plants belonging to the class syngenesis, and order polygamia se-grcgaia; natural order, Coiuposit;r. Calvcle unillorous; corol-lets tubular, hermaphrodite; receptacle naked, pappus feathery.There are nine species, all shrubby plants.
STOGUMBER, or STOKE-COMER, a town of England,in Somersetshire ; 26 miles W. of AVells. Lon. 3. 14. W. Lat.51. 10. N.
STOICS, the name given to a sect of Grecian philosophers,from zr., 1 , the poich in Athens, which the founder of the sectc.hose for his school. Tortile peculiar tenets of this sect, see Mo-ral Philosophy , and Zeno.
STOKESIA, in botany, a genus of the syngenesis polygamiaatqualis class and order. Corel lets in the ray funnel-form, longer,irregular; down four-bristled ; receptacle naked. There is but onespecies, viz. S. cyanca, a blue-lluwered plant, a native of SouthCarolina .
STOKESI.EY, a town of Yorkshire , in the N. Riding; 36miles N. of York, and 239 N. by tY. of London . Lon. 1. 2. W.I-at. 54. 29. N.
STOI.BERG, a town of Germany , in Upper Saxony, and ter-ritory of Thuringia ; 68 miles X. \V. of Leipsic. Lon. 11.8. E.Lat.'si. 42. X.
STOLE, a sacerdotal ornament worn bv the Romish parish-priests above their surplice, as a mark of superiority in their re-spective churches; and by other priests over the alb, at celebrat-ing of mass, in which case it goes across the stomach ; and by dea-cons, over the left shoulder, scarf-wise : when the priest reads thegospel for anv one, he lays the bottom of his stole on his head.
•Stole, Groom of the, the eldest gentleman of his majesty’sbed-chamber, whose otlice it is to present and put on his majesty’sfirst garment, or shirt, every morning, and to order the things intiie chamber.
STOLHOFTEN, a town of Suabia , in the electorate of Baden,8 miles S. W. of Baden, and J2 N. E. of Strasburg. Lon. 8. 10.E. Lat. 48. 41. X.
STOLPEN, or STOLPE, a town of Germany , in FartherPomerania; 66 miles N. W. of Dantzic. Lon. 16. 45. E. Lat.54. 32. N.
Stolten, a town of Germany, in the margravate of Meissen ;14 miles E. of Dresden, and 33 W. N. W. of Zittau .
STOMACH, >n anatomy, is a hollow membraneous
part, placed mostly in the left hvpocliondrium, immediately underthe diaphragm, and in an oblique situation, between the liver andthe spleen. See Anatomy, ami Physiology .
STOMACHICS, are medicines that strengthen the stomachand promote digestion, &c. Stomachic corroboratives are suchas strengthen the tone of the stomach and intestines.
STOMOXYS, a genus of insects of the order diptera: the ge-neric character is, sucker witli a single-valved sheath, inclosingbristles, each in its proper sheath; feelers two, short, setaceous,of five articulations; antenna; setaceous. There are-sixteenspecies.
ti I ONE, Edmund, a distinguished self-taught mathematician,was born in Scotland ; hut neither the place nor time of his birthare well known ; hut it is said on the authority of Chevalier Ram-say, author of the Travels of Cyrus, that lie was son of a gardenerot the iluke of Argyle. He arrived at eight years of age before helearned to read. By chance a servant having taught young Stonethe letters of tile alphabet, there needed nothing more to discoverand expand his genius, lie applied himself to study, and he ar-rived at the knowledge of the most sublime geometry and analysiswithout a master, without a conductor, without any other guidebut pure genius. At eighteen years of age his acquired meritswere discovered by the duke, who diew him out of nis obscurity,and provided him with an employment which left him plenty oftime to applv himself to the sciences. Mr. Stone was author andtranslator of several useful works; viz. 1. A New MathematicalDictionary, in 1 vol. Svo. first printed in 1726. 2. Fluxions, in
1 vol. 8vo. 1730. 'Pile Direct Method is a translation from theFrench , of Hospital’s Analyse des Infuiiments Petits; and the In-'verse Metiiod was supplied by Stone himself- 3. 'The Elementsof Euclid , in 2 vols. 8vo. 1731. With an account of the life and■w ritings of Euclid , and a defence of his elements asainst modernobjectors; with other smaller works. Stone was F. R. S. and hadin.erted in the Philosophical ’Transactions , (vol. 41, p. 218,) an
“ Account of two species of lines of the third order, not mention-ed by S r Isaac Newton or Mr. Stirling.
