S T R 
628 
S T R 
STRESS,®. [ptece, Saxon, violence; or from distress."] 
—Importance; important part.—The stress of the fable lies 
upon the hazard of having a numerous stock of children. 
L'Estrange.— Importance imputed; weight ascribed.—Con¬ 
sider how great a stress he laid upon this duty, while upon 
earth, and how earnestly he recommended it. Atterbury. 
—Violence; force, either acting or suffered. 
By stress of weather driv’n, 
At last they landed. Dryden. 
Though the faculties of the mind are improved by exer¬ 
cise, yet they must not be put to a stress beyond their 
strength. Locke. 
To STRESS, v. a. To distress; to put to hardships or 
difficulties. 
Stirred with pity of the stressed plight 
Of this sad realm. Spenser. 
To STRETCH, v. a. [pfcpeccan, Saxon; strecken, 
Dutch.] To extend; to spread out to a distance. 
Eden stretch'd her line 
From Auran, eastward to the royal towers 
Of great Seleucia, built by Grecian kings. Milton, 
To elongate, or strain to a greater space. 
Regions to which 
All thy dominion, Adam, is no more 
Than what this garden is to all the earth. 
And all the sea, from one entire globose 
Stretch'd into longitude. Milton. 
To expand; to display. 
Leviathan on the deep. 
Stretch'd like a promontory, sleeps. Milton. 
To strain to the utmost. 
This kiss, if it durst speak. 
Would stretch thy spirits up into the air. Shakspeare. 
To make tense.—So the stretch'd cord the shackl’d dancer 
tries. Smith. —To carry by violence farther than is right; 
as strain; as, to stretch a text; to stretch credit. 
To STRETCH, v. n. To be extended, locally, intellectu¬ 
ally, or consequentially 
A third ? a fourth ? 
What! will the line stretch out to th' crack of doom ? 
Shakspeare. 
To bear extension without rupture.—The inner membrane, 
that involved the liquors of the egg, because it would stretch 
and yield, remained unbroken. Boyle. —To sally beyond 
the truth.—What an allay do we find to the credit of the most 
probable event, that is reported by one who uses to stretch. 
Goo. of the Tongue. 
STRETCH, s. Extension; reach; occupation of more 
space. 
At all her stretch her little wings she spread 
And with her feather’d arms embrac’d the dead : 
Then flickering to his pallied lips, she strove 
To print a kiss. Dryden. 
Force of body extended. 
He thought to swim the stormy main. 
By stretch of arms the distant shore to gain. Dryden. 
Effort; struggle: from the act of running.—Upon this 
alarm we made incredible stretches towards the south to 
gain the fastnesses of Preston. Addison. —Utmost extent 
of meaning.—Quotations, in their utmost stretch, can signify 
no more than that Luther lay under severe agonies of mind. 
Atterbury. —Utmost reach of power. 
This is the utmost stretch that nature can 
And all beyond is fulsome, false, and vain. Granville. 
STRETCHER, s. Any thing used for extension. 
His hopes enstill'd 
His strength, the stretcher of Ulysses’string 
And his steeles piercer. Chapman. 
A term in bricklaying.—Tooth in the stretching course 
two inches with the stretcher only. Moxon. —The timber 
against which the rower plants his feet. 
This fiery speech inflames his fearful friends, 
They tug at every oar, and every stretcher bends. Dryden. 
STRETENSK, a village of Asiatic Russia, in the govern¬ 
ment of Irkoutsk; 492 miles east of Irkoutsk. 
STRETFORD. 1. A parish of England, in Hereford¬ 
shire; 4j miles soulh-west-by-west of Leominster.—2. A 
township in Lancashire; 4 miles south-west-by-west of Man¬ 
chester. 
STRETTON. 1. A parish of England, in Derbyshire; 
4f miles north-by-west of Alfreton. Population 390.—2. 
A parish of England, in Rutlandshire; 9 miles north-east- 
by-east of Oakham.—3. A township in Staffordshire; 3 
miles south-west-by-west of Penkridge.—-4. A township in 
Cheshire; ]0£ miles south-south-east of Chester.—5. A 
township in Cheshire; 7 miles north-north-west of Norwich. 
—6. A township in Staffordshire; 2 miles north-by-west of 
Burton-U pon-Trent —7. Stretton, Baskerville, a 
hamlet in Warwickshire; 3| miles east-by-south of Nunea¬ 
ton. —8. Stretton, Church. See Church Stretton. 
—9. Strf.tton-on-Dunsmoor, aparish in Warwickshire, 
situated on Dunsmoor-heath; 5± miles west-north-west of 
Dunchurch —>10. Stretton-en-le-Fifxds, a parish in 
Derbyshire; 5 miles south-west-by-south of Ashby-de-la- 
Zouch. — 11. Stretton-on-the-Foss, a parish in War¬ 
wickshire; 3 miles west-south-west of Shipston-Upon- 
Stour. — 12. Stretton-under-Foss, a hamlet in War¬ 
wickshire; 5j miles north west-by-north of Rugby.—13. 
Stretton, Grandsham, a parish in Herefordshire; 6| miles 
north-west of Ledbury.—14. Stretton, Magna and 
Parva, two hamlets in Leicestershire; 6 miles east-south-east 
of Leicester.. — 15. Stretton, Sugwas, a parish in Here¬ 
fordshire ; 3J miles north-west-by-west of Hereford. 
To STREW, v. a. [The orthography of this word 
is doubtful: it is sometimes written strew, and some¬ 
times strow. Skinner proposes strow, and Junius writes 
straw. Their reasons will appear in the word from which 
it may be derived: strawan. Gothic; stroyen Dutch; 
ftpeapian, Saxon ; streuven, German ; stroe, Danish. Per¬ 
haps strow is best, being that which reconciles etymology 
with pronunciation. Dr. Johnson. —.Todd adds the Sax. 
pcpeopian, and the Swedish stroo. Straw, as Junius writes 
it, and as it is often written in our transit tion of the Bible, is 
strictly comformable to the etymology, viz., to the Goth. 
strawan, which, as well as the Saxon verbs, Mr. H. Tooke 
derives from strawi] To spread by being scattered. 
Is thine alone the seed that s#r«esthe plain? 
The birds of Heav’n shall vindicate their grain. Pope. 
To spread by scattering. 
I thought thy bride-bed to have deck’d, sweet maid, 
And not have strew'd thy grave. Shakspeare. 
To scatter loosely. 
With furies and nocturnal orgies fir’d. 
Whom ev’n the savage beasts had spar’d, they kill’d, 
And strew'd his mangled limbs about the field. Dryden. 
STRE'WING, s. Any thing fit to be strewed. Mason. 
The herbs, that have on them the cold dew o’ the night. 
Are strewings fitt’st for graves. Shakspeare. 
STREWMENT, s. Any thing scattered in decora¬ 
tion. 
Her death was doubtful.—For charitable prayers. 
Shards, flints, and pebbles should be thrown on her, 
Yet here she is allow’d her virgin chants. 
Her maiden strewments, and the bringing home 
Of bell and burial. Shakspeare. 
STRI'iE, s. [Lat.] In Natural History, the small channels 
in the shells of cockles and scallops.—-The salt, leisurely per¬ 
mitted to shoot of itself in the liquor, exposed to the open air, 
did shoot into more fair crystalline strive, than those that were 
gained 
