Some few years since, a medical practitioner, of much celebrity in the town of Putney, not many miles from London, being suddenly called from home upon a professional occasion, happened to meet a broad wheel waggon upon the turnpike road, at which the horse being greatly terrified, immediately started, and sprung to a considerable distance, producing, in fact, no small degree of alarm and passionate mortification in the rider; who most inconsiderately adopted the usual mode of attempting to obtain by _violence_, what might have been probably acquired in an equal space of time with _patience_ and _philosophy_. Not affording time to recollect that the horse had his sensations of joy, fear, surprise, and dread of danger, in an equal degree with himself, he immediately proceeded to the use of _whip_ and _spur_, till the horse approached the waggon, which the poor complying animal no sooner did, in obedience to his master, than a sudden gust of wind passing under the tilt, raised it in such a manner just in the face of the horse, that so strange and aweful a renewal of the first alarm repeated the start, and with such violence, that the rider was dismounted, and the wheels going over his body, he lost his life upon the spot. A retention of this transaction in the memory of every juvenile or inexperienced reader, may, perhaps, prove an applicable preventive to unmanly passion at the very moment of its intentional exertion.
STERN.—The tail of the HOUND, or GREYHOUND, is sportingly so called.
STEW—is a small reservoir of water, to which fish are brought from larger receptacles where they are bred or caught, and there deposited for the daily use of the family, the supply being constantly kept up in proportion to the domestic consumption.
STIFLE.—The part of a horse called the stifle, is the projecting point of the hind-quarter, which comes forward under the flank towards the belly, forming an angular joint from the round bone above to the hock below. Injuries are not often sustained at this junction; and when they are, it is much oftener by neglect, a blow, or inadvertence, than by unavoidable accident. Lameness in this part can receive no assistance from bandage; fomentation, embrocation, and rest, are the only means that can be adopted to obtain _relief_; for when a lameness in the stifle is severe, or of long standing, a perfect cure is seldom obtained.