S'f’ON E, in geography, a town of England, in Staffordshire ;7 miles N. of Stafford , and 22 N. W. of Litchfield. Lon. 2. 0.W. Lat. 53. 4. N.
Stone, in merchandize, denotes a certain weight for weighingcommodities. A stone of beef at London is eight pounds: inHerefordshire , twelve pounds: in the north, sixteen pounds. Astone of glass is five pounds; of wax eighteen pounds. Astone of wool (by stat. 11 lien. VII.) is to weigh fourteen pounds;yet in some places it is more, in others less; as in Gloucestershire ,fifteen pounds; in Herefordshire , twelve pounds. Among hoi se-conders a stone is the weight of lorn teen pounds.
Stone, Rocking, or Logan, a stone of a prodigious size, soexactly poised, that it would rock or shake with the smallest force.Of these stones the ancients give us some account. Pliny says,that at Ilarpasa, a town of Asia , there was a rock of such a won-derful nature, that if touched with the finger it would shake, butcould not he moved from its place with the whole force of thebody. Ptolemy llephaistion mentions a gygonian stone near theocean, which was agitated when struck by the stalk of an aspho-del, but could not he removed by a great exertion offeree. Theword gygoiiius seems to be Celtic; for gwingog signifies motitans,the rocking stone. Many rocking stones aie to he found indif-ferent parts of this island; some natural, others artificial, or placedin their position by human art. In the parish of St. Leven, Corn-wall , there is a promontory called Castle Treryn. On the w esternside of the middle group, near the top, lies a very large stoue, soevenly poised that any hand may move it from one side to another;yet it is so fixed on its base, that no lever, nor any mechanicalforce, can remove it from its present situation. It is called theLogan stone, and is at such a height from the ground that no per-son can believe that it was raised to its present position by art. Butthere are other rocking stones, which are so shaped and sosituated,that there can be no doubt but they were erected by humanstrength. Of this kind Borlase thinks the great Quoit, or Karn-lehau, in the parish of Tywidnek, to be. It is 39 feet in circum-ference, and lour feet thick at a medium, and stands on a singlepedestal. ’I here is also a remarkable stone of the same kind inthe island of St. Agnes in Sally, curiously poised upon a rock. Theunder rock A is ten feet six inches high, forty-seven feet roundthe middle, and touches the ground with no more than half itsbase. The upper rock C rests on one point only, and is so nicelybalanced, that two or three men with a pole can move it. It iseight feet six inches high, and forty-seven in circumference. Onthe top there is a bason D hollowed out, three feet eleven inchesin diameter at a medium, but wider at the brim, and three feetdeep. From the globular shape of this upper stone, it is highlyprobable that it was rounded by human art, and perhaps evenplaced on its pedestal by human strength.
Stones, in general, are defined to be hard solid bodies, whichare neither soluble in water, nor malleable. They are formed inthe progress of time, within the bowels of the earth, by the gradualaccretion ot earthy particles; which, by different combinations?acquire various degrees of hardness. Some philosophers say thatstones are vegetables; that they grow and increase in size like aplant. This theory, we believe, was first offered to the world byM.Toiiriiefort, in 1702, alter fcUirning from his travels in the east-It was founded on a curious fact. In surveying the labyrinth o>Crete , he observed that the names which visiiors had engravenupon the rock were not formed of hollow but of prominent tetterslike basso relievos. He supposes that these letters were at fit**hollowed out by knives; that the hollow-shave since been filh’“up by the growth of the stone ; and hence he concludes that stone*vegetate. Allowing the supposition to be true that they werefirst hollow, we reply, it is only a single fact, and that it is altog®'tlier unphilosophical to deduce a general system from a single ta c jBut tliis protuberancy of the characters is very improperly calmvegetation, for it is not produced by a process in any respect b* jvegetation. Vegetation supposes vessels containing fluids a” jgrowth by expansion ; but w ho ever heard of vessels in a stone, ^fluids moving in them, or of the dilferent parts expandingswelling like the branch or trunk of a tree ? Even the fact wWTonrnefort mentions proves nothing. He does not pretend to ^that the rock itself u increasing, but only that a few small hoi to