538 
S A F 
enter on horseback. The population is stated by Mr. Jack- 
son at 12,000. Lat. 32. 20. N. long. 9. 5. W. 
SA'FFLOW, or Sa'fflower, s. A plant.—An herb 
they call sajjlow, or bastard saffron, dyers use for scarlet. 
Mortimer. 
SA'FFRON, s. \safran , Fr.; from saphar, Arabick. It 
was yellow, according to Davies in his Welsh dictionary. 
Crocus, Lat.] A plant. Miller .—Grind your bole and 
chalk, and five or six shives of saffron. Peacham. 
SA'FFRON BASTARD, s. A plant. See Carthamus. 
SAFFRON (Meadow). See Colchicum. Since the 
above article was written, the meadow saffron has come into 
very general use. It was for some time suspected to form the 
■basis of Husson’s famous Eau Medicinale; and when this be¬ 
came certainly known, many physicians experimented upon 
its virtues. It is now established as a very effectual cure for 
rheumatism, and a great palliative in gout. It is also used 
in conjunction with other remedies, with much success, in 
inflammatory diseases of the chest. It is said, in Mr. Carpen¬ 
ter’s “ Treatise on Agriculture,” that this plant is sometimes 
eaten by cattle to their great injury. He says, “ that the symp¬ 
toms they undergo, are difficulty in breathing and in dis¬ 
charging urine, which is very high coloured, the body costive, 
and the excrements hard and knotty, with dimness of sight 
and a general loss of the use of their limbs. When the beast 
offers to stand he staggers, and then tumbles, and dies with a 
great swelling all over.the body, on opening which, the lungs, 
are found apparently distended, and in a state of mortifica¬ 
tion.” These symptoms, some of which are very different 
from those produced by the same cause in he human body, 
are to be cured by strong purgatives. 
SA'FFRON, adj. Yellow; having the colour of saffron. 
Are these your customers ? 
Did this companion, with the saffron face. 
Revel and feast it at my house to-day, 
Whilst upon me the guilty doors were shut ? Shakspeare. 
To SA'FFRON, v. a. To tinge with saffron; to gild. 
Obsolete. 
In Latine I speke a wordes fewe, 
To saffton with my predication. Chaucer. 
SAFFRON WALDEN, a market town and parish of 
England, in the county of Essex, so named from the great 
quantities of saffron formerly cultivated in the vicinity. Its 
situation is peculiar, and Dr. Stukely, who conjectures it to 
have been a Roman station, describes it as remarkable for 
picturesque beauty, the town being built on the side of an 
eminence, which is encompassed by a semicircular valley. 
At the bottom of the hill stands the ruins of a castle, and on 
the top is the church, the bottom of which is as high as the 
town, and is seen over the-tops of the houses. The town is 
irregularly built, and not paved. The church is a spacious 
and very elegant pile of English architecture, chiefly of the 
age of Henry VII. and VIII. In the reign of the latter, the 
east end, and part of the south side of the chancel, were built 
by the Lord Chancellor Audley, who is interred in the vault 
beneath, with several of the earls and countesses of Suffolk. 
Walpole terms his one of the lightest and most beautiful 
parish churches in England. It consists of a nave, chancel, 
and side aisles, with an embattled tower at the west end. 
Several of the windows are richly ornamented with mullions 
and tracery. The building was thoroughly repaired in the 
years 1791, 1792, and 1793, at an expense of little less than 
£8000, of which the late Lord Howard contributed £2000. 
Besides the church, here are meeting houses for Independents, 
Baptists, and Quakers. At the south-west end of the town 
are some alms-houses, founded in the reign of Edward VI.; 
and here is also a free-school, of ancient foundation. The 
keep of the ancient castle is still to be seen. This fortress 
was'erected by Geoffrey de Mangaville, a Norman chief, 
who accompanied the conqueror into England, and whose 
services were rewarded with 118 lordships, 40 of which were 
in this county. The building occupied the highest part of 
the town, and, from the remaining fragments, appears to have 
■S A G 
been of great strength. On the green, behind the castle, is 
a curious work, called the Maze, supposed to have been a 
British cursus, or place of exercise for the soldiery. It con¬ 
sists of a number of concentric circles, with four outworks 
issuing from the four sides, all cut in the chalk. On the 
spot now occupied by Audley House, stood the Benedictine 
priory, founded in 1136 by Earl Geoffrey, and converted 
■into an abbey in 1190. Saffron Walden carries on a consi¬ 
derable trade in malting, and it has a manufacture of bolting 
cloths, checks, and fustians. Fine yarn and sacks are also 
made here. The cultivation of saffron has been discontinued. 
