, common turnips, 

 grains, &c.; and of the more dry sorts, oil-cake, 

 oats, barley-meal, rye-flour, bean and pea-meal, 

 and others of the same nature, with different 

 kinds of straw cut into chaff by means of ma- 

 chinery, or hay cut in the same manner. It is 

 usual with some to employ the different meals 

 in *v state of mixture in nearly equal propor- 

 tions, except bean-meal, which, from its heat- 

 ing quality, is mostly made use of in smaller 

 quantities. But on the principle of fresh kinds 

 of food having a more powerful effect on the 

 systems of animals when first applied, it may 

 be more beneficial to have them given in alter- 

 nation, or at distant intervals, as their effects 

 may in this way be more fully experienced. 



In respect to the cut straw and hay that is 

 made use of in this \vav, the first should be 

 prepared from that which is fresh thrashed out. 

 The hay, instead of being of the inferior kind, 

 should be the best that the farm affords, and 

 such as is not in the least injured in the smell 

 or taste by keeping. The more inferior kinds 

 of hay have, however, by the addition of a 

 very small proportion of common salt, been 

 made to be preferred to the best when not pre- 

 pared in that way. See CATTLE, FOLDING, FOOD, 

 SOILING, &c. 



STANDARDS. The young trees reserved 

 at the felling of woods, for the growth of tim- 

 ber. It also signifies such fruit trees as are 

 intended to grow in an open exposure, and not 

 to be hacked and mangled with the knife, as 

 the dwarf trees and those planted against 

 walls are. 



STARR, or BENT. See ABUNDO and ELT- 



MUS. 



STARCH (Germ. /urAc). One of the com- 

 mon proximate principles of vegetables. It is 

 characterized by its insipidity, and by insolu- 

 bility in cold water, in alcohol, and in ether. 

 The term " starch" is commercially applied to 



that obtained from wheat, which for this manu- 

 facture is ground and diffused through vats of 

 water, where it remains two or more weeks, and 

 undergoes a slight fermentation, and acquires 

 a peculiar sour smell. The sour liquor is 

 drawn off, and the precipitate washed in sieves, 

 through which the impure starch passes with 

 the water. It is afterwards passed through 

 other waters, drained through boxes lined with 

 linen or canvass, and ultimately stove-dried in. 

 paper. When drying, it cracks into the pris- 

 matic pieces, resembling miniature basalt, 

 which is its usual form. Starch may be ob- 

 tained from many other grains, and from pota- 

 toes and several esculent vegetables. Arrow- 

 root is the starch of the Maranta arundinacea ; 

 Briiish arrowroot that of the root of Arum ni'tcu- 

 latnni; sago, of the Sagus faranifera, an East 

 Indian palm tree; and tapioca and cassava, of 

 the Jatropha manihot. In the process of germi- 

 nation, and by various chemical agents, starch 

 may be converted into a species of gum and 

 sugar. Pure starch is white, tasteless, and 

 inodorous. It consists of two distinct sub- 

 stances, that are readily recognised under a 

 good magnifying lens, namely, a membrane 

 called amylin, and a gummy semifluid matter 

 named amiolin; the one the husk, the other the 

 contents of the granules. In cold water, unless 

 triturated in a mortar, the grains do not burst, 

 but remain entire and insoluble; but in boiling 

 water they burst and form a mucilage. Starch 

 is a compound of 42-8 parts of carbon, 6-35 of 

 hydrogen, and 50'85 of oxygen in 100 parts. 

 Starch is much less nutritious than wheat 

 flour, or the farina of any grain which con- 

 tains gluten ; and on this account the starch of 

 arrowroot, sago, dec., is used as a diet for the 

 sick. Starch is detected from other mucilages 

 by forming a blue colour with iodine, when the 

 niucilage is cold. Starch in England is charged 

 with a duty of 3$</.perlb., and its manufacture 

 is consequently placed under the control of the 

 excise. 



STAR OF BETHLEHEM. See BETHLE- 

 HEM, STAR or. 



STAR-THISTLE. A name applied to some 

 species of Ctn'aurea, viz. Jersey star-thistle (C. 

 isnardi), the common star-thistle (C. calcitrapa), 

 and the yellow star-thistle, or St. Barnaby's 

 thistle (C. solstitialis). The first is a perennial 

 weed, the others are annuals. See BLUE-BOT- 

 TLE, KNAPWEED, &c. 



STARWORT (Aster, a star; whence also 

 the common name, the flowers resembling little 

 stars from the rays of their circumference). 

 Many species of this extensive genus are 

 stately and handsome plants. The swellings 

 or galls as large as a walnut, so often found 

 on the stems of some American species of 

 starwort, or aster, are caused by the punctures 

 of a fly. 



STARWORT, THE WATER (CallHriche; 

 named by Pliny from kaks, beautiful, and thrix, 

 hair). Annual aquatic plants, which grow in 

 ditches, ponds, and lakes. 



STEAM. Water converted into an elastic 

 fluid by the application of heat. It would be 

 foreign to our subject to go into any detail of 

 the various mechanical uses and improve- 

 ments to which steam has been applied with 



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