The town was incorporated by Edward VI. in the year 
1549. By a charter of William III., it is governed by a 
mayor, twelve aldermen, a recorder, town-clerk, &c. Market 
on Saturday. Population 3403 ; 27 miles north-west of 
Chelmsford, and 42 north-by-east of London. Lat. 52. 2 
N. long. 0. 14. E. 
SAFIA, a small river of Arabia, which falls into the Red 
Sea; 2 miles north of Tor. ' 
SAFIEHA, a watering place in the desert of Nubia; 30 
miles south-south-east of Syene. 
SAFNAS, a village of Lower Egypt; 12 miles south-west 
of Tin eh. 
SAFRA, a town of Hedsjas, in Arabia; 40 miles south- 
south-west of Medina. 
To SAG, ». n. [perhapsa corruption from swag. “To 
sag or swag, is to sink down by its own weight, or by an 
overload. See Junius’s Etymologicon. It is common in 
Staffordshire to say, a beam in a building sags, or has 
sagged." Toilet, Note on Shakspeare’s Macbeth. Mr. 
Malone says, that sag in Macbeth is printed erroneously for 
swag, merely from the pronunciation; as swoop is some¬ 
times pronounced soop; and sworn, sorn. To sag, in 
Norfolk and Suffolk, is to fail, to droop: “he begins to 
sag, i. e. to decline in his health.” Peggei] To hang 
heavy; to shake so as to threaten a fall; to stagger.—His 
state and tottering empire sagges. Miseries of Arthur. 
The mind I sway by, and the heart I bear. 
Shall never sag with doubt, nor shake with fear. Shakspeare. 
To SAG, v. a. To load; to burthen. 
SAGA'CIOUS, adj. [sagax , Lat.] “ Quick of scent.” 
Johnson. With of. 
So scented the grim feature, and up-turn’d 
His nostrils wide into the murky air. 
Sagacious of his quarry from so far. Milton. 
Quick of thought; acute in making discoveries.—Only 
sagacious heads light on these observations, and reduce them 
into general propositions. Locke. 
SAGA'CIOUSLY, adv. “ With quick scent.” J. —With 
acuteness of penetration.—Lord Coke sagaciously observes 
upon it. Burke. 
SAGA'CIOUSNESS, s. The quality of being sagacious. 
SAGA'CITY, s.[sagacitas, Lat.] “ Quickness of scent.” J. 
—Acuteness of discovery.—It requires too great a sagacity 
for vulgar minds to draw the line nicely between virtue and 
vice. South. 
SAGADAHOC, a river of the United States, in Maine, 
which joins the Androscoggin, in Rumford. 
SAGADAHOC, the name formerly applied to most of 
that part of Main which lies east of the Kennebeck. 
SAGADENON, a name given by the ancients to what 
they say was the very finest kind of opobalsamum, produced 
in Palestine and the adjacent country. 
SAGALA, a town of India, on this side of the Ganges. 
SAGALESSUS, or Sagalassus, a considerable town of 
Asia Minor, south of Apamsaa Cibotos; placed by Ptolemy 
in Lycia, by others in Pisidia, and by M. D’Anville in the 
interior of the limits of Phrygia. Hierocles calls it “ Aga- 
lessus.” According to Strabo, it was within the department 
of the governor established by the Romans in the kingdom 
of Amyntus. According to Livy, the territory of this town 
was fertile, and its inhabitants a brave people. 
SA'GAMORE, s. [Among the American Indians.] A 
king 
